The Blog from City Hall

Las week I predicted that Governor Pawlenty would begrudgingly allow the 2007 Tax Bill to become law simply by ignoring it. Unlike other states where failing to sign a bill is sometimes called the Governor’s “pocket veto”, in Minnesota an act of the State Legislature becomes law if the Governor signs it or fails to veto it within three days of his official receipt of the bill. I knew that Governor Pawlenty did not like some elements of the 2007 Tax Bill, but I thought that he’d ultimately allow it to become law because there were provisions in the bill that he did like.

I was wrong. He vetoed the bill yesterday. You can read the Star Tribune’s take on the veto at this link: Star Tribune. You can read the Governor’s press release on the veto at this link: Governor Pawlenty.

I am disappointed that he vetoed the bill, personally. Not because Eden Prairie was going to get a windfall out of the bill. We weren’t. True, there was quite a bit of new Local Government Aid in the bill for some Minnesota cities, but Eden Prairie wasn’t one of them. There was a provision in the Tax Bill to study the effectiveness of the state’s Fiscal Disparities tax base sharing program. This program hurts Eden Prairie taxpayers. The state really needs to take a look at it and determine if it’s doing what it ought to be doing. Now study appears to be dead for yet another year. I’m also disappointed that the veto puts 2,000 new jobs that were planned as part of an expansion of Thomson-West in Eagan and the new expansion of the Mall of America at risk. Those jobs would have good for the metro area, and good for the state’s tax revenue base.

But it’s the Governor’s prerogative in our system of government to do what he did for the reasons he did it. That’s the way it works.

Each year I present my proposed performance goals for the upcoming year to the City Council. I want the Council to know what I see as important and I want to get their unofficial blessing of that vision. I think that’s important because my performance goals tend to trickle down through the organization. At least they’re supposed to. The Council took a look at the following set of goals during my annual performance review earlier this month:

1. Eden Prairie Promise - We developed the Eden Prairie Promise performance measures system in 2006-2007. I want to fully implement it in 2007-2008, including a new website for the system which allows residents to observe our performance and results online.

2. ALS Initiative - We sometimes refer to this as the “ambulance initiative”. The City has been researching and pursuing the acquisition of the Primary Service Area (PSA) authority for the past three years. We have slowed our pursuit in order to negotiate in good faith with Hennepin County. I want to follow through with our original plan this year to present a formal request to the state regulatory board to grant the City its own PSA and control over who provides ALS services to our residents.

3. Budget Advisory Commission - The Budget Advisory Commission, if implemented and managed properly, will add a great deal of value to not only our budget process, but quite possibly to our overall operations as well. My goal for 2007-2008 is to work closely with the BAC to ensure that their work makes a meaningful and positive difference to the budget preparation process. I want the addition of the BAC to our budget making process to be successful.

4. Work Plan Reviews - Staff has been conducting formal group reviews of departmental work plans twice each year for the past four years. My goal for 2007-2008 is to figure out a way to be more open about communicating the results of these work plan reviews with department employees and City Council Members.

5. Technology Task Force - We held the kick-off event for the new Technology Task Force this week. My goal is to have this group complete its assignment by late October and produce a deliverable which will be used by the City to launch a new community-wide upgrade in the quality, dependability, affordability and speed of Eden Prairie’s telecom infrastructure.

6. Mission, Vision, Key Objectives - My goal is to have Council reaffirm the current City mission, vision and key objectives; or , to have a revised mission, vision and key objectives endorsed by the Council as part of the approval process for the 2008-2009 budget process.

7. Joint Staff Meetings with Neighboring Cities - It’s important on many fronts for our City staff to have good diplomatic relations with City staffs in neighboring cities. During the upcoming year, it will be my goal to organize the implement joint City staff meeting with the cities of Chanhassen, Minnetonka, Edina and Bloomington.

It’s going to be a busy year. I’m looking forward to it.

We have an award winning Communications team here at the City of Eden Prairie. The Communications Division won four awards this week at the Minnesota Association of Government Communicators annual Northern Lights Awards ceremony. The City of Eden Prairie tied with the cities of Minneapolis and Bloomington for the highest number of awards.

