Residents Rate Public Works Projects Most Important for Next Fiscal Year

RIVERSIDE (CNS) - Riverside County residents who participated in a
survey to gauge what matters most to them rated ``public works and community
services'' at the top, while public safety took second place -- a switch from
the previous fiscal year, according to results presented to the county Board of
Supervisors Tuesday.
  

``The differences (from year-to-year) were subtle,'' UC Riverside
School of Public Policy Dean Mark Long told the board Tuesday. ``Infrastructure
was a little bit more emphasized this year than last. I didn't come away with
any surprise. These surveys are useful information, but I wouldn't take them as
purely what you should do as supervisors.''
  

Long, as well as two graduate students -- Andres Gugig and Esther
Mejia -- were retained by the county Executive Office to conduct the 2026-27
Community Budget Priorities Survey over the winter. The online polls took place
ahead of a series of community workshops held in each of the five supervisorial
districts.
  

The surveys taken during the workshops provided only a very small
sampling of opinion, while the online questionnaires received wide
participation, with a total 26,543 respondents, according to documents posted
to the board's agenda Tuesday.
  

It was the second year the county commissioned a countywide survey.
The previous one, completed in winter 2025, reflected that the highest level of
interest was in public safety.
  

While the latter slipped into second place this year, it was a
marginal difference from public works, which landed a 64% rating among all
respondents, compared to 60% for public safety.
  

The other priorities were healthcare at 53%, human services at 49%,
government finance at 23% and ``internal services'' -- the public sector's
inter-agency operations -- at 4%.
  

The survey team said ``key words'' were the determinants of how to
classify respondents' answers to the online questionnaires. For public works,
terms such as ``road maintenance'' and ``pothole repairs'' were what amplified
understanding of residents' priorities, according to the team.
  

``People could write whatever they wanted,'' Gugig told the board.
``But I think if it was things that affect them on a daily basis, that's what
they wrote about.''
  

The team said poorly lit and damaged streets, or corridors where
flooding is an issue, would push a higher number of responses into the public
works category.
  

The Second District's residents responded at the highest level, with
just under 7,000 respondents to the survey. The district encompasses Canyon
Lake, Corona, Eastvale, Jurupa Valley, Lake Elsinore, Temescal Valley and
multiple other communities.
  

The lowest response rate was in the Fifth District, where there were
4,435 respondents. The district includes Banning, Beaumont, Calimesa, Hemet,
Moreno Valley and San Jacinto. Most of the survey takers were English speakers,
though 599 responses were exclusively in Spanish.
  

One Fifth District resident and a frequent commentator on county
business, Roy Bleckert, told the board the survey results should speak less to
what the supervisors should do and more of what they should refrain from doing.
  

``Practically everything that comes through here, as you grow the
government monster bigger, makes the lives of everyone in Riverside County
harder,'' Bleckert said. ``The more you spend, the worse everything becomes.
When do you start to drop, like Sweden did, the influence of government and
empower the people you serve?''
  

Another speaker, Veronica Langworthy of the Third District, touched on
a similar topic, saying the results reflected how the board can make
people's lives better by reducing government red tape.
  

``If you can drop fees to adopt animals from county shelters, how
about dropping fees for humans?'' she said. ``It's impossible for people to
house because of the fees from government on property.''
  

Supervisor Jose Medina said he found the results ``helpful as we look
at the budget decisions we make and the priorities we set.''
  

The entire survey can be found at rivco.gov/budget.
  

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