Poll: Crime, Schools Are DC’s Biggest Issues

Last week we asked Borderstan.com readers to choose the biggest issue facing Washington, DC. A total of 200 readers voted and “crime” was the choice of nearly one-half (49.5%) followed by “public schools” at 22%. “High Housing Costs” and “High Tax Rates” finished a distant third and fourth, respectively. Next came “Development-Related Issues” at 4.5% followed by “Local Economy/Unemployment” and “Transportation/Metro/Parking,” each with 3%.

Here is how 200 respondents answered, “What is DC’s Biggest Issue?” in this extremely unreliable, unrepresentative and unscientific survey:

1. Crime: 49.5% (99 votes)
2. Public Schools: 22.0% (44 votes)
3. High Housing Costs: 8.5% (17 votes)
4. High Tax Rates: 6.5% (13 votes)
5. Development-Related Issues: 4.5% (9 votes)
6. Local Economy/Unemployment: 3.0% (6 votes)
7. Transportation/Metro/Parking: 3.0% (6 votes)
8. Other: 3.0% (6 votes)

Some of the comments we received:

1. Crime and HIV/Aids are the two biggest issues and its difficult to choose one over the other but I put other as my selection since HIV wasn’t one of the choices and it should be. Thanks for doing the poll and I appreciate your information about our great neighborhoods. Jack from Dupont (16th and Q)
2. To frame this, I thought of it as “what keeps people from moving to or staying in DC”? And I went with crime, but upon further reflection (it’s still early) I think “development issues” are at the heart of that and many of the related problems (Schools). So that’s a bit of a cop-out, but it also does have the biggest impact. Also, agree with Jack that HIV/Aids is a big one.
3. DCRA-HIV-CRIME
4. I voted “public schools” due to the interwoven nature of education with some of the other issues. Education is a crime issue, because children learning, gaining self confidence and setting life goals are less likely to become engaged in criminal activity. Education is both a development and tax issue, because even the great recent influx of urban residents can become an unreliable churn if they zip out to the ‘burbs upon having children. Education is obviously an economy/jobs issue, as too many of DC’s youth are departing school (I did not use the word graduating) ill prepared for the workplace, much less growing into a situation in life where they can employ others and grow jobs.