Communications staff took home two Awards of Excellence, the highest level of achievement for government communications in the state of Minnesota, for the following:

Promotional or Informational Brochures, 12 or More Pages
2007 Spring/Summer Parks and Recreation Brochure

Best for Least
Women’s Fire Expo Public Information Campaign

The Communications Division also received two Awards of Merit for the following:

Public Information Projects - Special Events
Women’s Fire Expo Public Information Campaign

Visual Design - Logos/Illustrations/Graphics
City of Eden Prairie Folder

Judges said the redesign of the 2007 Spring/Summer Parks and Recreation Brochure showed creativity, excellent graphic design and overall excellence in readability and user-friendliness. This award is not only a tribute to the high-quality professional brochure, but the Parks & Rec Department’s exceptional programming as well.

The Women’s Fire Expo Public Information Campaign was a “home run” according to judges and an excellent example of a well-defined goal being met at minimum cost. Thank you to the Fire Department, especially Kimberly Cummings, for her innovative idea, hard work and dedication to making the Women’s Fire Expo an easy sell to the media and a huge success!

We’ve got a very good Communications Division staff right now, led by our two full-timers Communications Manager Joyce Lorenz and Communications Assistant Jessica Brennan. Joyce and Jessica also manage a number of independent contractors, interns and part-time employees. They make the most out of their resources, and as these awards show, do an excellent job for the city.

Bravo and Congratulations!

The Omnibus Tax Bill in the Minnesota State legislature is more technically known as House File 2268. The bill is currently awaiting the Governor’s signature or veto. Governor Pawlenty has been very open with the public that he does not like the bill. He has said clearly that he is “likely” to veto it. He’s also said that he “may” veto it. So you may be wondering what’s in this bill. Here’s a sampler:

1. It has $70,000,000 of new Local Government Aid. 62.6% of this new LGA would go into Greater Minnesota. 37.4% wold go to metro cities. Of the $26,200,000 that stays in the metro, Minneapolis gets half of it. St. Paul gets 34% of it. The remaining 15% gets spread around to other metro cities. Eden Prairie doesn’t get any of it.

2. The bill requires the Commissioner of Revenue to conduct a study of the metropolitan fiscal disparities program and to report the findings of the study to the House and Senate Tax committees by February 9, 2009. This is a very good idea. Eden Prairie gets absolutely socked by the fiscal disparities program. It’s time to study it, and then amend it.

3. It exempts from state sales tax the materials and equipment being used to construct a new water treatment facility in Minnetonka.

4. Creates new tax increment financing districts for special projects in Bloomington, Brooklyn Center, Minneapolis, Fridley, Eagan, Burnsville, and New Brighton.

5. Allows for local governments to continue to impose local sales taxes in Duluth, Cook County, Proctor, Bemidji, Clearwater, North Mankato and Winona.

6. Approves the issuance for the Met Council of $33,600,000 in bonds to purchase new buses.

7. Allows cities to increase their debt limit from 2% up to 3% of their gross taxable market value. This is not big deal for Eden Prairie. Our municipal debt is nowhere close to even 1% of our gross taxable market value.

8. Allows cities to send out their annual Truth-In-Taxation notices electronically, under certain circumstances.

9. Increases the state’s budget reserve by $150,000,000.

10. creates a 30 member task force to make recommendations on runway safety zones at the MSP airport.

The Governor has until June 1, 2007 at midnight to either sign or veto this bill. If he vetoes it, it’s dead. If he signs it, it’s approved. There is a third option. If he does nothing by this date and time, the bill becomes law without his signature.

My bet is on option 3.

This is a view of the main entrance into the City offices here at Eden Prairie City Center. The brick walls that line the concrete stairs coming into our building deteriorated to the point were small chucks of brick had dislodged and broken off. It became noticeable during this past winter. Our Facilities team organized a repair project for this spring that is almost done.

The contractor has excavated the soil away from the wall in order to install some protective coating against the brick. We hope this will protect the brick from water and moisture damage in the future. The contractor also tuck-pointed the mortar where it was loose and replaced broken brick where necessary.

