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Shorewood staff present findings from 2025 community survey; officials caution results are not statistical
Summary
Communications Coordinator Wilson told the council the April 14–May 23 survey attracted just over 300 responses and included questions on services, water, and potential initiatives; City Administrator Nevinski cautioned the Council the nonrandom sample is not statistically representative and comparisons with 2011 are limited.
Communications and Recycling Coordinator Wilson presented the results of the 2025 Shorewood Community Survey to the City Council at its June 9 work session, saying the online survey was open April 14 through May 23 and drew just over 300 responses.
City Administrator Nevinski immediately cautioned the Council that the 2025 survey was not a statistically representative sample. "I just wanted to make sure the Council understood that a comparison between the 2011 and the 2025 survey was not comparing apples to apples," he said, noting that statistically valid surveys can cost substantially more than the ad-hoc online effort.
Wilson described basic respondent characteristics and item-level findings on quality of life, service quality, and awareness of city operations. He said the questionnaire used many of the same questions from 2011 and included items asking whether residents supported initiatives such as a single trash hauler, community gardening, or curbside organics. Wilson said the survey platform reported an average completion time of about 17–18 minutes and that some items (notably water-related questions) were skipped by more than 100 respondents.
Councilmembers asked several methodological questions. Councilmember DiGruttolo asked how much the 2025 survey cost; Wilson said staff used SurveyMonkey plus a few days of staff time, and Nevinski estimated a statistically reliable survey would cost roughly $15,000–$20,000. Councilmember Sanschagrin said he found the open-text comments especially useful and suggested the city highlight a few representative comments and follow up with residents to explain how their feedback will be used.
Wilson said staff may refine future instruments by placing comment boxes in each section rather than only at the end so respondents can target feedback, and that communications staff would consider publishing short highlights from the current survey to spur broader conversation.
The presentation concluded with staff and council agreement to treat the results as directional input for outreach and planning rather than a definitive, population-representative measure. Staff plans to incorporate selected survey findings into upcoming budget outreach and to explore whether a repeated or statistically sampled survey would be feasible in future budget cycles.
