Are People Happy With Sioux Falls Government?

What do you think of the City of Sioux Falls? The mayor and city council want to know. That's why they've hired a company to conduct a scientific survey.

"This is good old fashioned government, I think at its best. It is where you can actually pay more attention to the citizens of your community than those special interest groups or those power players, in terms of prioritizing your government," Mayor Mike Huether said.

This isn't the first time Sioux Falls has conducted a survey like this. The last was 2009 when residents gave the city good marks.

"On almost every benchmark, [Sioux Falls] exceeded responses in other communities.  The same survey had also been done in 2008 and the city showed considerable improvement in almost every area," City Director of Finance Tracy Turbak said.

That survey also told city leaders to make improvements with street maintenance and code enforcement. The cost of the survey is $22,000.

The firm will select 3,000 residents at random.  If you're one of them, they'll let you know next week and will mail out the survey the following week.

"I want to see the goods, I want to see the bads and I want to identify are there any uglies out there that I need to address as a mayor or as a council or as a city team we need to address," Huether said.

The firm will compile the results and present them to the city council in April. City leaders say that's when they'll be able to spring into action.

Because hundreds of other communities across the nation use very similar surveys, it will also give city leaders an idea of where Sioux Falls stacks up to similar towns.