Jason Marado, director of community research at ETC Institute, presented results of the City of Auburn’s 2025 resident survey to the City Council, reporting 609 completed responses and a margin of error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. Marado said the survey was administered by mail and online to randomly selected households and that responses were distributed across the city.

Why it matters: The survey measures resident satisfaction and helps city leaders prioritize investments. Council members and staff said they will use the results to inform the upcoming budget process and capital improvement planning.

Marado said the findings show “residents have a very positive perception of the city of Auburn.” Key headline results he reported included: 93% of respondents rated Auburn as an excellent or good place to live; 92% rated it an excellent or good place to raise children; 87% were satisfied or very satisfied with the overall quality of city services. Marado also reported that Auburn’s satisfaction ratings were well above national averages in 57 of 59 comparable areas, with the city scoring roughly 38 percentage points above the national average on overall quality of services and about 40 percentage points above the national average on customer service.

The survey collected demographic information, Marado said, and city staff confirmed the questionnaire included age, race, ethnicity, gender, household income and length of residence so results could be checked for representative coverage. City staff said the city mailed the survey to about 4,000 randomly selected households to achieve the 609 completed responses, which Marado described as a typical response rate of roughly 12–15% for a survey of this length.

On service detail, Marado reported that satisfaction with parks and recreation rose since the 2022 survey—quality of parks and recreation increased from about 80% to 87%—while satisfaction with flow and management of traffic was lower than most service areas (about 40%, compared with a national average of roughly 45%). Other notable figures cited included a 73% satisfaction rating for overall value received for city tax dollars and fees (compared with a national average near 33%). Marado said the survey also identified top priorities residents want the city to emphasize over the next two years: flow and management of traffic, and maintenance of city infrastructure.

City staff told the council the full report (including raw, unedited public comments) will be distributed to council members and posted on the city website. Staff also said they can produce cross-tab analyses to show whether satisfaction varies by age, length of residency or other demographics.

The council and staff discussed how long-term trends have changed in recent years and noted the survey will be used to help set priorities during the budget process. Council members asked about the 2022 sample size and how non-random online submissions are handled; staff replied that only randomly selected households’ responses are included in the official dataset and that online links circulated publicly are not counted unless those households were in the randomly selected sample.