Linn County is having a special election on July 24, 2007 in which voters will be asked how they would like to elect County Supervisors. In a poll conducted by KCRG-TV9 and The Gazette, Plan 3 was favored, particularly among rural respondents and likley voters.

Voters will have to pick one from the three choices below:
• Plan One: At Large; all board members would be elected by the entire county. They may live anywhere in Linn County. This is the system the county has now.
• Plan Two: At large by District; all board members would be elected by the entire county, but the board member must live within the district they represent.
• Plan Three: District by District; board members must live in the district they represent and only those voters within the district may vote for those board members.

The Poll:
Demographics of Respondents (Linn County Registered Voters):
Gender - 47% Male, 53% Female
Age - 32% 18-35 years old, 37% 35-55 years old, 31% 56+
78% of the respondents live in the metro area (Cedar Rapids, Marion, Hiawatha, Robins), with 22% of the respondents living in rural areas.

Question 1:
Before today, were you aware of the special election coming up on July 24th, that will ask Linn County residents to decide how Linn County Supervisors are elected?
51% - Yes
48% - No
1% - No Answer

*There are a higher percentage of rural respondents that are aware of the upcoming special election. In total, 56% of the registered voters in the rural area are aware of the special election, compared to 50% of the registered voters in the metro area. Additionally, 58% of the men are aware of this election, compared to 45% of the women. And, 68% of those age 56+ are aware of this election, compared to 54% of those 36-55 and 32% of those 18-35.

Question 2:
If the special election were held today, would you like the county supervisors to be elected by Play 1, Plan 2 or Plan 3?
Registered Voters:
11% - Plan 1
14% - Plan 2
63% - Plan 3
12% - Don't Know
Likely Voters:
5% - Plan 1
15% - Plan 2
70% - Plan 3
10% Don't Know
Metro Respondents
12% - Plan 1
17% - Plan 2
60% - Plan 3
11% - Don't Know
Rural Respondents
7% - Plan 1
8% - Plan 2
73% - Plan 3
12% - Don't Know
*Plan 3 seems to be the favored choice, particularly among rural respondents and likely voters. A 'likely voter' is defined as a respondent who is awre of this issue, who plans to vote on Tuesday and who voted last fall to expand the Linn County Board of Supervisors from three to five members.

Voting Information:
The voting locations will be open from 7:00 AM to 8:00 PM and voters should go to their normal (general election) precincts.

Voters in CR-30 will be voting at the Peace Christian Church, 6600 C Ave NE with CR-29 Voters.

From Monday July 9th through Friday July 20th, the Auditor's office will be open from 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM for election business.

Monday July 23rd the office will be open from 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM.

Survey Methodology:
The results of this survey are based on 450 completed interviews with Linn county registered voters. Interviewing took place on Monday, July 16 and Tuesday July 17, 2007. Interviewing took place between the hours of 3:00 p.m. and 9 p.m.

Each household with a phone in Linn County had an equal chance of being called. When an original call on the first household designated by the sample failed to result in a complete interview, two additional calls were made to the phone number. Up to three attempts were made to that phone number before that number was disqualified from the sample.

The gender and age demographics of the 450 completed surveys were compared with the age and gender demographics of all registered voters in Linn County. The Survey data was weighted against the age and gender breakdown identified by the Linn County registration file. The weighting procedure prevents data being skewed and it allows the entire data set to accurately represent all adults in Linn County.

In a random sample of 450, the probability of error at the 95% confidence level is a maximum of +/-4.6 percentage points. This means that 95 times out of 100 when the sample of approximately 450 is used, the percentages reported for the total sample on each question will lie within +/-4.6 points of the true percentages that would have been found if the entire population had been interviewd. This limit of error applies to percentages of about 50%.