Public Opinion Poll: Philadelphians are Optimistic about Their City But Residents are Split Over Budget Options

A year into his term as mayor, Michael Nutter is getting mostly high marks from city residents. And Philadelphians are more optimistic about their city than they have been in some time. Yet, Philadelphians don't like some of the actions the mayor has taken so far to deal with the city's massive budget shortfall, and there is no public consensus about where he should go from here.

These are some of the findings of a wide-ranging new poll of 1,600 city residents commissioned by The Pew Charitable Trusts' Philadelphia Research Initiative and conducted by Abt SRBI Public Affairs, working with Rutgers Professor Cliff Zukin.

The survey was conducted by telephone between January 2 and January 19 among a citywide random sample of 1,600 city residents, ages 18 and older. Most of the survey was completed before January 15, when Mayor Nutter announced that the city's budget shortfall was bigger than previously projected. Interviews were conducted with 1,200 landline users and 400 cell phone users to reach a broad representative sample of Philadelphians.