Among the big takeaways in a recent survey by the community organization Peekskill Walks were concern about reckless driving and support for Esther Place.

“We knew that people were concerned about reckless driving and speeding,” says Conor Greene, co-founder and executive director of Peekskill Walks. “The survey responses solidified that.” Three quarters of survey respondents said that speeding and reckless driving is an issue in their neighborhood. “This is a serious alarm that is being sounded,” said Greene. “If there’s any number in the survey that City Hall needs to look at, it’s this number.”

While the group, founded in 2019, wants safe, accessible streets, it also wants strong, healthy neighborhoods, and a vibrant downtown.

“Our favorite takeaway,” Greene said, was related to the Esther Street closure, which 92 percent of respondents said they want to make permanent. “We knew it was very popular,” Greene said, and now he has numbers to prove it.

Greene believes the numbers are important. “We wanted to get a better and more data-driven sense of what our neighbors are thinking,” he said. “A big part of Vision Zero–something cities including Peekskill have adopted–is using data to determine what the issues are and where the resources should go.” According to its website, Vision Zero is a strategy to eliminate all traffic fatalities while increasing safe, healthy, equitable mobility for all.

Greene said that Ben Freiman, a Hunter College graduate student and part of Hunter’s Urban Planning Program–helped Peekskill Walks create and conduct the survey.

“A lot went into it,” Greene said. “Both what we wanted to find out and how to put together a solid, scientific survey. We wanted this data to be useful and meaningful and represent as wide a part of Peekskill as possible.”

Greene said that the organization was “very cognizant of going beyond our normal reach.” They emailed the survey to dozens of community groups. They had it translated into Spanish and got it out to the churches as well as the Peekskill Hispanic Community Corporation.

“Lots of Peekskill businesses and organizations helped spread the word,” Greene said. Peekskill Coffee House put the survey on its tables. Copy Center & Services helped print materials. And to encourage responses, 140 Kitchen donated a $100 gift card to be given to a random respondent.

During the six weeks it was live in the spring, the survey garnered nearly 900 responses. About 85 percent of the responses came from Peekskill residents. And while the majority of respondents identified as white, there were responses from a wide range of ethnicities. The responses also came from people of all ages and from neighborhoods across the city.

“We do feel like the survey and the results are pretty representative of what people are thinking,” Greene said. “We think we got meaningful information from this.”

Peekskill Walks has presented the survey results to the Rotary and wants to put out a formal report to share all of its findings. “We want to get it out to the community, to elected officials, to nonprofits–everyone who cares about Peekskill,” Greene said of what he called, “probably the most comprehensive public survey that’s been done in Peekskill in the last few years.”

“Our hope is that City Hall looks at it and listens to what the community is saying,” Greene said. “It’s not gospel, but it does tell a story and may challenge some preconceived notions. It also gives some support to things they’re already doing.”

He added, “We would love for the BID and the Chamber to dive into the responses of what would make people spend more time downtown.” And as far as safety is concerned, Greene said, “Our DPW, our planning, our city manager, our police chief should be reading through this list of what areas should be made safer for pedestrians. Residents put a lot of time into this and are giving you a lot of information saying where they do not feel safe. “

Greene said he looks forward to sharing the surveys many important takeaways. Among his favorites is that “people really care about Peekskill.” More than two-thirds of respondents rated optimism about Peekskill on a scale of one to ten at seven or above. “Despite the issues and challenges we all see,” he said, “people are really glad to be here and feel optimistic about the city’s future. I think that’s a great thing.”