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Citizen survey en route to 25,000 in Wichita/ Sedgwick Co.

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by Anne Meyer

KWCH 12 Eyewitness News

5:23 PM CST, January 30, 2013

(WICHITA, Kan.)

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Check your mail boxes. 25,000 people in Sedgwick county and Wichita will get a new survey to fill out. The results may help lawmakers decide where to spend billions of your tax dollars.

The survey is nine pages long and has 99 different questions. It covers areas like transportation needs, economic development, various public investments and your willingness to pay for those services.

"This is their opportunity for their voice to get heard and for them to control what the priorities are," said Wichita Mayor Carl Brewer.

Brewer joined county leaders Wednesday morning to kick off this new campaign


It's intended to get more input from people to help policy makers decide where tax dollars should be spent during the next 20 years.

"Between the City of Wichita and Sedgwick county, we have billions of dollars in community assets and we need to have a solid plan," said Sedgwick County Commissioner Dave Unruh.

But some question why this planning doesn't come with a clear price tag.

"Too many of these questions are the the governmental equivalent of would you want a cadillac, and generally people say sure I want a cadillac," said Sedgwick County Commissioner Karl Peterjohn. "But then you say the price is this and then they say wait a minute I can't afford that."

It will cost about $70,000 to mail out the survey and results should be ready within a few months.

"It should help focus the public discussion about where we should go," said Wichita State Professor Dr. Mark Glaser. "The larger the return, the more confidence we have in what we are saying."

If you don't get a survey, you can still give lawmakers your feedback by going to a special website, which got a like to that site on this page.

Anyone who gets a survey, is asked to fill it out and return it within seven days. Lawmakers are hoping to get at least six thousand surveys back.

Citizen survey en route to 25,000 Wichita/ Sedgwick Co. residents