Grand Junction council narrows survey wording on Orchard Mesa pool, drops "special district" option

Mike, the city manager, opened the workshop item by saying the 2026 community satisfaction survey must be finalized in time to meet ballot-related deadlines and asked council for feedback on wording and content.

Council members immediately pressed staff to add context to two headline figures in the survey background: the average daily participation figure of about 90 patrons and the estimated $500,000 subsidy for 2026. "If people don't have a reference point for what that is per user ... that may not be a full picture," one council member said, urging a per-user subsidy calculation and a resident vs. non-resident usage breakdown.

Sean Maher of RRC Associates, the consultant firm assisting the survey, recommended preserving maximum consistency with prior surveys to retain a reliable benchmark. "We definitely recommend maximizing consistency from survey to survey," Maher said. Ethan Adams, RRC's statistical expert, confirmed the planned methodology would produce a statistically valid sample and advised separating questions that ask whether an issue should be placed on the ballot from questions that ask whether respondents would support funding or tax increases.

Ken Sherman, Grand Junction's parks and recreation director, told the council the 2025 participation average already accounted for a three-month closure while the pool boiler was out of service and said staff could provide a 2024 full-year comparator to clarify the baseline. "We were closed for three months with the boiler that failed ... that was factored into the average," Sherman said.

On substantive question design, the consultants and several council members agreed the survey should first ask whether residents support funding options and then separately ask whether the city should put the question on the ballot, to reduce confusion created by immediate references to taxes. Councilors also argued against language that sounds like a pre-commitment (for example, phrasing that implies the city already decided to place the measure before hearing public input).

After debate about an option that asked about forming a city "special district," council members said "special district" is unfamiliar to many respondents and risks being misleading when the survey targets city residents only. Council reached consensus to remove the special-district option and to narrow the set of pool questions to three focused items: (1) support for city funding mechanisms (tax/debt options), (2) whether respondents support putting a funding question on the ballot (separate from funding support), and (3) an opt-out/no-additional-funding choice.

Staff will revise the survey preamble to include contextual details requested by council (per-user subsidy and a resident/non-resident usage breakdown or comparable-year numbers), update the question order and wording per the consultants' recommendations, and return the edited questions to the council for further review before the August workshop deadlines. The RRC consultants had to leave the meeting when their engagement ended; staff noted a final ballot-timing check will remain a scheduling constraint.

The council did not take a formal roll-call vote on the survey changes at this workshop; instead, members provided direction to staff to revise wording, add requested context, and remove the special-district option before the next review.

The next procedural step: staff will reword the survey and circulate the revised questions to council ahead of the August workshop dates that staff identified as the last opportunities to meet ballot deadlines.