2006 Citizen Survey ResultsFORT COLLINS AS A COMMUNITYUsing a scale ranging from very bad to very good, respondents gave mean ratings1 of good to Fort Collins as a place to raise children, a place to attend college and a place to retire. They also gave the community a mean rating of good overall, as a place to live (Figure 1). These ratings have been consistently good since the survey’s inception in 2001, with no statistically significant2 variation from survey to survey. The 2006 survey asked respondents, for the first time, to rate the overall economic health of Fort Collins. Nearly all respondents (97%) expressed an opinion. As a group, they gave it a grade of average (Figure 1). The majority of all respondents (57%) rated overall economic health as average or lower (Table 1), with respondents between the ages of 25 and 65 rating it the lowest. Respondent comments help to shed some light on the issue of economic health. Nearly five percent (4.8%) of respondents wrote that the City needs to attract business and promote the growth of high-paying jobs, and nearly three percent (2.8%) said that the City should be more business-friendly. Despite this apparent concern, how respondents rate the economic health of Fort Collins has very little relationship with how they rate the community as a place to live, a place to raise children or as a place to retire. The survey data show very low correlation or relationship between ratings for economic health and the others.  0 to 12 = very bad, 13 to 37 = bad, 38 to 62 = average, 63 to 87 = good, 88 to 100 = very good
The survey also asked respondents to rate Fort Collins on several specific attributes, shown in Figure 2 and Table 2. Nearly all of these items were either newly added to the 2006 survey or substantially revised from past surveys. Respondents rated most of the attributes as good. They gave mean ratings lower than good to two attributes. The highest ratings, in the good range, were given to:
The next highest ratings, in the good range, were given to:
The lowest ratings, in the average range, were given to:
The majority of respondents rated each of these two items as average or below (Table 2), similar to their opinions of the community’s overall economic health. 
0 to 12 = very bad, 13 to 37 = bad, 38 to 62 = average, 63 to 87 = good, 88 to 100 = very good
1In order to make valid comparisons between the ratings for different community attributes, and to track each attribute’s ratings over time, respondents’ ratings were averaged using a scale ranging from 0 to 100, where 0 = very bad and 100 = very good. Respondents who selected the no opinion option for any given attribute were not included in the mean rating. 2The term “significant” is used in statistics (and in this report) to mean that the change in a measured number from one period to the next or the difference between two measured numbers is not due to chance or random variation. Significance depends upon sample size, the amount of variation in the sample data and the amount of change or difference between two numbers. The mean ratings that respondents give to various items (such as Fort Collins as a place to raise children) may change from survey to survey, but small changes are usually due to random variation in the survey sample data and are not significant. Any significant changes are identified in the report text. |
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