Ask Edina residents what the most serious issue facing their city is and their most frequent response is … "nothing."
That's right, nothing.
Those people are what Decision Resources President Bill Morris calls community "boosters." When his firm surveyed Edina residents in July and gave them the chance to hammer away at their city with whatever criticism they wanted, 34 percent said they couldn't think of a single serious issue that faced the city.
That's extraordinary, Morris told the City Council last week. The next-highest "nothing" response among area cities is 25 percent, he said, and in most cities only about 6 percent can't find a bone to pick with their hometown.
Edina surveys residents every two years, as a way for the council to track the opinions of their city's silent majority. While this year's survey showed that residents are less likely to rate their quality of life as "excellent" than they did two years ago — 73 percent did this year, vs. 90 percent in 2011 — 99 percent still said life was good or excellent in Edina.
A hint at why that superior rating faded was in the 10 percent of residents who said housing teardowns are the most serious issue facing the city. Morris said those people were more likely to call their quality of life good rather than excellent.
The only city services that residents were lukewarm about were the quality and taste of drinking water and street repair. Eighty-four percent said they would like better drinking water, and 47 percent they would like better street repair.
The survey showed growing concerns about juvenile crime and speeding, but 22 percent of residents could think of no serious safety concerns. Some 72 percent said there isn't an area in the city where they would feel unsafe walking at night.
