City Seeks Resident Ratings in Online Survey
City residents have an opportunity to digitally rate Fredericksburg's government and direction in an online survey.
Fredericksburg officials are seeking digital feedback from city residents on the quality of municipal services through an online survey. The results of the online survey will be presented as a supplement to a snail mail survey which was mailed to 1,200 city households this past winter. Both the snail mail survey and the online survey ask the same questions.
A press release issued by the city on Wednesday afternoon asks that only city residents participate in the online survey. It should be noted that the online survey didn't ask for an address or present the survey taker with any other way of specifying his or her residence. The survey takes about 10-15 minutes to get through, containing 20 questions designed to eke out opinions on a wide range of topics relevant to municipal governance.
Among others, the survey asks the following questions:
- To what degree, if at all are run down buildings, weed lots or junk vehicles a problem in Fredericksburg?
- How safe do you feel in your neighborhood at different parts of the day?
- What was your overall impression of your most recent contact with the city of Fredericksburg Police Department?
- To what degree would you like to increase or decrease city funding for various city services?
- To what degree would you support or oppose certain activities to promote economic development?
In February, the city sent 1,200 postcards to randomly selected city households alerting them that they would soon be receiving a full survey in the mail. The results of the snail mail survey will be available in April. The results of the online survey and the snail mail survey will be presented separately. The results from the online survey will be available in May.
“We want to thank everyone who took the time to participate in the household survey,” wrote City Manager Beverly Cameron in the press release announcing the online surbey. “Now, through the on-line survey, we are giving everyone the opportunity to let us know what you think. We look forward to hearing directly from our citizens about how we are doing, what we could be doing better, and where we could be better focusing our resources.”
The online survey can be found here.
Residents will be able to respond to the survey through April.
Overall, how would you rate city services?
Tell us in the comments.
Matthew Kelly
10:09 am on Thursday, March 31, 2011
Mike how many of the mailed surveys were returned?
Michael Theis
11:07 am on Thursday, March 31, 2011
I put a call into the city manager's office asking this very question. I'll update in the comment thread once I get a reply.
Matthew Kelly
4:18 pm on Thursday, March 31, 2011
Some thoughts on the National Citizens Survey--
http://questeverything.blogspot.com/2010/11/national-citizens-survey.html
Michael Theis
7:19 am on Friday, April 1, 2011
Hey Matt, still no answer from the city manager's officer regarding the participation rate in the survey.
Matthew Kelly
4:26 pm on Friday, April 1, 2011
I guess they have unitl next Thursday to provide you the info or provide a reason on why you can't have it.
Beatrice Rose Paolucci
8:52 am on Saturday, April 2, 2011
Mr. Theis and Mr. Kelly, on the Home Page of the City's Website under "In the News" section, in the article regarding the City's National Citizen Survey it clearly states 325 households pesponded to the survey.
Matthew Kelly
10:20 am on Saturday, April 2, 2011
Bea, The 3/30 Press Release sent out by the City did not mention the number of households responding and at the time nothing was up on the site. Thus the question was asked. Or in this case I asked Mike if he had the info. If the information was available why not either 1) note it in the Press Release, or 2) respond to the inquiries or direct the person making the request to the website? But I guess, as you have noted, just posting on the website should be sufficient and it's our fault for not checking the website everyday. So much for interacting with the public. Just fill out the forms or read the site seems the order of the day. I know you have issues with this attitude and thus my suprise regarding the tone of your response.
Michael Theis
10:28 am on Saturday, April 2, 2011
Keep it civil, guys.
(I do wish the city website had an RSS feed, though. Having to actually go to a website and read its contents is so 1999)
Michael Theis
10:40 am on Saturday, April 2, 2011
Also, Councilor Paolucci, thank you for directing me to that information. I was unaware that it had been posted to the site. My previous call for civility was rooted in a concern over snark seeping into the response to your comment. As I'm sure we all know, tone can be easily misread on the internet.