Agenda - Council - 05/14/2024 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Ms. Arocha said she is not sure and explained that they would have to reanalyze all past data sets, which would have a cost associated with it. Councilmember Howell asked what baseline is used for weighting the data and how they would rate someone who checks `race not listed' versus any of the other races that are listed. Ms. Arocha said they use the most recent census and community survey data available to perform the weighting. She explained that for any of the weighting questions when the answer is not specific, it is given a weight of 1 and they do not do any adjustments for this person's response. Councilmember Howell asked about the weight of all other races versus `race not listed.' Ms. Arocha explained that for rating purposes in most of their communities, they divide the data into categories of white and not Hispanic, and not white and/or Hispanic. She noted that they rarely see enough responses outside of these two categories to create a whole new category. She added that they do not want to give the respondents outside of these two categories too much weight. She added that historically, all of the other non-white responses are less than 10%of the total responses. Councilmember Musgrove asked how Ramsey's data is used to provide the City information as well as compiling a database for Polco. Ms. Arocha explained that this data is reflected in the City's reporting. She added that they have a benchmark database that consists of around 500 communities, and they are able to compare particular communities' data against the national database. Councilmember Musgrove asked if this data is ever sold. Mr. Arocha said no and that they have a privacy policy. She noted the only time they ever share data sets is with the communities they work with. Councilmember Musgrove asked about the purpose of collecting this data for the database of communities. Ms. Arocha said it is to provide benchmark comparisons to communities and aid in digesting the data. She added that these benchmarks are very valuable to clients so they can see how they compare to other communities. She noted that they can also use this data to compare communities on a regional level rather than national. She said they have a number of clients in the Twin Cities that want to see how they compare to other Minnesota cities. Councilmember Musgrove asked if the unweighted data is the same as raw data. Ms. Arocha said yes. Councilmember Musgrove asked if it was possible to start a new trend line with just the raw data. City Council Work Session/April 23, 2024 Page 2 of 7