Almost 300 Cottonwood Heights residents told the city council and leadership their honest opinions within a 48-hour period. On Jul. 8, FlashVote sent out a five-question survey to 570 city residents. By 11:06 a.m. on Jul. 10, there were 283 reliable responses. Let’s get into some of those results. 

When the 283 respondents were asked what they thought the strengths of Cottonwood Heights were, there were: 194 (69%) responses for ‘local recreation and parks/trails’, 187 (66%) responses for ‘physical safety and security’, 141 (50%) responses for ‘snowplowing’, and 140 (49%) for ‘trash and recycling services’. 

Options that received less than 40% response included (from highest to lowest): ‘ease of getting around town’, ‘community events/sense of community’, ‘condition of streets and sidewalks’, and ‘range and cost of available housing options’. 

Fifty-four respondents reported they had called the non-emergency police dispatch number. Out of those, 37 (13%) had a good experience while 14 (5%) had a bad experience. 

When contacting the city, 69 (25%) respondents reported they had a good experience while 17 (6%) respondents reported they had a bad experience. 

One hundred respondents said they had interacted with an elected city official while 116 respondents said they’ve attended a city event. 

While going through the results, Councilmember Suzanne Hyland encouraged the council to keep in mind margins of error. For example, the FlashVote software has the capability to tell if survey respondents are accurately responding to their unique link or if links are being sent out to others. Out of the participant pool in this first survey, 10 respondents accessed forwarded links and were not accounted in statistically significant analysis.  

Mayor Mike Weichers noted the frequency of questions about the upcoming Hillside Town Center plans for development within the ‘other comments or suggestions’ free-response sections of the survey. (See our previous coverage by visiting the City Journal website and searching for “Hillside Plaza”.) 

“I’m just as anxious as everybody else,” he said. “We are getting really, really close to where we can share important things with the community and involve them.” 

While most respondents provided feedback specific to Cottonwood Heights, its leadership, and city services, a few respondents provided comments on individuals and services outside of the city’s jurisdiction.

“One of the longest complaints was about the rec center,” said City Manager Jared Gerber. 

In addition, survey responses included complaints and compliments about state senators, UDOT (Wasatch Blvd. speeds/Gondola), Wasatch Front Waste & Recycling (glass recycling/trash collection), UFA (budget/fireworks), UTA (public transit/sustainability), and Google Fiber vs. Xfinity (fiber optic internet). Gerber has forwarded those comments along to the appropriate parties. 

Overall, the council was pleased with the survey and the feedback from the results. Councilmember Ellen Birrell noted she liked the shorter topical survey in comparison to elongated surveys residents have received in the past. Hyland appreciated granularity of the survey. 

“I want to know what our constituents are experiencing so of course I took the survey,” said Hyland. Birrell echoed the sentiment. 

Participants for this FlashVote survey signed up to be in the participant pool earlier in June. (See previous article “Want to tell the Cottonwood Heights City Council how you really feel?” through the City Journals website.) This initial overview survey was the first to be sent out since the city’s drive to get residents signed up. 

“We need more surveys from District 1,” said Weichers. “We would love District 1 to participate at a higher level.”

The council has asked FlashVote to send out three to four more topic-specific surveys throughout the year. Residents are still encouraged to sign-up and take part in responding to these surveys. 

“It takes less than 60 seconds,” said Weichers. “We hope that people will participate and be involved.” 

Residents can sign up to be apart of the city survey participant pool through FlashVote by visiting: www.flashvote.com/cottonwoodheights.