Jim's 2012 Sunnyvale Study Issue Survey

Thank you for participating in this year's survey, which is being conducted to gauge public interest in the various study issues up for consideration this year. This survey attempts to simulate the process that Council goes through when ranking study issues.

Note to residents familiar with past surveys: this survey looks different from last year's survey. I got a lot of comments last year, and I rewrote my survey software to take your comments into account. The survey is much simpler, as a result.

Council goes through a three-phase process for ranking study issues:

1. Council votes on study issues to be dropped from further consideration. Sponsoring a study issue requires only two co-sponsors, but approving a study issue requires a majority vote. Items lacking any significant interest from a majority of councilmembers are initially eliminated. These items are not automatically brought back in future years, although it is common for study issues to resurface a few years after being dropped.
2. Council votes on study issues to be deferred until next year. Through a lack of support, concerns about limited resources or staff hours, or known timing issues (such as pending statewide legislation), Council may consider some issues to be potentially worthwhile but not timely. Any deferred items are automatically brought back for re-ranking in the following year
3. Council ranks the items which remain according to importance, identifying only the top three or four items. These rankings are combined to identify the items of highest interest.

After the rankings are done, staff looks at the rankings combined with the difficulty level of the top-ranked items for each department. Each department then compares the rankings against the amount of staff hours estimated to be available for study issues beyond what a department needs to perform its core mission (running the library, maintaining the parks, paving the streets, and so on). This determines which ranked study issues are actually performed in a given year.

The three pages which follow allow you to go through these same steps that Council must go through at the study and budget issues workshop on February 3rd. At the end, your responses will be submitted and included in the final results. Individual results and the identity of respondants will not be made public or used in any other way.

Please Note: I expect some study issues to be submitted between now and the deadline. I will reflect them as quickly as I can, but it will take staff some time to provide the full write-ups for new study issues. Feel free to revisit the survey to see updates and resubmit results right up until the deadline.

Deadline for submissions is 11:59 p.m. on Sunday, January 29th.

You may participate multiple times, should you change your mind or learn of further important details. Only the final submission will be counted in the results

Email Address

Please submit your email address. This information is confidential, and it is only used to eliminate duplicate submissions and to allow you to reconsider and resubmit your answers later.