City Services Satisfaction Survey 2008 City Services Satisfaction Survey | Page 14

Overall Rating Of Arlington And City Services
In terms of quality of life, Arlington residents rate the city moderately high as a place to
live. Three out of four residents (77%) rate Arlington as offering a “good” or “excellent”
quality of life. The quality of life rating in 2007 has decreased over last year, and it is
still trending downward. This year’s rating tied for the lowest rating to date.
Residents rank the feeling of safety as the most important aspect of a city that affects
the quality of life rated by 17 percent of respondents. Feeling of safety includes feeling
of safety in the city (11%) and crime rate (6%). The next highest rated attribute was
convenient location with 13 percent, followed by the quality of schools (11%), Sense of
community (9%), entertainment venues (6%), city services (5%), public transportation
(5%), economy (3%), management of traffic (3%), city appearance/cleanliness (3%).
Taxes, recreation facilities/services, cost of housing, medical/health services, and
environment condition all received less than a 3 percent mention.
City services in Arlington generally receive high overall ratings, with eight of the fourteen
services rated receiving a top-two-box rating (“good” or “excellent”) of 81 percent or
higher. The Arlington Fire Department, at 98 percent, continues to receive the highest
ratings among city services, followed by Emergency Medical Services, garbage
collection, curbside recycling, Community Education Services by the Fire Department,
landfill efforts, convention center, and police. Services receiving the lowest ratings are
municipal courts, Handitran, animal services, and code enforcement.
Customer service provided by the city is rated moderately high (78%), this is a slight
decrease over last year’s rating of 79 percent, but has remained relatively constant
since 2005. Only seven percent of residents rate customer service as “poor”, this was
an increase from the previous two years.
Decision Analyst, Inc.
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