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Councilmember Backous stated he thinks the survey on road reconstruction was a waste of <br />money because the Council did not do anything with the information received. He stated the <br />City sends mailings (utility bills /newsletters) already and he would suggest always stuffing those <br />mailings with questions on how the City is doing and then keeping a record of the responses. In <br />that way, all have the opportunity to respond. Councilmember Backous stated he does not <br />support hiring a professional firm to conduct a survey. <br />Councilmember LeTourneau stated the City conducted strategic planning and found it would be <br />a good way to gauge the Council's performance and get community direction. He noted the <br />Council made a commitment to do that but now when it is under discussion, the Council is not as <br />engaged in the survey process. He stated he knows there are items that need to be addressed and <br />a survey could gather that information but some issues, such as average fire response time should <br />be information the City already has. Councilmember LeTourneau stated the Council should <br />know about ratings of the business community and other services and that type of survey <br />information could be beneficial during the next strategic planning exercise. <br />Councilmember Backous agreed but stated if transparency is the goal, it should be a simple <br />quarterly survey and the Council should not pick and choose the time the survey is conducted. <br />Councilmember LeTourneau stated a longer conversation on the tools will need to be held along <br />with the type of information to be gathered, as the statistical results from a telephone survey will <br />be totally different than the statistical results from a mailed survey. He felt a telephone survey <br />will produce better outcomes. <br />Councilmember Backous stated he thinks a lot of people used to have home telephones but they <br />now have cellular telephones so those statistics went "out the window." <br />Councilmember Tossey stated he would like to talk about the idea that it was in the Strategic <br />Plan so it has to be done, as he does not want to be "tethered" to the Strategic Plan if it does not <br />make financial sense. He stated if funding was not an issue it would be great but in Ramsey the <br />money is not there so the Council should stop spending it. Councilmember Tossey stated as <br />policy makers, the Council has the right to be flexible and make that type of decision, to adapt to <br />the current conditions. <br />Mayor Strommen agreed with the need to be flexible with the Strategic Plan, noting the other <br />issue is that metrics are part of the Strategic Plan and residents support having a means to <br />measure. She stated she is also asking if the survey is worth the cost and the types of questions <br />that would be asked. Mayor Strommen asked if there is another way to measure whether the <br />Council is succeeding and suggested another conversation of how to measure success with the <br />Strategic Plan and in setting priorities. She agreed that the City can ask questions but how the <br />questions are framed needs to be considered to ensure the input received will be useful. Mayor <br />Strommen stated as the Council considers the 2015 budget, it needs to know the services that <br />residents find to be important. Mayor Strommen agreed it is important to have good baseline <br />information but she wants to consider if there is another method to get the information and if a <br />survey is conducted, to clearly define the intent. <br />City Council Work Session / October 8, 2013 <br />Page 6 of 7 <br />