CSJ to survey residents on problems facing city
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College of St. Joseph research assistants review the procedure for conducting the 2009 Rutland City Survey under the direction of assistant professor Dr. Luis Garcia. Photo provided |
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By STEPHANIE M. PETERS STAFF WRITER - Published: March 17, 2009
What are the greatest problems challenging Rutland City? How effective is its police department? What can be done to encourage business downtown?
These questions are frequently posed to city officials, but rarely do average residents get a chance to meaningfully voice their opinions.
Beginning today, however, there's a chance residents might receive a phone call seeking their input. In partnership with the city, College of St. Joseph will randomly ask about 300 adults to participate in its 57-question survey that touches on everything from quality of life to crime to city services.
When complete, the information could be used to inform policy decisions throughout the city, according to the survey's coordinator, Dr. Luis Garcia, chairman and associate professor of criminal justice at the college.
"I see some of the things the city is struggling with and the current state of economic affairs and I thought it couldn't hurt to hear and see what residents are thinking," Garcia said.
"Since many residents do not attend public meetings or vote, this scientific method provides a broader representation of opinion on a more extensive list of issues," he said.
Surveying will begin today and continue for three weeks. It will be conducted by about a dozen trained research assistants and students and Garcia himself, who has experience administering large-scale surveys for the Boston Police Department, he said. Garcia has selected two time frames for polling – between 9:30 and 11:30 a.m. and 7:30 to 9 p.m. with the hope of reaching people at the least-invasive times of the day for the 20- to 25-minute phone call, he said.
And to make the survey as reliable as possible, participants – who will represent a cross-section of ages, races and genders – will be randomly selected from across the city's neighborhoods, Garcia said.
Before developing the survey, which includes open-ended questions and others that ask participants to rate or rank problems and priorities, Garcia first approached city officials to see if the city would allow CSJ to mention it as a sponsor of the survey, and if they would be open to the feedback such an exercise would yield, he said.
"They were all favorable to the idea," Garcia said, referring to the mayor, police chief, Board of Aldermen president, several academics and regular citizens.
Mayor Christopher Louras said he didn't know if any similar survey has been conducted in recent memory, but he thought it would be a "great exercise."
"Hopefully the data sample will be large enough to glean some significant input from the residents," he said.
The final analysis of the survey is expected to be complete in May, and will be available to any city resident who'd like a copy, Garcia said.
"When you get a representative sample like this, it's not the end-all, be-all, but its valuable information to take into consideration," he said. "There might be a common consensus and some people may have some very viable ideas."
stephanie.peters@rutlandherald.com
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