It’s a first for Lacombe.
The City of Lacombe is currently undergoing its inaugural Citizen Satisfaction Survey.
“We haven’t done a survey of this kind before,” said Deven Kumar, communications coordinator for the City of Lacombe. “This is the first time.”
Kumar said the survey will serve as a report card for the City from both residents and businesses in Lacombe. He said it will show the City where satisfaction levels stand in the delivery and quality of its programs and services as well as aid the City in improving those areas.
“It is important because it helps council, City staff and the public set priorities,” said Kumar.
Currently beginning the data analysis stage of the study, the survey asked participants questions about the quality of life in Lacombe, the availability of programs and services, as well as rated those programs and services in order of importance to participants. Kumar added that questions about the Solid Waste Roadmap, currently a hot topic here in Lacombe, were asked as part of the survey as well.
The survey is split into two parts. Kumar said the part of the survey dealing with residents was done via telephone. He added that the City is hoping to obtain information from a sample size of 400 residents, although researchers may need to call up more people in order to get that number.
“In order to get a sample size of 400, the researcher may need to phone 1,000 people.”
For the second part of the survey, which deals with businesses in Lacombe, researchers asked businesses to fill out an online survey. Kumar said they hope to receive 205 responses back to make the survey significant.
Participants for the survey were selected at random, Kumar said. He added that this is to get the widest cross-section of participants possible and to not just receive information from citizens who are already engaged in giving feedback to City Hall.
“We here at City Hall often hear from people who are engaged, but they are usually a small number,” said Kumar. He added that feedback of any kind is always welcome from members of the community.
Data collection from both the telephone survey and web-based survey has been completed. Now, researchers have moved on to analyze and code the data. Once that is complete, researchers will present their findings in a report to council on May 27.
Bannister Research and Consulting Inc. is the organization conducting the research project. Kumar said it is important for the survey to be handled by a third party because that way, the data is unbiased and truly reflects the community opinion.
“From what I have heard from the researchers they are plugging along, they are doing well,” said Kumar. “They are happy to report that everything is progressing smoothly.”