The yellow caution tape should be down soon. The the main entrance into our building will be fully back in business before the end of this month.

It’s Friday. Here’s my weekly Friday Report that I shared with the City Council today:

Office of the City Manager | Friday Report

DATE: May 18, 2007

TO: Mayor and City Council

FROM: Scott H. Neal, City Manager

RE: Friday Report for May 18, 2007

1. Joint Meeting with School District- The spring joint meeting between the School Board and the City Council is scheduled for Monday, May 21, at 5:15 pm. The meeting will be held at the School Administration Building. There is a regular School Board meeting that evening immediately following our joint meeting.

2. Nine Mile Creek Watershed District Meeting - The Nine Mile Creek Watershed District Board is hosting a special public hearing on Wednesday, May 30, at 7 pm here in City Center to have additional public dialog about the District’s proposed solution to water quality problems in Anderson Lakes. There will be an opportunity at this public meeting for citizens to share their thoughts, concerns and ideas about the issue and the proposed solution.

3. Employees News - I will be having exit interviews next week with Lynette Biunno and Jean Johnson. Lynette, who works part-time for us in Customer Service, has accepted an offer to do similar work for the City of Edina. Jean Johnson is retiring. Congratulations to both of them. Congratulations also go out to Officer Matt Mohn. Officer Mohn was selected by his peers as the 2007 Labor Management Team Officer of the Year. He was recognized at last night’s annual Police Department Awards & Recognition Ceremony.

4. Camp Eden Wood -The Camp Eden Wood project continues to move forward. It looks like Friendship Ventures will be able to meet their goal of having the camp open for business in early June. City staff members are assisting Friendship Ventures in working through issues they are having with getting their grant reimbursements from the state.

5. Technology Task Force - City staff members and consultants held a successful kick-off meeting last week for the Technology Task Force. We have a high-powered task force. After listening to the task force members talk about the issue, I am convinced more than ever that we are on the right track with this issue.

-end-

I received the final word on my 2006-2007 annual performance review this week at the City Council meeting. The Council met in Closed Session in advance of the regular Council meeting to conduct the review. The review is coordinated by a private personnel consultant named Harry Brull. Mr. Brull works for Personnel Decisions, Inc. (PDI). He coordinated my review last year too. And the year before that as well.

The review process starts with a survey that goes out to City Council Members at to a representative sample of City staff members. The survey is a simple set of five questions:

1. What do you view as Mr. Neal’s significant accomplishments during the past year?

2. What hasn’t happened that you would like to seen happen?

3. As city manager, what does he [me] do particularly well?

4. What could he do more of/less of?

5. What should his priorities be during the next twelve months?

Council Members and staff members complete the survey by answering these questions. Most do it online, but some do it on paper. All the information is then routed to Mr. Brull at PDI. Mr. Brull assembles the information, analyzes it and then presents a report to the City Council. I am not present in the room when this information is presented to the Council. I have always done it that way. I think it makes for a more comfortable and open environment for the Council to discuss my performance. I am especially comfortable doing it that way in Eden Prairie with the kind of Council I have here. In other places I’ve worked, I’ll just say that not being in the room was a bigger risk than being in the room.

Here’s a very truncated summary of the comments from the survey:

1. Accomplishments. Some respondents pointed to the completion of physical projects like the Fire Station #4. Some talked about the training program we offer on our Performance Partnership. But most of the comments were about leading staff members and the City organization through a particularly contentious local election in November 2006.

2. What hasn’t happened: There were a couple of comments from concerned employees about the erosion of salary and fringe benefits. There were a couple of comments about needing to lead the Council through a consensus or visioning process.

3. What I do well: Lots of comments about communication. People think I am a good communicator. I’m glad they do. I think it’s important and I spend a lot of my day doing it. I also had favorable views of my leadership style and vision for the city.

4. More of/Less of: Not much in the way of comments here. Some would like me to provide more updates about what’s happening at the State Legislature. That’s a good idea. I’m going to do that. I also had a few comments that employees would like to see me more often. Maybe drop by their staff meetings or work places more often. Also good advice. I’m going to do that in the upcoming year too.

