The fourth item in this series examined the question of taxpayers and the TPA.  This instalment looks the Billy Bishop Toronto Centre Airport (BBTCA) and the ruination of the waterfront. 

http://www.torontoport.com/PortAuthority/media_content.asp?id=439

The TPA version

Fact: Three successive annual public opinion surveys show that Torontonians support the TPA in its efforts to improve the waterfront and initiatives to improve access to the BBTCA, including a proposed pedestrian tunnel.

The TPA is undertaking a wide array of initiatives to enhance the quality of the environment in the waterfront, not just at the BBTCA but throughout the harbour area. These include:
• An agreement to purchase power from renewable sources through Bullfrog Power;
• Investing $900,000 in sound barriers at the airport;
• Investing $1 million to create protective islands and fish habitat wetlands at Tommy Thompson Park;
• A transition to green lubricants on TPA machinery, vessels and vehicles;
• Aggressive enforcement of anti-idling rules for vehicles using TPA facilities;
• Encouraging the use of shuttle buses and public transit to and from the airport;
• Altering approach protocols for aircraft landing at the airport to burn less fuel.
The TPA is looking forward to enhancing our waterfront around BBTCA with the help and input of a permanent advisory committee made up of community members and other stakeholders.

The CommunityAIR version

In responding to the charge that the airport is ruining the waterfront, the TPA’s fact does not tackle the question head on.  Their response, “Three successive annual public opinion surveys show that Torontonians support the TPA in its efforts to improve the waterfront... .”, is the answer to a different question.  It answers an unasked question - Do Torontonians support the TPA in its efforts to improve the waterfront.

Nevertheless, since the TPA relies so heavily on the results of the surveys, it may prove worthwhile to scrutinize both the survey instrument and the answers.

In an August 14, 2009 letter to Mayor Miller designed to win City approval of the TPA’s planned pedestrian tunnel to the airport, TPA Chairman McQueen portrays Pollara Strategic Insights, the firm that the TPA has used for the last three years for their annual survey, as independent.

Pollara says this about themselves, “We don’t just measure public opinion, we manage it.  We develop short term and long term data-driven public affairs strategies that impact on public opinion, reshaping or reinforcing it, with a view to influencing public behaviour.  Public opinion affects all decisions made in both the private and public sector.  The POLLARA affairs team assists decision-makers by managing opinion to achieve their desired outcome.”

Go to http://www.pollara.ca/ and click on Sectors to read the rest.

Pollara’s 2008 survey for the TPA, Toronto Port Authority’s Image Tracking Study, 2008, Topline Results, August 2008, seems to give several examples of the instrument design intended to produce a certain result.  http://www.torontoport.com/PortAuthority/REPORTS/TPA%20-%202008%20POLLARA%20SURVEY%20-%20INTERVIEW%20SCHEDULE.pdf

Question 8 asks respondents to rate their impression of the TPA as unfavourable or favourable.  The mean score comes out pretty much in the middle, 5.08, neither unfavourable nor favourable.

The next ten questions, 9 to 18 inclusive, ask respondents if their impression of the TPA changes after each of the questions.  The ten questions follow.

Q.   9  Carries out dredging to prevent flooding around the Don River?

Q.10 Provides transportation, distribution, storage and container services to

          businesses?

Q.11  Designed and constructed the Leslie Street Spit, a breakwater protection

          for the harbor area, including Centre Island?

Q.1 2 Ensures safe and efficient movement of ships in the harbor including

          sailboats?

Q.13 Grants permits to recreational boaters in the harbor of Toronto?

Q.14  Removes pollution and contaminated garbage from the Don River and the

          inner harbour?

Q.15 Created a wetland in cooperation with conservation authorities protect

         wildlife habitats along the waterfront?

Q.16 The Toronto Port Authority should help manage the sustainable the

         growth of Toronto?

Q.17 The Toronto Port Authority plays a vital role in the environmental wellbeing

         of our City?

Q.18 The Toronto Port Authority provides important economic benefits to the

         City?

In each instance the respondents’ impression of the TPA improved by a mean score of one or more and in some cases two points. 

With all of those motherhood issues that the TPA is looking after, preventing flooding, protecting Centre Island, granting (NOTE – not selling) permits to recreational boaters, removing pollution and contaminated (not ordinary) garbage, and protecting wildlife habitats, is it any wonder that the TPA can claim the survey shows that “Torontonians support the TPA in its efforts to improve the waterfront... .”

