Layton residents are invited to participate in the Utah Wellbeing Project, an in-depth survey conducted for cities gauging the feelings of residents about several aspects of life — from their natural surroundings to cultural opportunities and mental health. The Utah Wellbeing Survey aims to track perspectives from Layton citizens on wellbeing and change. The goal is to provide information to support local planning processes. The new online survey is conducted in partnership with Layton City leaders who help promote survey participation. Dr. Courtney Flint at Utah State University administers the survey, intends to analyze the data, and report the results back to the city.
Dr. Flint started with a modest idea that has significantly grown into an annual statewide project that now helps cities shape policy to reflect their residents. Why is participation in the survey important? Utah communities are changing rapidly. Keeping a finger on the pulse of the wellbeing and attitudes about community issues helps promote sound planning and decision making to support the overall quality of Layton. The survey tracks demographic characteristics, allowing transparency on the representativeness of survey participants and varying insights within the community.
For city leaders, the project is also specifically diving in to a study of the impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic. With over 25 cities of different sizes and experiences participating to date, the Utah Wellbeing Project can compare wellbeing information across cities and clusters of cities. This helps city leaders and planners see how they are doing compared to others. This effort can facilitate dialogue and sharing of ideas to address important issues as communities plan their futures.
Participating cities can use the data as part of their general planning processes and for capital improvement prioritization. Survey findings can be used to test assumptions about how residents are doing and to compare with other sources of information about local perspectives. Findings may help to frame and support planning recommendations. Running the survey over time can help track wellbeing in relation to plan implementation and other local changes.
Last year, Utahns seemed to feel pretty good. The average wellbeing score was 4.07 on a 1-5 scale, and that’s considered high, according to Dr. Flint. That survey was before COVID-19 changed life in Utah in several ways.
Flint won’t have a full set of results available for Layton City for several months, but she has observed trends from other communities that completed the survey. Utahns in a number of cities say their sense of well-being has expectedly declined.