5. Priorities: Several comments about working closely with the Budget Advisory Commission to make sure it is successful. There appear to be some concerns among employees about this new feature of our budget process, but there seems to be confidence that I can handle it well. There were also several comments about moving forward with the redevelopment of the Major Center Area into Eden Prairie’s new Town Center. Also several comments about working with the Council to help them reach good decisions for the City.

I’m a lucky guy. Always have been. I have been lucky enough to land here in Eden Prairie in a great city with a great staff. I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again now: The secret to being a successful city manager is having a team of smart hard working people working with you. I’ve got that here. I’ve also been fortunate enough to work with very solid City Council Members since I’ve been here. That’s makes a big difference to me. So, I get another year as city manager. I’m happy with that. Judging from my performance review, the Council and City staff is happy with that result too.

Flags at all City of Eden Prairie facilities were lowered to half-staff yesterday, Tuesday, May 15, in honor of the federal, state, and municipal officers who have been killed or disabled in the line of duty, in accordance with a proclamation issued by Governor Pawlenty. The City Council adopted an official proclamation at last night’s Council meeting recognizing the week of May 13-19 as National Police Week and May 15 as National Law Enforcement Officers’ Memorial Day. It’s a day to think about those law enforcement officers who made the ultimate sacrifice, and the families, friends and co-workers they left behind. I think it’s something we should take a few moments sometime this week to do.

We are blessed in Eden Prairie to have an exceptionally talented Police force. They are smart, hard working people. We are fortunate to have this group of men and women patrolling Eden Prairie’s streets. They put themselves in harm’s way every time they make a traffic stop or approach someone’s front door. They do it to enforce the laws of this community. And if you look around Eden Prairie, you’ll see the results of a law abiding community. Our Police and our residents work together to make this community a wonderful place to live, work and raise a family.

There are times in life when I really do wish that I could “un-ring” the bell. I’m currently having one of those times right now. I said/wrote something about the City’s relationship with Flying Cloud Airport that I wish now that I had not said/written. I wish that because what I said wasn’t a fair characterization of the City’s position on the airport. In the hustle & bustle of getting ready for a trip to Washington DC, I used the word “expand” when I should have used the word “improve”. It was a sloppy. So now I’ve got to fix it.

I wrote a commentary for the Eden Prairie News and Eden Prairie Sun-Current explaining the error and my proposed remedy. I’ve also pasted in below the cover letter and revised airport position statement.

We all make mistakes. I subscribe to the point of view in life that if you don’t want to make any mistakes, don’t do anything. That’s not me. I think it’s important when you make a mistake to own up to it; be accountable; and try to fix it. That’s what I’m going to do.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

REVISED VERSION POSITION STATEMENT

The Current State of Affairs between the City of Eden Prairie and the Metropolitan Airports Commission concerning Flying Cloud Airport in May 10, 2007.

Over the past fifty years, the City of

has had what might best be described as a “mixed relationship” with. Prior to 2002, the relationship between the City and the Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC) was contentious. But in December 2002, the City Council and MAC jointly signed what we call The Final Agreement which outlines the conditions for the ultimate magnitude and scope of the future development of Flying Cloud Airport. The implementation of The Final Agreement has been followed by a period of relative peace regarding airport issues.

In 2005, the Eden Prairie City Council re-established the Flying Cloud Airport Citizen Advisory Commission. The Commission, which includes representatives from MAC, the Eden Prairie business community, general aviation interests at the airport and citizen groups concerned about the future of the airport, began meeting in April 2006. The Commission’s busy and productive inaugural year is described in its February 20, 2007 report to the City Council. As the Commission’s 2007 Work Plan has been approved by the City Council, I have enclosed both documents with this memorandum for your reference.

I am providing this report as a demonstration of the new, positive relationship between the City of Eden Prairie and MAC. The City Council sees Flying Cloud Airport as an important economic development amenity for our City that must be balanced with the quality of life of our residents. The City Council wants to restate to Eden Prairie’s federal legislators that the City continues to affirm the 2002 Final Agreement with the Metropolitan Airports Commission regarding the future of Flying Cloud Airport.

