SG Citizen Survey yields encouraging results

December 20, 2013

By Natalie Juns | Elburn Herald

SUGAR GROVE—The Sugar Grove Village Board on Tuesday discussed the results of the village’s 2013 Citizen Survey. Results from the survey were generally positive, though residents reported dissatisfaction with economic development and cable TV.

The cable TV issue is essentially out of the Village Board’s hands, as Sugar Grove currently has a Cable Television Franchise Agreement with Mediacom.

“From the survey, we found they want more businesses and jobs. It’s all economic development,” village trustee Rick Montalto said. “As far as cable TV, maybe we should compare how many people have Mediacom now versus a couple of years ago. I dumped Mediacom this year. Now I have Direct TV (for television) and AT&T for Internet.”

An additional resident complaint pertained to the purity of the village’s water. Director of Public Works Anthony Speciale mentioned that they have brought up the purity of the water in recent years.

“Since 2007, we have improved the purity of the water from 52 percent to 72 percent in 2013,” Speciale said.

It was mentioned by several board members that although the purity level is high, it might be hard for residents to recognize the change over that many years.

Village President Sean Michels recognized that a high percentage of residents enjoy reading the village newsletter.

“I think it would be good to write a quarterly or semi-annual newsletter, since a lot of residents like reading it already,” Michels said. “More newsletters throughout the year would give us an opportunity to notify the residents of what we are doing throughout the year. Maybe, we could send it to them, as well.”

Trustee Mari Johnson brought up the idea of including a couple of pages of village information in the Sugar Grove Park District booklet.

“The Park District publishes a booklet three times a year. I think it might be a good idea to pay to have a couple of pages of village information in their booklet,” she said.

The survey results included compliments regarding Public Works’ Tree Replacement Program.

“We found that 90 percent of people would recommend Sugar Grove as a great place to live for people they know. We have a lot of happy residents,” Speciale said.