County, staff score high on citizen survey, with caveats

Sarasota County commissioners heard their 24th annual Citizen Opinion Survey at their Mon., Sept., 21 meeting, and had a lot to be happy about. But the picture painted by University of South Florida professor Dr. Susan MacManus and her associates wasn’t entirely blue skies and sunshine.

For the second year, the survey, conducted through USF’s Institute of Government, reported that growth and development was cited as the top issue facing Sarasota County. MacManus pointed out that, in her experience, issues like growth management and the environment will move to the forefront of the public consciousness as jobs and the economy move back.

27 percent of respondents cited “population growth/new development” as the most important issue, and 10 percent cited “homelessness.” Six percent cited “traffic/transportation” and six percent also cited “economy/jobs.” The latter dropped from 36 percent in 2012.

MacManus and commissioners noted that county officials scored well, comparatively across Florida counties and also compared to federal and state officials, in winning the public trust and confidence.

When County Commissioner Christine Robinson asked how Sarasota county compared to other Florida Counties, MacManus responded, “Frankly, there’s a lot of people that would really like to have these numbers.”

County officials were also vindicated in their budget prioritization, with 48 percent of the respondents saying they would not change service levels and property taxes. 18 percent said they would cut taxes and reduce “less vital” services, though 25 percent suggested creating a new revenue source and earmarking that money for a service.

MacManus noted that respondents in that latter group are often more educated, more affluent and have children in their homes.

Commissioner Hines suggested to his colleagues that they use the survey results in their budget prioritization going forward.

Commissioners congratulated staff on high marks in some areas and on high quality of life ratings (95 percent said life in Sarasota is “excellent” or “good”), but didn’t comment about prominent issues like homelessness and affordable housing. Affordable housing is not limited to very low-income people, MacManus said, but permeates other demographics.

Commissioner Robinson directed staff later in Monday's meeting to evaluate comprehensive plan policies related to affordable housing to measure their success and effectiveness.

MacManus admonished the commissioners not to be selective in their reading.

“There are a lot of people here who are not faring as well as others,” she said, suggesting that commissioners pay attention to responses from various age and employment demographics, as well as education, race and ethnicity.

The survey was conducted with a +/- 3.5 percent margin of error through a random sample of 800 county residents. MacManus said some demographics were underrepresented. Renters, and those who had only a high school education or less were among those demographics, for example.

Though she said they didn’t usually vary in their responses from those that live in the area part of the year, 98 percent of the survey respondents live here year-round.