Respectfully Submitted,

Scott H. Neal,

City Manager

REVISED COVER LETTER

Date

Name

Address

City, state zip

Dear ___________;

On March 12, 2007 City Council Member Sherry Butcher, Fire Chief George Esbensen and I met with your staff to discuss the City of Eden Prairie’s federal legislative priorities for 2007. During that visit I provided your staff with a package of written materials that presented and explained the City’s position on nine public policy issues. The section describing the City’s relationship with Flying Cloud Airport requires clarification.

While the airport section accurately characterized the City’s relationship with the Metropolitan Airports Commission as increasingly positive and cooperative, it may have unintentionally left the impression that the City now supports the expansion of Flying Cloud Airport. This section, rather, was only intended to convey the City’s position regarding advocacy for federal funding assistance pertaining to airport security, hangar improvements, and sewer & water projects. We did not intend to imply or state any city government advocacy for federal funding for the proposed runway improvement projects at the airport.

I have enclosed a revised version of the City’s legislative letter concerning Flying Cloud Airport that is dated May 10, 2007. If you have any questions about this matter, please feel welcome to contact me.

Sincerely,

Scott H. Neal

City Manager

We honored our many volunteer board, commission and task force volunteers last night at the City’s 2007 Board & Commission Recognition Banquet. It was a wonderful event. There were approximately 150 people in the Garden Room last night to enjoy a good meal and to recognize and appreciate the voluntary service of Eden Prairie residents in city government.

That’s our keynote speaker Roy Terwilliger in the photo on the left. Roy is a banker, statesman, and all around community leader. He has served his country in the Army; his community in the Minnesota State Senate; and now serves the State as the Chair of the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission. Roy knows what community service is all about. He ended his keynote address with a poem that I’ve heard him recite before. It says a lot about what has motivated him in life, and is good advice for anyone who cares about his or her community. It’s called The Builder and its author is unknown.

Thanks to Roy for a great keynote address. Thanks to our honorees. And thanks to the members of my staff that worked hard to put on a great event. Bravo

THE BUILDER

I saw them tearing a building down
A team of men in my hometown.
With a heave and a ho and a yes yes yell,
they swung a beam and a sidewall fell.

And I said to the foreman, “Are these men skilled?”
“Like the ones you’d use if you had to build?”
And he laughed and said, “Oh no, indeed…
the most common labor is all I need…
for I can destroy in a day or two
what takes a builder ten years to do.”

So I thought to myself as I went on my way…
Which one of these roles am I willing to play?
Am I one who is tearing down as I carelessly make my way around?
Or am I one who builds with care, in order to make the world a
little better… because I was there?

All levels of government tax. All levels of government spend. It doesn’t matter if it’s federal, state or local government. It doesn’t matter if it’s a government controlled by Democrats or Republicans or Independents. Governments tax and spend. That’s what they do. The more important questions about government taxing and spending are: “What is government taxing?” and “What is government spending the tax money on?”.

There was an article in the Sunday Star-Tribune about the current status of the State’s budgeting process. The article identifies the difficulties of reaching agreement on a budget for state government functions in an atmosphere of politically divided government. It must be tough. First there’s the challenge that political partisanship brings to the process of discussion and debate. Then there’s the challenge of the needing the legislative branch and the executive branch to ultimately reach an agreement.

Budget making at the local level is challenging too, but the challenges are different. We have a new addition to our process this year of forming the City’s 2008-2009 budget. It’s called the Budget Advisory Commission (BAC). The BAC was appointed by the City Council earlier this spring. We have been meeting with them over the past two weeks for their orientation process. It’s been very interesting.

The BAC is going to review and comment on my proposed budget to the City Council. That budget is under development right now. Once it’s ready in draft form, City staff will present the draft budget to the BAC. We will share with the BAC the operational and fiscal assumptions that go into making a budget. They’ll ask us questions we may not have thought to ask ourselves. They’ll challenge (I hope) our assumptions and give us ideas and suggestions that will improve what we do and how we do it. Sometime in August, I’ll forward a budget proposal on to the City Council which has (I hope) an endorsement from the BAC. That’s my goal.

