Participate in the Walton County Taxpayers Opinion Poll on Tourism

[Bob Hudson]

The Walton County Taxpayers Association is committed to representing your interests on issues facing Walton County government. In line with our commitment to continuous improvement, we are seeking your input on some timely issues being explored by our County Commission.

The best way to do this is by asking you to participate in this Opinion Survey.

The survey is completed on-line, and should take around five (5) minutes to complete. We encourage you to complete the customer survey in a quiet time when you are able to concentrate without interruption.

Please remember, there are NO right or wrong answers. It is your honest feedback we are seeking.

By participating in this survey you will be making an important contribution helping the WCTA Board to improve and to serve you better. Your opinion counts.


What do you have to do?

Please click on the link below to start the Opinion Survey:



WCTA Opinion Survey


I would like to thank you in advance for your support and input.

Zuma Banks
President
Walton County Taxpayers Association

 

[Beach Bimmer]

WCTA, I support your mission to improve South Walton. That said, respectfully, please learn how to phrase questions so that you're not "leading" the answer. I copied and pasted this gem from your survey:

Would you support restricting the amount of money that Walton County can spend to advertise tourism, by limiting the amount that could be spent to attract more tourist while increasing the amount spent on infrastructure such as beach accesses and improving parking. Tourists are the marginal demand and then some, and the bed tax should include enough moneys to pay for that increased demand. It’s obvious that the bed tax, the sales taxes, and any other taxes paid by the tourists are insufficient to pay for the demands they impose on residents. Witness the jammed roads and beaches and the unaddressed or inadequately addressed drainage problems we have that are largely due to construction and tourists’ perceived demands.

My answer was "yes" to the first sentence. Everything past the first sentence represents a biased opinion, and would never fly in the real world of survey research. WCTA, while I feel you'll get plenty of responses to this survey, please consider hiring a professional that understands survey design to help achieve your goals.

 

[Mike Smith]

Bummer - Agree. I started to take the survey, but stopped because of the way the questions were phrased.

Every time the word "infrastructure" was used, it included a laundry list of infrastructure related items - some I agree with and some I do not. They should try asking which infrastructure items should be prioritized.

And what are "tourist dollars?" I assume they refer to the bed tax, but any taxes generated from tourists are generally deemed tourist dollars but most municipalities. So sales tax is one of those "tourist dollars" and I believe those can be used to address our infrastructure needs. Taking monies earmarked for one cause and using them for another cause is called corruption.

My personal opinion is that we need to beautify and expand the walking/biking paths so they run the entire length of 30A - preferably on both sides of the road as a top priority. This includes improving the bridge walkways. Encourage people to walk & bike - staying off the roads. These same paths could connect to the non-neighborhood public beach accesses, too. Just seems crazy to me that a lot of money was spent on half completed paths. One can't even walk from Seagrove to Seaside and stay on a path the entire way without crossing 30a. My hope would be that the paths look like the ones west of seaside, and between eastern lake and The Hub.

Got on a rant here.... Count me out on the survey....Clearly a biased survey...

 

[Bob Hudson]

Thanks for your comment.

No opinion survey is totally unbiased.

This is a snapshot of the results on one question after 1023 people have participated.

Question:

Would you support restricting the amount of money that Walton County can spend to
advertise tourism, by limiting the amount that could be spent to attract more tourist
while increasing the amount spent on infrastructure such as beach accesses and
improving parking. Tourists are the marginal demand and then some, and the bed tax
should include enough moneys to pay for that increased demand. It’s obvious that the
bed tax, the sales taxes, and any other taxes paid by the tourists are insufficient to pay
for the demands they impose on residents. Witness the jammed roads and beaches
and the unaddressed or inadequately addressed drainage problems we have that are
largely due to construction and tourists’ perceived demands.

68.1 % of those responding are "Full Time" Residents
22.6 % of those responding are "Part-Time" Residents
9.3% of those responding are "Non-Residents"



We will post the entire survey results after the closing date for participation.

 

[Snowbean]

Nice to get the answers ahead of time;-)

 

[Danny Glidewell]

This is just a snapshot of how our citizens feel about this important topic. It's purpose is to help the leadership of the WCTA better represent those very taxpayers. It is not binding on anyone, it simply gives an idea of where people are on this particular issue. Too many times the squeaky wheel gets the grease and surveys like this one gives everyone a chance to share their opinion. Please take the time to answer the questions and share your opinions.

 

[Matt J]

You can also attend their meetings. No invitation needed.