The TPA’s claim that three successive annual public opinion surveys show that Torontonians support the TPA in its efforts to improve access to the BBTCA, including a proposed pedestrian tunnel.  However, the subject doesn’t come up in the 2007 survey.

http://www.torontoport.com/PortAuthority/REPORTS/Polara2007.pdf

 As for the 2009 results, Pollara seems to have employed the same methodology for airport questions in order to allow the TPA to claim broad public support.

http://www.torontoport.com/PortAuthority/notices/4049%20TPA%20Interview%20Schedule.pdf

Up until Question 22, the survey uses the approach described above to establish the TPA in a favourable light.  Once the respondents have been enlightened as to the good that the TPA is doing, Question 22 asks if respondents believe it should be abolished and its duties, including two of motherhood duties, taken over by the City.  Should it come as any surprise that 58% oppose?

Once opposition to a City takeover is established, respondents are asked to respond to a long, confusing hypothetical question. Question 23 asks, “If, as part of this take over, the City of Toronto closed the Toronto City Centre Airport and removed Porter Airlines, how would this impact your support or opposition to the Toronto Port Authority being abolished and the City of Toronto taking over the Port's duties? Would it make you more supportive, more opposed, or would it have no impact on your support or opposition to this move? Is that much more or somewhat more supportive/opposed?

A website that is geared towards creating surveys for the human resources sector, lists a number of pitfalls to be aware of when formulating questions.  See ‘Things to Avoid When Constructing Items’ at http://www.hr-survey.com/ItemConstruction.htm.  Although the examples on the website are for human resources work, the principles behind the question construction are universal.  For example, Question 23 above is an “if” question, and “if” questions are potentially confusing and confusing questions may be used to elicit a desired response rather than to find information objectively.

Then there are the questions that totally mislead in order to manufacture support.

Q28: I'd like to read you some statements about the proposed pedestrian tunnel. For each, please tell me if it makes you much more supportive, somewhat more supportive, somewhat more opposed, much more opposed, or has no impact upon your support or opposition to building this pedestrian tunnel to the Toronto City Centre Airport. How about - The tunnel would save the City of Toronto around $2.5 million that it currently spends each winter on ferry services for the permanent residents of the Toronto Islands?

Q29: I'd like to read you some statements about the proposed pedestrian tunnel. For each, please tell me if it makes you much more supportive, somewhat more supportive, somewhat more opposed, much more opposed, or has no impact upon your support or opposition to building this pedestrian tunnel to the Toronto City Centre Airport. How about - The tunnel's construction costs are eligible to be covered by the federal government's infrastructure stimulus program?

Q30: I'd like to read you some statements about the proposed pedestrian tunnel. For each, please tell me if it makes you much more supportive, somewhat more supportive, somewhat more opposed, much more opposed, or has no impact upon your support or opposition to building this pedestrian tunnel to the Toronto City Centre Airport. How about - The tunnel would improve access to the Toronto islands for all residents, not just airport users?

Questions 28 and 30 have no validity.  The tunnel’s stated purpose is to provide access to the airport -  full stop.  There is no way that any pedestrian once reaching the airport will be allowed across a busy runway to get to the rest of the island. 

As for Question 29, only projects with March 31, 2011 completion dates are eligible for federal Infrastructure money.  The survey was carried out last summer.  Given the complexity of the project and the length of the bureaucratic process to get the project approved and the funds released, it simply couldn’t be completed on time.

Would a firm which wasn’t looking to manage public opinion ask such questions? 

Based on the above information, the TPA’s claim that, ‘Three successive annual public opinion surveys show that Torontonians support the TPA in its efforts to improve the waterfront and initiatives to improve access to the BBTCA, including a proposed pedestrian tunnel.’ doesn’t seem very factual.

As for the TPA’s green initiatives listed above, with the exception of the noise barriers, the TPA is to be applauded.  Until details as to their design and effectiveness are known, the noise barriers stand to simply re-direct the noise to Hanlan’s beach, Hanlan’s park picnickers and the Island Yacht Club.

And the permanent advisory committee?  It will work when the TPA proves that it is willing to hear what residents are saying and make compromises that actually show that the TPA has changed the way the TPA does business.

Bob Kotyk