City staff are busy now working on their budget and work plans for the 2008-2009 biennial budget. Work papers are due to our Finance Office in early June. It’s going to be a busy process this year, but one that I think will bring added value to that way we do our work here. I’m looking forward to it.

This is my final installment of the week long blog series that I’ve been writing about the City’s 2006 Quality of Life Survey. As part of our contract with the Decision Resources, Ltd (the survey consultant who conducted the 2006 QLS) we will receive a fairly lengthy report that provides more detail about the individual questions, responses and even some cross tabulations of certain questions. When we get this report, we will post it on the City’s website for all to enjoy.

I’ve entitled today’s blog post: Planes, Trains, Lakes and Liquor. As the title implies, we wanted to hear from residents on a variety of City issues. More than just finances, city services and public safety. Here’s what we learned from residents on this array of topics:

Flying Cloud Airport has been a source of discussion and debate in Eden Prairie for many years. We asked residents in the QLS about the impact of airport noise. The question was: “How serious of a problem is airport noise in Eden Prairie - very serious, somewhat serious, not too serious, or not at all serious?” 37% said airport noise was either very serious or somewhat serious. 63% said it was either not too serious or not at all serious. The 2:1 ratio of the “not serious” to “serious” responses for this question surprised me, given the level of interest on this issue in the local newspapers. 37% of the respondents reporting that airport noise is a serious issue makes it a serious issue, so it is a quality of life issue that the City will be paying attention to in the coming year.

For the past four years the City has been moving forward with a vision of creating a livable/walkable Town Center in Eden Prairie in the area around the Eden Prairie. We wanted to find out from residents what they thought of this vision. The survey included a question with a lengthy preamble that explained what the vision was and then asked if residents supported that vision. Then, the respondent was asked to qualify (i.e. - strongly Yes or strongly No) their level of support or opposition. 78% support the vision of a livable/walkable Town center with mixed residential and commercial land uses and a strong transit component. 29% strongly supported that vision. Only 7% opposed that vision. 3% strongly opposed it. 17% were unsure. This vision for the commercial and retail heart of the City is a major factor in our plans for the future. I had a hunch that it had the support of residents, but I feel much more confident about it now.

We asked a very similar question for residents about the City’s efforts to continue improving the water quality of Round Lake. Now, we’re in Minnesota, so who would be opposed to improving the water quality of a lake? But that’s not exactly what we asked. The City has been working hard to improve the water quality to the point where we could re-open the Round Lake beach to swimming. That’s a high standard, and it hasn’t been cheap. We wanted to know if residents supported this investment of their tax dollars. 74% of the respondents told us they either supported or strongly supported the City’s effort to reopen Round Lake to swimming. 17% either opposed or strongly opposed the effort. 9% were unsure how they felt about it. The City Council and City staff have been moving forward with the plan to reopen the beach this year. We’re pleased with the progress made so far to clean up the lake, and I guess we’ll be keep moving forward with that effort for the foreseeable future.

The final graph I’ll share in this series is the one that probably surprised me the most. It seems that every session of the Minnesota State Legislature includes a proposal from the Minnesota Grocers’ Association that seeks to sell wine in grocery stores. Cities that have municipal liquor stores oppose this bill every year because it is seen as the first step of a slippery slope toward the end of municipal liquor stores. Let grocery stores sell win this session, and then they’ll want to sell beer, and so on. Because this question is, at its heart, a political question, we thought it would be helpful to know what Eden Prairie residents thought about our municipal liquor stores. We asked a half dozen questions in the survey about municipal liquor issues. The first question we asked was whether or not the respondent has visited one of our three municipal liquor stores during the past twelve months. 72% said they had. That was higher than I thought it would be. Then we asked a number of questions about their experience in our stores. Did we have what they were looking for? Good selection? Good customer service? That kind of thing. Then we asked a straightforward question that read exactly like this: “Do you favor or oppose the City continuing to operate its municipal liquor stores?” 84% that they favor it. 9 % opposed. 7% unsure. If a respondent said they opposed the City continuing to operate municipal liquor stores the respondent was asked this follow-up question: “Do you still oppose the continued operation of the municipal liquor stores if closing of the liquor stores would result in a $1,000,000 loss of revenue for the city?” Of the 9% that were asked this follow-up question, half of them (50%) did not change their mind. They still favored the City getting out of the municipal liquor business. But, almost half of the respondents who initially opposed the City being in the municipal liquor business (47%) did change their mind about the issue once they learned of the potential loss of revenue to the City. The follow-up question was interesting, but the initial response to the question stunned me. 84% favor of the respondents favor the City remaining in the municipal liquor business. That’s a strong endorsement.

