Schaumburg asking residents about future needs

Schaumburg will be seeking input from its residents next month as the village prepares revisions of its capital-improvement and comprehensive land-use plans.

That input will come from a survey soon being mailed to 1,200 randomly selected households.

"It's a pretty simple survey," Village Manager Brian Townsend said. "Most people should be able to finish it in 10 to 15 or 20 minutes."

The National Citizen Survey, as it's called, is organized by the International City/County Management Association and the National Research Center. Though those organizations can use the results for their own databases, the primary beneficiary is Schaumburg, Townsend said.

Postcards will be mailed out Monday, Aug. 25 to let residents know that they've been selected for the survey. The surveys themselves will be mailed Monday, Sept. 1. The National Research Center will be following up with reminders on Sept. 8 and data collection will end Oct. 6.

Though the survey is designed to be easy - consisting largely of multiple choice questions - getting as large a response as possible will be important to the village as it begins to make major decisions regarding its future infrastructure and land use, Townsend said.

The village expects to see survey results in mid-November.

This is the first time Schaumburg has chosen to gauge public opinion through this particular survey, and officials intend to repeat the process every two to three years.

"With a survey like this, you would want to do this periodically to measure progress," Townsend said.