Studying the Survey

With people seeming to need more services from government, how to pay for them becomes a growing concern.

The state of Illinois is threatening to cut services to many of those who need the most help, unless the income tax is increased from three to 4.5 percent.

Locally, there seems to  be a correlation between the services people pay for and their overall satisfaction with those services.

As part of the process of updating the city's Comprehensive Plan, the Morris Planning Commission, and consultant Michael Hoffman, developed a survey, which was completed by 313 Morris residents.

Results of the survey show that the services in Morris which received the highest ratings were the ones people pay for, including fire and ambulance, police and the library.

The fire protection and ambulance district and the Morris Area Public Library levy their own property taxes. The police department is one of the city's biggest expenses, paid for with property and sales tax revenues.

One of the lowest rated areas was recreational programs.

Only 20.7 percent of those completing the survey rated recreational programs as good while 36.7 percent rated them poor.

Parks and ball fields, which are funded by the city and with payments from subdivision developers, were rated good by about 50 percent of those taking the survey.

In the last five years the city has built a skate park and new ball fields across from White Oak school

There is no direct funding for recreational programs in the city, so those that exist function largely through volunteers, donations and fees.

In 2005, residents of Morris overwhelmingly voted against a proposal to create a park district.

The Community Foundation and a committee worked to get the question of forming a park district on the February 2005 ballot.

While early surveys indicated people supported the formation of a park district, when the actual vote was held, 70 percent were opposed. The final total was 2,956 opposed and 1,244 in favor.

With volunteers and donations there are youth soccer, youth baseball and softball and youth football programs.

District 101 Recreation, formerly the Morris Area Leisure Services (MALS), offers recreational opportunities at the MCHS fieldhouse for a fee.

The Joliet YMCA has offered a youth basketball program and after school programs for children, also for a fee.

Further, the Joliet YMCA is looking to build a facility in Morris, but that will require the donation of land and millions of dollars to pay for construction of the building.

Quality police, fire and ambulance services are more important to most people than recreational programs and this is reflected in their willingness to pay for them.