Well that wraps up my week long series on Eden Prairie’s 2006 Quality of Life Survey. You’ll continue to hear us talk about this survey in the coming months as it will be one of the tools we refer back to during our budget making process for 2008-2009. It’s always interesting to learn what citizens think about the City. Judging from the results of this survey, Eden Prairie residents love their city and believe their city government is doing its part to make this a great place to live. It was a good report card.

The answer to the question posed in my blog title today is very simple: Yes. Residents have a strong feeling of safety and security in Eden Prairie. I think it’s one of the top reasons that people move here. Take a look at these graphs from the 2006 Quality of Life Survey. Click on any or all of them for more detail.

The two graphs on the left show information about the quality of the service that residents perceive they are receiving from the City’s Police and Fire Departments.

For the Police Department, of the 15% of the respondents who said they had had contact with the Police during the past twelve months - that’s any contact, mind you - 95% thought the Police handled the situation appropriately and 93% thought the department’s response time was excellent or good. For the Fire Department, 72% think our response time is either excellent or good and 89% said they “trust” the response and service level of the Fire Department. For Police, only 20% of our survey respondents said they were aware of our public safety programming. That’s a number we want to improve. On the Fire side, there were 23% of the respondents who were not aware that our department is staff largely by volunteers fire fighters. We need to do a better job of explaining that story to residents too.

Residents told us in the survey that their greatest public safety concern is: None. 34% reported “no” greatest public safety concern in Eden Prairie. The consultant who conducted the survey said that number is comparable to the norm for this question in other comparable Twin Cities suburbs. The highest rated public safety concern was traffic speeding at 19%.

Speaking of traffic, we asked residents about their level of concern for traffic violations. 45% of the respondents said that traffic speeding is either very or somewhat serious. 55% said traffic speeding was not too serious or not at all serious. 45% is a high number, I think. We’ll be taking a closer look at the issue this year. 28% said that sign violations was very or somewhat serious compared to 69% who said traffic sign violations were either not too serious or not at all serious. According to our consultant, that breakdown (30%/70%) is about normal.

To sum it up: Eden Prairie residents feel safe in Eden Prairie. They support the work of the Police and Fire Departments. In other survey data residents report a strong level of support for continued budgetary support for Police and Fire. Residents report that people appear to be driving too fast in Eden Prairie, which is a behavior that our Police Department can moderate.

Tomorrow: Planes, Trains, Lakes, and Liquor.

The 2006 Quality of Life Survey (QLS) asked residents several questions that tried to get at what they thought of City services and City staff. Here’s what we learned:

This is a graph of the responses that residents gave to this question: “Please tell me whether you would rate the quality of the service as excellent, good, only fair, or poor?” You can click on the graphic to see it in a larger size. If I had to sum it up, I’d say that residents are generally pleased with the quality of City services. 90% rank our Police services as excellent or good. 93% rank our park maintenance services as excellent or good. 89% think our snow removal services are excellent or good. Our lowest ranked service was our Senior programs and services with only 35% ranking it excellent or good. The City service with the highest negative ranking was Street Lighting with 15% of the respondents saying it was only fair or poor. Snow plowing got a 10% negative rating. Take a look at the graph. By and large, residents appreciate the quality of the services they are receiving from city government in Eden Prairie.

