A new survey shows only about a quarter of Cincinnatians are satisfied with the city’s maintenance of streets, sidewalks, and other infrastructure.
External consulting firm ETC Institute conducted the survey with a random sample of residents that reflect the city population's demographics according to age, race, gender, geography, and income.
ETC Assistant Director Ryan Murray presented the results to City Council Monday.
"We saw that the largest levels of dissatisfaction were with the maintenance of our city streets, sidewalks and infrastructure," Murray said. "It's also the most important item for residents, in their minds, for us to emphasize moving forward."
The second highest priority for respondents is police services, followed by code enforcement and overall city communication. Those priorities are mostly consistent with ETC's first resident survey conducted in 2021; the firm did a smaller survey in 2022 that looked a few specific topics.
Only 40% of respondents say they're satisfied with the overall feeling of safety in Cincinnati, compared to 42% in 2021 (below the margin of error for statistical significance).
RELATED: 80% of Cincinnatians in 2021said the city is a good place to live, survey shows
Murray says it's not surprising the city didn't improve in this area over the past two years, given where the majority of respondents get their information.
"Many of our respondents are not necessarily getting firsthand source information from the city and were simply looking at TV news media," Murray said. "[TV news] can very much heighten some of those more negative stories about the community and make it seem as if it's a more or less safe place to live."
The most recent data from Cincinnati Police shows a 10% decrease in violent crime compared to the previous three-year average, and no significant change in property crime (looking at 2024 year-to-date compared to the three-year YTD average).
The most highly-rated city services are fire and ambulance, and city parks and recreation centers.
A few highlights:
- 65% of respondents were satisfied or very satisfied with the overall image of the city, up from 57% in 2021
- 33% of respondents were satisfied or very satisfied with the overall quality of the city's public transportation system, up from 24% in 2021
- Cincinnati respondents showed higher satisfaction with the city as a place to live, work, and raise children compared to peer cities and the U.S. average (but Cincinnati ranks slightly below the national average for satisfaction as a place to retire)
See the full report on the city website here.
