<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class="">This is awesome, thank you Stephen! Having the narrative responses in that google doc is super helpful.<div class="">
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<div><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Mar 10, 2020, at 12:59 PM, Stephen DeSanto <<a href="mailto:rachidian@gmail.com" class="">rachidian@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><div dir="ltr" class="">Here's some basic numbers. In general, the majority of respondents to the survey are highly supportive of the proposal (surprise). The comments express support for *any* kind of subsidy up-to and including free public transit for everyone.<br class=""><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><b class=""><span style="font-family:monospace" class="">How do you feel about this basic proposal?</span></b></div><span style="font-family:monospace" class="">Highly supportive 174<br class="">Somewhat supportive 19<br class="">Highly opposed 5<br class="">Somewhat opposed 5<br class="">Neutral 1<br class=""></span><div class=""><span style="font-family:monospace" class="">Choose one 1</span></div><div class=""><span style="font-family:monospace" class=""><br class=""></span></div><div class=""><pre class=""><b class="">Large employers: Over 500 employees worldwide</b><br class="">100% subsidy 124
Less than 100% but more than 50% subsidy 43
50% subsidy 19
No requirement 16
Choose one 3<br class=""><br class=""><b class="">Large Seattle employers: Over 500 employees in Seattle</b><br class="">100% subsidy 151
Less than 100% but more than 50% subsidy 37
No requirement 10
50% subsidy 4
Choose one 3
<b class="">Very large Seattle employers: Over 5,000 employees in Seattle</b>
100% subsidy 178
Less than 100% but more than 50% subsidy 10
No requirement 8
Choose one 7
50% subsidy 2
<b class="">Large worksites: Over 100 employees of a single employer arrive daily at a single site.</b>
100% subsidy 130
Less than 100% but more than 50% subsidy 38
No requirement 17
50% subsidy 16
Choose one 4<br class=""><br class=""><b class="">Should part-time employees, seasonal/temporary employees, and/or independent contractors be included in this legislation?</b><br class="">Yes, definitely 130
Yes, maybe 43
I'm not sure 15
Probably not 11
Definitely not 5
Choose one 1<br class=""><br class=""><b class="">Should non-profits be included in this legislation?</b><br class="">Yes, definitely 107
Yes, maybe 54
I'm not sure 28
Probably not 9
Definitely not 6
Choose one 1<br class=""><b class=""><br class="">Would you support Seattle funding and expanding a [small-business subsidy program]?</b><br class="">Yes, definitely 162
Yes, maybe 21
Definitely not 8
I'm not sure 6
Choose one 6
Probably not 2</pre></div><div class="">A few themes and suggestions emerged from the various comment responses:</div><div class=""><ul class=""><li class="">Support for ORCA cards / transit subsidies for everyone (not just employees of large companies), and/or free public transit. One respondent had a comment that matches my personal sentiment: "I am much more interested in seeing everyone have an Orca card that causes them to consider transit usage an option, than I am concerned about the mechanisms of the subsidy."</li><li class="">Support for improvement to public transit reliability and quality. More frequent buses, reliable service, better routes.</li><li class="">Desire to see big businesses pay for their effects on public infrastructure.</li><li class="">Many respondents who are highly supportive of the basic proposal also take the bus to work.<br class=""></li></ul><div class="">Some suggestions from the comments:<br class=""></div><ul class=""><li class="">Large companies should subsidize transit benefits for smaller ones / non-profits / other orgs excluded from this org.</li><li class="">Not only make transit easier, but making driving harder. (e.g. financial incentive to not drive, penalize parking)</li><li class="">"My concern about this is that it places power over our transit system in the hands of employers as the ones who fund it... Couldn't we just tax the companies and eliminate the need for fares and employer subsidy?"</li><li class="">"The focus on size of employer sounds good to the anti-Amazon crowd but is bad public policy. Transit should be free and subsidized by all taxpayers in the city."</li></ul><div class="">With regards to employee classification and benefits for temp/contract workers:</div><div class=""><ul class=""><li class="">Concern that temporary, part-time, independent contractors, and similar groups would be excluded due to "loopholes" that let companies avoid giving benefits to their employees.</li><li class="">On the other hand, some respondents oppose independent contractors receiving transit benefits.<br class=""></li><li class="">Concern that low-paid workers and independent contractors (who would most benefit) can't afford to live in Seattle, so driving is a better option than transit for some.</li><li class="">Sentiment that part-time employees should get at least partial subsidy, but don't structure the law to incentivize companies to not provide work hours or transit benefits to employees who need both (i.e. "no loopholes")<br class=""></li></ul></div><div class="">Many respondents already have transit benefits, but what it would mean for others:</div><div class=""><ul class=""><li class="">"I wouldn’t be spending all of my tip money on transit"</li><li class="">More money to pay bills -- medical bills, student debt, daycare bills.<br class=""></li><li class="">More likely to use transit, or use more often.<br class=""></li></ul></div></div><div class="">Our canvassing efforts have made an impact in producing survey results. How people heard about the survey:</div><div class=""><ul class=""><li class="">Seattle Transit Blog</li><li class="">TRU membership emails</li><li class="">Twitter, Facebook</li><li class="">Canvassers on the bus and train. "A guy walked up to me saying that tammy moralez wants to create a law where everyone gets a orca. And that i should do the survey."