So what do resident think of Eden Prairie city staff generally? We wanted to know the answer to that question too, so we asked them. Residents were asked this question: “From what you’ve seen or heard, how would you rate the job performance of the Eden Prairie city staff - excellent, good, only fair or poor?” You can click on the graph and read the responses for yourself, but 71% said that our performance was in the excellent or good category, while only 7% rated us as only fair or poor. That’s a 7:1 ratio of excellent/good to fair/poor ratings. The consultants from Decision Resources, the company who conducted the study, told us that ration was exceptional. They told us a ratio of 5:1 is very good.

My final graph for today is an interesting one. We asked residents if they’ve had contact with city government during the last year, and if they have, how did they rate that contact. 37% of those responding to the survey said they had had contact with city government during the past year. The survey consultant told us that is a high rate of contact for a 3rd ring Twin Cities suburb. That 37% was then asked to rate the quality of service they received from city government. The ratings we got were outstanding. The consultant told us they look at the 80% positive mark as a benchmark that an organization is providing good customer service. We did not have a rating lower than 94%. In fact, 100% of those responding said the courtesy of the staff was positive (the excellent or good rating). The consultant told us our customer service ratings were the highest they seen of any city they’ve survey in the metro area. We can be proud of that, but we must also recognize that the bar is high and they we must continue to meet it. There’s no where to go but down when you’re #1.

Tomorrow: Do residents feel safe in Eden Prairie?

The 2006 Quality of Life Survey (yes, I know it says 2007 on the slide) provided us good information about what residents like about their city and how much they like it. For example, in the pie graph to the left (click on it to see it in a larger size) residents were asked by the polling consultant to rate the overall quality of life in Eden Prairie. Residents were offered five responses from which to choose: Excellent, Good, Only Fair, Poor, or Unsure. The response to the question was overwhelmingly positive: 97% of those responding rated the quality of life in Eden Prairie was Excellent or Good. Only 2% rated in Only Fair. And nobody rated it as Poor. These ratings are similar to the ratings given by residents of the cities of Minnetonka, Edina, Woodbury, Eagan and Shoreview in their respective quality of life surveys. Does the city government take full credit for this high rating? No, we don’t. The rating is attributable to the “community” which is much more than just the city government. But does the city government play a big role in creating this exceptional quality of life rating? You bet it does. I’ll touch on that more later.

The second graph shows what residents reported to the question: “What do you like most about Eden Prairie?”. To nobody’s surprise, the top two things that residents reported they liked best about Eden Prairie were Parks and Schools, in that order. We hear this all the time, that’s why it was no surprise to me. The factor that surprised me was that “shopping” came in #3. That says a lot about Eden Prairie’s maturation over the past 10 years. There are many people who live here that can remember the days of a dead shopping mall and not much variety in restaurants. Today, the Eden Prairie center is thriving and we’ve had spurt of new retail growth in the City’s Town Center area with the recent addition of such retailers as Best Buy, Gander Mountain, Sports Authority and Home Goods. Again, is the city government responsible for our good ratings here? Yes for parks. No for schools. We’ve been very helpful for the shopping rating, but General Growth Corporation and the new retailers deserve the most credit for that surprise rating.

The third graph I’ll refer to today asked residents to identify the “most serious issue” facing Eden Prairie today. Like the question about what they liked most about the City, this question was posed as an open-ended question. Residents filled in the blank with their own response. They were not given a list to choose from. You can click on the graph to see the response information in more detail. The most serious issue in Eden Prairie, according to our residents is……Nothing. 21% of the respondents said Eden Prairie had no serious issues. When asked the same question in nearby cities, the consultant told us that 46% of residents in Minnetonka said nothing, while 17% of Edina residents said nothing. The second highest ranked issue in Eden Prairie was “taxes”. 18% of our residents said that “taxes” were the most serious issue in the city. About 1 in 5. The consultant told us that the norm for the “taxes” response to this question in 2nd and 3rd ring Twin Cities suburbs is 30%. 18% is significant, but well below the norm.

Tomorrow: What do residents think of Eden Prairie city staff?