Westword
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Back in September, Westword announced we were taking a poll of our readers to compare with results from the newly formed Colorado Polling Institute, which released its first survey of Denver’s likely 2024 election voters in August.
Well, the results are in.
CPI respondents depicted a city divided over whether it’s headed in the right direction, while also identifying homelessness and housing affordability as top issues for voters. Westword’s results largely matched up with their sentiment, though our readers say homelessness, crime and public safety are the city’s top issues, while housing affordability comes in next.
Westword readers also seem to be more dissatisfied than those surveyed by the CPI, giving lower approval ratings to every entity identified in the survey. Additionally, when compared to the CPI’s finding that 44 percent of people think Denver is currently on the right track – while another 44 percent think it’s heading in the wrong direction – Westword‘s readers are less optimistic.
Of the more than 300 people reached, 38 percent said the Mile City City is currently on the right track and 56.1 percent said it’s headed the wrong way.
“We’re pleased our Denver poll continues to draw attention to many of the issues facing Colorado’s capital city, and we hope to provide a similar spark with our first statewide poll later this year,” says Curtis Hubbard, senior advisor with the CPI, of Westword‘s survey.
The CPI reached just over 400 people with its inaugural poll, which Brent Buchanan – a pollster with Cygnal, one of the two organizations to oversee the questionnaire – said is a solid number during a media briefing on September 8.
“Four hundred is a really good sample for the size of a city,” he noted. “If you do a statewide survey, a 600 sample size is accurate.”
Our method wasn’t as scientific as the one used by the CPI, which was founded earlier this year by social entrepreneur and investor David Carlson with the goal of providing accurate and publicly accessible information about issues in the state; Westword just made a Google Form using the CPI questions and didn’t collect any demographic information, since Google Forms just isn’t secure enough for that. This means people could have sneakily completed the form multiple times and we’d be none the wiser.
Still, Westword hopes the results offer another look at where Denver’s residents stand in a time of transition.
“It’s an interesting time for Denver,” Kevin Ingham, a pollster with Aspect Strategic – the other polling entity used by the CPI – told Westword in September. “The city’s still recovering from pandemic-induced challenges. Denver has its first new mayor in twelve years. … Half the city council members are new.”
The CPI asked voters for their opinions on the city council, the Denver Police Department, the Regional Transportation District and Denver International Airport. All achieved positive favorability.
In Westword‘s poll, however, only DIA came out in the positive.
City Council, meanwhile, is considered unfavorable by 52.6 percent of those surveyed, while the DPD is considered unfavorable by 51.6 percent. RTD got the worst results, with 55.8 percent of respondents rating it unfavorably.
Despite seemingly endless complaints about DIA, 59 percent of Westword respondents rated it favorably. In the CPI poll, 71.1 percent did so – showing that our respondents were consistently more unhappy, even on the items they’re happy with.
“When it comes to DIA, we’re asking people just, ‘How do you feel about your airport?'” Ingham offered on DIA’s high ranking in September. “It’s not specific things about how it operates or how people feel about the Grand Hall construction or anything like that.”
As far as Denver Mayor Mike Johnston is concerned, respondents tracked with the CPI survey, with 39.7 percent ranking him favorably, 24.2 percent with no opinion and 32.5 percent describing him as unfavorable. In the CPI poll, 46 percent ranked him favorably, 28.3 percent had no opinion and 22.2 percent ranked him unfavorably.
Johnston’s homelessness plan had many respondents feeling like they didn’t know enough to give an opinion in August, when the CPI conducted its survey and the plan was newer. Of those who replied to Westword, only 14.5 percent said they didn’t know enough to approve or disapprove.
Instead, 44.2 percent approve and 38.4 percent disapprove.
Westword‘s readers are even more gung-ho on encampment sweeps than the CPI respondents: The CPI survey found 65 percent of people in support; Westword recorded 73.9 percent.
One of the closest results came on the financial strain that Denver’s current housing situation causes, with 64.2 percent of Westword‘s respondents saying it has some or significant strain on their budgets and 65 percent telling CPI the same.
One of Johnston’s other priorities since taking office has been revitalizing downtown Denver, as seen with the recent announcement of grants designed to bring events to the area.
“What we know is that downtown Denver is the economic hub of the city of Denver,” Johnston said at an October 10 press conference. “We know as downtown Denver succeeds in its economic and social recovery, so goes the rest of the city and the rest of the region, and so we’re very committed to making sure downtown Denver is a place that feels vibrant and safe and welcoming to residents, to workers, to visitors all the time.”
Both the CPI and Westword found in each of the polls that people aren’t optimistic about the recovery of the city center, though they report that a majority of people feel safe in the Mile High City. Another result that falls in line with the CPI survey is the feeling about reducing the time city officials can spend in office from three consecutive terms to two.
In Westword‘s survey, 64.8 percent of people support that idea and 63 percent of the CPI respondents do, too.
Westword readers are slightly more jazzed about the concept of ranked-choice voting, with 53.6 percent saying they support the system compared to the CPI’s 48 percent finding.
While many of the results between the two surveys had a similar outcome, the CPI encourages people to pay attention to those with slightly more stringent methods than Westword‘s, when possible.
“A scientific approach to polling is the best way to gather opinion that is reflective of the diversity – be it racial and ethnic, socioeconomic, or geographic – of voters in Denver and Colorado, and we hope people continue to find value in our work,” Hubbard concludes.