</li></ul><div class="">If there is more specific data that you'd like me to get from the survey responses, or specific questions you'd like me to answer, let me know and I'll go digging. It takes me a while to re-learn how to use <a href="https://pandas.pydata.org/" class="">pandas</a> every time I tackle a dataset, but I have some quick views saved in my notebook so I should be faster to respond now. For the qualitative data presented in this email, I only did a quick skim of responses, nothing rigorous, so I might have missed some good ideas or sentiments. <br class=""></div></div><div class=""><br class="">I've saved some of the narrative responses, grouped by feeling towards basic proposal, in a Google Doc. I think it provides an easier view of the comments than the CSV/spreadsheet. If there's a specific question you want added to this doc, let me know and I'll scrape it out, super-easy to do: <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1apc1sy4QyH6z5ildB2CyIkXZNT6myktmuX5S8irjwR8/edit?usp=sharing" class="">https://docs.google.com/document/d/1apc1sy4QyH6z5ildB2CyIkXZNT6myktmuX5S8irjwR8/edit?usp=sharing</a></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Data cleaning note: Several responses for "Comments about the basic proposal and possible tiers?" contained physical addresses. Not sure what happened there.<br class=""></div></div><br class=""><br class=""><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Fri, Mar 6, 2020 at 2:18 PM Katie Wilson <<a href="mailto:katie@transitriders.org" class="">katie@transitriders.org</a>> wrote:<br class=""></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div style="overflow-wrap: break-word;" class="">Ok! Here’s the .csv. Have at it.<div class=""><br class=""><div class=""><div class="">
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<div class=""></div></div></div></div><div style="overflow-wrap: break-word;" class=""><div class=""><div class=""><div class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Mar 6, 2020, at 2:00 PM, Stephen DeSanto <<a href="mailto:rachidian@gmail.com" target="_blank" class="">rachidian@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class=""><div class=""><div dir="auto" class="">I can scroll through the data this weekend and see what stands out to me. With surveys like this, I assume the qualitative data will be more useful than the quantitative. I can do a pass over it. </div><br class=""><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Fri, Mar 6, 2020, 13:13 Katie Wilson <<a href="mailto:katie@transitriders.org" target="_blank" class="">katie@transitriders.org</a>> wrote:<br class=""></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div style="overflow-wrap: break-word;" class="">Hey all,<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">We have over 200 responses to <a href="http://transitriders.org/orcasurvey" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank" class="">our survey</a>. If I were to share a .csv of the responses (without personal info of course), would anyone be interested in taking a look at the data, quantitative and/or qualitative? As we begin to work with CM Mosqueda’s office on crafting the actual policy, it would be great to be able to share our survey results with them.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Obviously it’s not a representative sample, and most people are in favor of strong legislation, but I’d be especially interested to know if there’s anything there we might not be expecting. Anything in the written comments we might not have thought of? Any entries from people associated with particular employers that are of interest?</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Katie</div><div class=""><br class=""><div class=""><div class="">
<div style="overflow-wrap: break-word;" class=""><div style="font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-weight:normal;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:start;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px" class=""><span style="color:rgb(102,102,102);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px" class="">Katie Wilson</span></div><div style="font-family:Helvetica;font-size:12px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-weight:normal;letter-spacing:normal;text-align:start;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px" class=""><div style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px" class=""><font color="#666666" class="">General Secretary</font></div><div style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px" class=""><font color="#666666" class="">Transit Riders Union</font></div><div style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px" class=""><font color="#666666" class=""><a href="https://transitriders.org/" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank" class="">https://transitriders.org</a></font></div><div style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px" class=""><span class=""><font color="#666666" class="">206-781-7204</font></span></div><div style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px" class=""><font color="#999999" class=""><br class=""></font></div><div style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px" class=""><i class=""><font color="#999999" class="">The Transit Riders Union is a democratic organization of working and poor </font></i><i class=""><font color="#999999" class="">people, including students, seniors, and people with disabilities, taking control over our own lives, and building up the power we </font></i><i class=""><font color="#999999" class="">need to change society for the good of humanity and of the planet. We will </font></i><i class=""><font color="#999999" class="">fight to preserve, expand, and improve the public transportation system in </font></i><i class=""><font color="#999999" class="">Seattle and beyond, so that every human being has access to safe, </font></i><i class=""><font color="#999999" class="">affordable, and reliable public transit.</font></i></div></div></div>
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