Eric Erica Barnett at the Stranger is the latest to fall victim to the flawed SurveyUSA poll I explored yesterday on the Roads & Transit measure. She says:
Tellingly, voters the roads part of the package by a much larger margin than they opposed building 50 new miles of light rail: 65 percent opposed raising taxes for roads, compared to 56 percent who opposed raising taxes for rail.
Maybe voters feel that way, maybe they don't. This poll has too many problems to trust either way. Granted, given the potentially close nature of the ballot measure proponents and opponents of the measure are both going to try and find golden nuggets in any poll. But both sides shouldn't use this one.
Previously I had mentioned the poll surveyed registered voters across King, Pierce, and Snohomish Counties, while noting an accurate poll for this issue would survey likely voters within the smaller geographic area actually eligible to vote on the issue. Remember it's only the Sound Transit district voting on the transit portion of the measure. The same voters plus a portion of exurban Snohomish County (Marysville, Lake Stevens, Snohomish, & Monroe) will vote on the roads portion. That means while the actual eligible voters for the measure are concentrated in urban and suburban neighborhoods, the SurveyUSA poll captured exurban and rural areas in all three counties not eligible to vote (and no doubt less likely to want to pay for transportation improvements). This PDF map shows the breakdown reasonably well.
For perspective, compare the SurveyUSA poll's crosstabs with a bipartisan poll of the Sound Transit district earlier this year. The SurveyUSA poll surveyed 49% of its voters from King County, 31% from Pierce, and 20% from Snohomish. The bipartisan poll in the correct voting area included 64% from King County, 23% from Pierce, and 14% from Snohomish. That's quite a difference in the constitution of the projected electorate.
If there are any lingering doubts the crosstabs of the SurveyUSA poll tell the tale further. They have more voters in Snohomish County (42%) than in King (38%) supporting light rail. They have more voters in King (35%) than in Snohomish (28%) and Pierce (24%) supporting the roads projects. It's hardly likely that either situation is true.
Anyone else using this poll, or any future such polls from SurveyUSA using the same methodology for this election, isn't standing on firm rhetorical ground. It is a blemish on King 5 and Robert Mak's otherwise excellent journalistic reputation that a such poll was reported as relevant news.
Posted by Eric Earling at September 18, 2007 07:15 PM | Email ThisBuy them all Lionel train sets and keep em busy in their skyscraper offices.
I want them the hell out of our pockets for a change.
Posted by: GS on September 18, 2007 07:26 PMRepublicans love sprawl, freedom, independent houses.
Posted by: John Bailo on September 18, 2007 07:44 PMJust look at the Sounder train which exists now. It is subsidized to the tune of $62K per rider per year, and that's just the expense cost from Tacoma to Seattle. It's almost double that from Everett to Seattle. And there's still the capital costs to contend with. Even with that HUGE subsidy, there are only a few trains a day, and they are not full. If rail is the panacea, why isn't it working right now?
Trains won't ease congestion, and they are far too expensive and difficult to build. We can start Bus Rapid Transit tomorrow and soon be the talk of the country with respect to solving transportation, or we can continue to listen to the lies from Progressives and Construction Lobbyists who tell us that more billions wasted on trains are the answer.
Posted by: Jeff B. on September 18, 2007 09:35 PMOne qualm with the analysis, though. A subsample can have a huge margin of error. It's quite possible that, adjusting for MoE, an accurate poll could show Snohomish approving more than King. Consisting 20% of a poll with a 4.4% MoE, the Snohomish subsample isn't really worth looking at. It could still be a perfectly solid poll.
Also, in Mak's defense, KING5 contracts SurveyUSA to do the polls. Not reporting them solely because they dislike the methodology is probably not an option. I imagine they have some sort of ongoing exclusive deal.
Posted by: Benjamin Johnstone-Anderson on September 18, 2007 09:51 PMHe is the person most responsible for what will be on the ballot. He appointed a majority of the ST board members. As Co. Exec. he could have vetoed the RTID measure in King County.
He was chair of ST when all the lousy contracting decisions were made, which has put ST into a massive financial quagmire.
ST2/RTID is MOSTLY about being a taxpayer bailout of ST. The best possible move is to reject this measure, to cut our losses. After a couple of years, once the lawsuits from light rail contractors againsts ST are over and the trains are operational, we'll know the true extent of the damage. Don't allow ST to get additional billions of taxing authority before then!
The legislature NEVER should have stuck road project taxes and ST project taxes together for a single up or down vote.
This joint ballot measure is entirely unfair. Let's say I wanted to support RTID's taxes and partial funding of some road projects (which I don't because we don't know what those projects like SR 520 would look like yet, nor do we know what additional taxes and tolls will be needed). So if I wanted to vote yes for RTID, no way should I be forced to also vote to approve more money for Sound Transit's light rail misadventures. ST has proven over the past ten years that it is completely incapable of delivering on light rail promises efficiently.
Posted by: orotund on September 19, 2007 08:45 AM