Raleigh Issues Poll

Tuesday night we conducted a poll on four current issues in Raleigh:

Mayor Meeker has proposed a temporary 50% increase in water rates to help encourage people to conserve water during our drought conditions. Do you support his plan?

Yes 27
No 64

A lot of the time when there's a big public outcry over a political issue, especially at the local level, it's a loud minority trumping a silent majority. This is not one of those cases. There's not much support from the electorate for handling the water crisis in this particular way. It's no big surprise that only 16% of Republicans support the plan, but even 56% of Democrats are opposed to it.

A coalition of neighborhoods in Raleigh has proposed an interim moratorium on teardowns, the practice of tearing down an existing house and replacing it with a new one, while the Planning Department comes up with a long term approach for solving the issue. Would you support an interim moratorium on teardowns?

Yes 52
No 38

Teardowns have been one of the hottest issues in Raleigh city politics over the last few months. A majority of likely voters support the city putting a stop to this practice while it takes a step back to take a wider, more long term look at how to solve the problem. There are significant gender and party disparities in how Raleigh voters view this issue. While women support a moratorium 58-29, men oppose it 47-46. 61% of Democrats support it, while just 35% of Republican do.

Mayor Meeker has proposed doubling impact fees that developers of new homes and businesses pay to cover costs incurred by growth like new streets and parks to bring them closer to the state average. Would you support a doubling in impact fees?

Yes 71
No 21

This issue is always extremely popular with the voters of Raleigh. They want developers to pay their fair share for the cost of growth, as was shown visibly through last fall's election. While the city continues to study the issue, it appears that there is a significant mandate from its residents to go ahead with a plan to double the fees. Interestingly, there is bipartisan support for this concept. It's not big surprise that 77% of Democrats are in favor of it, but 60% of Republicans are too.

Would you support a half cent increase in property taxes to make improvements to the City of Raleigh’s bus system?

Yes 32
No 57

There is not much support for raising taxes to enhance the city's bus system at this time.

Bottom line: parts of the Meeker agenda are popular with the electorate, others less so. But if the City Council wants to take some steps to address the nagging issues of impact fees and teardowns, they will have the strong support of their electorate.

Full results here.