Oh, mercy, they don't know what they're in for...

Hey...me too!

(And before anyone gets their panties in a knot about posting from work --and I don't mean you, Jack-- I'm at home!)

Jack,
I got one too. I guess they don't filter their database very well.

We got one too.

They didn't leave me out, either.

Yeah, but all of the favorite "citizens" are given double weight and invitations.

Can you just imagine the accolades they'll deliver to this assessment.

It's linchpin heaven here in the City of Roses.
Keep it weird!

Snif. Snif.

If these arrved in Saturday's mail, they seem to have left me out.

If its Monday's mail, I'll look at about 3:00 PM.

I'd be happy to tell Blackmer what I think.

Lets see, does "Auditor" came before
"City Council", "Parks" and "Streets" in the alphabet?

Can we just refer Blackmer to Jack's
"Survivor - City Hall" votes from this spring as an indicator of how various city departments are doing?

Oh, mercy, they don't know what they're in for...

Yes they do. The questions will be worded in a way that the answers given will support whatever conclusions they've already decided should be drawn out of the whole process.

John Rettig:

You are absolutely 100% correct. That's what they do whenver they seek a "transparent" process. They don't seek input, they simply seek affirmation.

If they get the answers they want, you'll hear all about it. If they don't, into the round file it goes.

Sort of like Potter's "Visioning Portland"
multimillion dollar farce, Jack?

Actually, that one had no agenda except giving the appearance of caring.

Oh boy, another faith-based initiative by the CoP.

Their faith in voters' disinterest is well-placed.

I think this survey is an annual event going back to the mid-1990s. Perhaps Mr Dufay can shed some light on this...

How many of these darn things are they sending out? Heck, even I got one.

Is it an electioneering expense that should be audited by the auditor to see if the auditor should pay the full cost himself personally.

Either that or it is like an unwelcome creepily slow back rub from some old fart that thinks he has some ordained position of status that gives him an exemption. Ick.

Time for him to go.

I didn't get one, thank god.

Remember the years when ONA would send out surveys to neighborhood associations with the framed questions. Then about four people for each NA representing four or five thousand citizens might fill out the trumped up survey, then CoP would claim: "everyone is happy, we are doing a good job, roads are fine, parks are great.... but a few are concerned about the crime rate....". Those kinds of surveys have led us to the city's infrastructure chaos.

20 bucks says Potter, Sam the Tram and/or Opie are somehow behind this...

http://www.portlandonline.com/auditor/auditservices/citizensurvey/

The Survey is probably an update of this last one.

For those that want to read the "loaded" questions (from the 2005 survey), go here:

http://tinyurl.com/26uf98

I read the survey, seems they left out the question,
"Are you a city employee blogger or citizen streetcar activist blogger?

I notice the survey is laced with queries about streets. I suspect this is related to Adams push for backfill taxes to replenish the millions wasted that should have been going to street maintenance for decades.
Coincidentally joining the chorus is an Oregonian commentary today hyping Adams; effort. Seems other electeds who have wasted countless millions are in the same boat. In this opinion piece it's clackamas county officials who recently plundered their revenue by diverting ANOTHER $25 million in Urban Renewal property taxes for a Clackamas Town Center expansion. Translation: To spawn the development the new light rail line will not despite the claim by the same people two weeks earlier that it would.

I guarantee all of you the League of Oregon Cities is helping to cook up this latest Portland money grab scheme preparing to distribute it to cities around the state. Just as they did with the wholesale abuse of Urban Renewal which contributed mightily to the massive shortfalls many municipalities face.

They did so with a pack of lies, official malfeasance and well orchestrated misrepresentations. Over and over again in city after city using the same model of deception and same highly paid consultants acting as impartial analysts. Consultants caught lying in public hearings.

Wake up folks. Forget about Bush for a while. We have a cabal of very dishonest people sitting in elected office right here .

"Wake up folks. Forget about Bush for awhile"....no kidding...it's best to start a revolution close to home. Less commuting.

The Auditor's Office has been conducting the same survey for 16 years. It is designed to gauge resident satisfaction with the 11 largest Portland bureaus. They represent about 80% of City expenditures each year.

I'm trying to get bureaus to pay attention to results and this is a good tool for getting that change to happen. You can read our annual review of City bureau activities, including the survey results each year, in our Service Efforts and Accomplishments Report. (here is a link to the pdf of the most recent report)

We track results over a ten year period and Council and the bureaus do care and act on areas of dissatisfaction.

This year, like two years ago, we increased our sample size so we can report resident responses at the neighborhood association level. We think it can help neighborhoods focus on problem areas and get the City to be more responsive.

We report what we hear from the random sample. Here are the results from two years ago:

http://www.portlandonline.com/auditor/index.cfm?c=40988

It is anonymous so we can't "weight" people differently than others. Portland is one of the few cities that seeks objective feedback from residents (and we've added a business survey as well).

I hope this answers all the concerns raised by the folks who commented.

Gary Blackmer
Portland City Auditor

Does the mailer, which I do not have a copy of, contain an invitation not to participate and provide a method to express such desire so that the City of Portland can save the printing and mailing expense of the survey?

I worked for a time at the Oregon Agricultural Statistical Service which does surveys surveys and nothing but surveys and I would not dare to even dream of preceding a survey mailing with a pre-survey mailing of a bit of junk.

Pay for it yourself.

Signed -- Your Unqualified Auditor.