4:00pm | At the top of the list of issues that Long Beach voters think should be the priorities of the Long Beach Mayor and City Council include improving our local schools and education, bringing jobs to the city and balancing the city’s budget, according to our new lbpost.com/Probolsky Research poll among likely Long Beach voters. Voters were given a list of more than a dozen options to choose from and asked to select the three most important issues.
“Voters look to different echelons of elected officials to fulfill different roles—roles not necessarily confined by the powers of their various offices. In this case voters place a high value on education and have an expectation that their local elected officials will do something about improving it,” explained Adam Probolsky, poll director and Chairman and CEO of Probolsky Research. “The fact that jobs and fiscal responsibility at City Hall also rank highly are simply reflective that high unemployment and a stuttering economy is definitely impacting Long Beach voters.”
Schools and Education
Local schools and education topped the list, with 43.4% of those polled naming it a top priority. The Long Beach Unified School District was forced to lay off hundreds of K-12 teachers over the summer due to slashed budgets, increasing class sizes and also changing bus routes for students. The school district also instituted five furlough days where no class will be held during the upcoming school year, as a cost-saving measure. Exactly half of women polled (50%) named education on their list compared to 35.9% of men.
Jobs
Not far behind, 41.5% of those polled said that bringing jobs to the city is a critical issue. Thousands remain out of work as the Long Beach unemployment rate still hovers over 14%, which is greater than both the state and national rates. Long Beach was named the Most Business Friendly City in Los Angeles County in late 2009 for offering tax incentives to incoming businesses. However, since then the city has lost major employers such as two high-paying Boeing programs that outsourced to Oklahoma and a potential deal to manufacture Tesla electric vehicles in Long Beach fell through. Voters listed as Republicans were most likely to name jobs to their top issues, at a rate of 44.9%. More than half (54.8%) of voters aged 18-34 ranked this issue on their list.
City Budget
Finally, 34.2% of those polled said that balancing the city’s budget is very important. The City budget faced an $18.5 million deficit before major cuts to programs and services, such as cutting the use of one fire engine and reducing operating hours at public libraries. Some city employees agreed to pay freezes, but the City is still deeply entrenched in battles with Police, Fire and other employee unions over rising pension costs. Largely due to these massive pension amounts owed, Mayor Bob Foster has warned that there are more difficult budget battles to be fought over the next few years.
The issues of crime (31.4%) and fixing city streets (33.2%) also received support from voters.
The poll also found:
– Decline to state voters (42.2%) rank local schools and education first than do Republican voters (33.7%).
– More Republican women aged 18-54 rank local schools and education first (57.8%) than those aged 55+ (42.7%).
– More Republican women rank local schools and education first (39.6%) than Republican men (26.2%).
– More Democratic women rank local schools and education first (52.9%) than Democratic men (43.9%).
– More decline to state women rank local schools and education first (54.2%) than DTS men (28.6%).
– 43.6% of very high propensity voters (5/5) rank balancing the city’s budget first.
—
Our Polls
Poll: Mayor Foster At 63.7% Approval Rating, 60.3% Of Voters Say City On Right Track
Poll: Long Beach Divided On Local Ballot Measures, Pot Tax and Vet Proposition Poised to Pass
Poll: Support For Same-Sex Marriage In Long Beach Grows
Poll: Three Most Important Issues To Long Beach Voters
Click here to read our policy on covering the Long Beach City Council.
Publisher’s Note: In a February 2010 message to our readers we highlighted our role as a local leader in the changing world of news delivery. We remain committed to providing new ways for you to obtain the information you want. This week we launched our first comprehensive research poll in partnership with Probolsky Research and we encourage you to form an opinion and debate the results in the comments section below.
About the lbpost.com/Probolsky Research Poll
Click here for the detailed polling results.
lbpost.com is a daily, online media publication providing news, politics, business, life and sports coverage on issues impacting our city. Newport Beach-based Probolsky Research specializes in opinion research, with government, corporate and political practice areas. The poll was conducted October 6 – October 7, 2010 with 325 likely Long Beach voters with a +/- 5.4 margin of error. Likely November 2010 Long Beach voters included those who voted in any of the November 2008, May 2009, June 2010 elections and voted at least in three of the November 2006, February 2008, June 2008, November 2008, May 2009 and June 2010 elections or if they registered after February 2008 and voted in any of the June 2008, May 2009, and June 2010 elections or registered after November 2008 and voted in either the May 2009 or June 2010 elections or registered after June 2010.