This spring, as the Phoenix City Council debated whether to pass a controversial parks ordinance that would ban distributing food and providing medical care to homeless people in city parks, the city commissioned a survey to gauge public sentiment on the issue.
But despite survey questions seemingly slanted to drum up support for the ordinance — which the city council ultimately passed — survey responses were overwhelmingly opposed to it. The results were never publicized.
Phoenix New Times obtained the buried survey via a public records request. One expert — Mike Noble, the CEO and founder of Noble Predictive Insights, a nonpartisan polling firm that was not involved with the city’s survey — found numerous methodological issues with the survey, which appears to have been stuffed in a metaphorical drawer…