If the Metro Council asked for good news for Christmas, perhaps Santa brought it to the Council a little early, in an unconventional package.
A DHM Research survey of Oregonians found that there's public support for the regional government's main policy points among metro-area residents.
DHM's 2013 Oregon Values & Beliefs Survey, sponsored by OHSU, OPB, the Oregon Community Foundation and Oregon State University, looked at attitudes on topics ranging from economic development to health care to civil rights, and then broke down those results by region.
DHM Research principal Adam Davis ran through the survey with the Metro Council last week, highlighting results from residents living in Clackamas, Multnomah and Washington counties. About 43 percent of Oregonians live in the three Portland-area counties.
The top issue of discussion at the Metro Council's Dec. 17 work session was economic development, topics that presented the biggest dichotomies in the DHM study.
When asked the most important thing they wanted the government to do something about, 15 percent of Oregonians and 12 percent of Metro-area residents said either unemployment or economic growth, with unemployment being the top answer statewide and ranked second in the Portland region.
The DHM poll then asked people how much they support no less than 20 government services.
"Which one of these was at the very bottom of these 20 services? Economic development subsidies and tax breaks," Davis said.
"They want jobs at the top," said Metro Councilor Carlotta Collette, " and they want to pay for them at the bottom."
"But they want us to be involved in jobs and economic development," Metro Councilor Craig Dirksen said later in the work session.
"They don't want economic development that they don't perceive as helping small business," Davis said. "They see it all going to these big multinational companies. They don't necessarily understand that there's an effect on their communities, and that other small businesses benefit."
More broadly, Oregonians "consider the same issues to be important," he said. "We consider the same government services to be the most important. And right now, we're all feeling really negative about government and elected officials."
How negative? Nearly two-thirds of tri-county area residents surveyed agreed that "Government is wasteful and inefficient with our taxes and cannot be trusted to make good decisions." That was on par with results statewide.
That may look like a big lump of coal for a government that regulates outward growth and manages the trash and recycling system, is increasingly looking at roles in economic development and is trying to address a state mandate to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
But the DHM survey seems to indicate that Oregonians, especially those in the Metro area, support the things that government does, even if they don't like the government that's doing things.
Almost 70 percent of the region's residents say new development should happen in cities, and farmland should be preserved, compared to 23 percent who said new development should be outside of urban growth boundaries. Sixty percent of Metro-area residents said it's desirable for new growth to be in cities and towns, not natural areas and farmlands.
Only 19 percent of Metro-area residents said land use laws should be revamped to permit more development.
Sixty-one percent of Metro-area residents said there should be stronger regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while just 19 percent said it would be desirable for Oregonians to not change the way they live, and instead let science solve climate change.
Those numbers were only a couple of percentage points off from statewide and Willamette Valley numbers.
More than two-thirds of Metro-area residents said there should be a priority for building more public infrastructure, and 59 percent said there should be more public transportation. About 49 percent said they want to see investment in new roads and highways.
More than three-quarters of Portland region residents surveyed said protection of water and air quality should be a priority.