In January, 1,200 households in the Town of La Plata were asked to participate in The National Citizen Survey™.
The National Citizen Survey has been conducted in over 500 jurisdictions in the United States with thousands of survey questions dealing with resident perception about the quality of community life, community characteristics, perceptions of safety, community participation, public trust, services and impressions of Town employees. Comparisons are made to municipalities across the Country. La Plata had a very high response rate of 39%.
Survey questions covered the spectrum of Town services. The most telling component of the survey was the knowledge, responsiveness, courtesy and overall impression of Town employees. Compared to jurisdictions across the nation the overall impression of La Plata employees was at the 76th percentile, better than three fourths of local governments across the Country. Employee courtesy was the highest Town employee score, coming in at the 84th percentile. La Plata Mayor, Gene Ambrogio, was very pleased with those results, “An important component of success in any organization is its employees. The Town of La Plata is here to provide service, and the people who are responsible for that service are doing a fantastic job.”
The Quality of Life ratings for evaluating La Plata as a place to live had 86% of respondents rating the Town from good to excellent. When evaluating safety in the community a high percentage of respondents felt somewhat to very safe in La Plata. In our parks 89% of respondents felt somewhat to very safe, in our downtown 92% of respondents had those responses, and in our neighborhoods, 93% felt safe, all well above the national norm.
Individual services ranked high as well. Garbage collection in the Town was ranked as good or excellent by 86% of the community. Snow removal was another high scoring service with scores placing it in the 74th percentile among communities across the country.
The Town also has areas in need of improvement, Water and Sewer both received relatively low scores. Both services received ratings well below national norms. Drinking water was only in the 35th percentile as compared to the nation, and sewer services were only at the 25th percentile. Both of these areas are currently being addressed. The Town is working toward improvements in both of these areas with substantial investment in the Town’s infrastructure underway now, and in the years to come.
In addition to the survey questions, Town officials developed three policy questions. The first question asked to what degree should customers that use above the average amount of water be charged a higher rate; 59% of respondents somewhat or strongly agree. The second policy question asked to what degree would you support the Town encouraging residents to conserve water and reducing water and sewer fees for those who do; 87% of respondents somewhat or strongly agree. The third policy question asked whether residents supported the Town pursuing LEED environmental certification for new buildings it constructs in the future; 96% of respondents somewhat or strongly supported that action. The La Plata Town Council has already acted on the third policy question and unanimously passed a resolution requiring new Town of La Plata constructed buildings to achieve LEED certification.