Hello Peter, Clay and Meghan, On Dec 2 and 3, I wrote you to ask that you post the entire 2017 Resident Satisfaction Survey currently being conducted by Godbe Research. While you have a web page http://The survey serves as a tool to assist the City Council and City staff in setting priorities, evaluating the community needs and establishing goals to improve service. It is important for the City to know how residents feel about the quality of everything from facilities and programs to events and services. The City is utilizing Godbe Research, a California corporation based locally in the city of Burlingame to conduct the survey. Godbe Research will conduct an internet and telephone survey methodology of a random sample of registered voters and non-voting residents in the City. The survey is approximately 22 minutes in length and will be available in Spanish, with the goal of at least 400 total Menlo Park registered voters. The survey will run through Dec. 6, 2017. After the survey is evaluated and analyzed, Godbe Research will present findings at a future City Council meeting. For more information, please contact Peter Ibrahim in the City Manager’s Office.>with a blurb about the survey, you don't include a link to the complete survey. The public has a right to see the survey. Multiple residents have written Council, and posted to Next Door and other forums with their concerns about the survey, which makes posting the entire survey even more relevant. Let us see the questions and decide for ourselves if the survey appears biased towards collecting data to support the City's position on one or more topics -- or if the survey appears to be an accurate and impartial collection of public opinion related to city services and directions. As taxpayers pay for the survey, please also post the costs of conducing this survey. The bi-yearly survey represents an opportunity to involve the public in Menlo Park in a meaningful way towards what should be our shared goals. Sharing the survey would increase transparency, accountability and a sense of teamwork with the residents. Thus, I would first share the draft survey with all City Commissions and collect their input. After revising based on commissioner input, I would then allow a period of public input before the collection of data begins. I am not suggesting a "rubber-stamping" only process. For future surveys,I would like to see the city collect and incorporate meaningful public input into the survey questions BEFORE the survey commences. For the record, the Library Commission was not told about the survey, and given a chance to review the questions, as part of a formal agenda topic. I only learned about the survey, in a very general way, during a November library strategic plan (one year later) update meeting to which I was the only Commissioner invited. There, I learned generally that the survey was about to begin and that it included four library-related questions, of which at least some pertained to matters relating to new library buildings in Menlo Park. However, the selected participants at this strategic plan update meeting were not given the exact library-related questions and their sequence in the survey. We also did not learn about any other questions (or focus areas) in the survey. I realize that you all must be busy or I assume that I would have heard back in response to my earlier emails. As the topic is a timely one, I am writing again but in a more public way. Sincerely, Lynne Bramlett lynne.e.bramlett_at_(domainremoved) Received on Mon Dec 11 2017 - 10:48:39 PST
