What Six Months of Surveys Tell Us About Piqua
Vol. III, No. 307 - What Piqua is Saying in our Community Survey
Over the past three years, this publication has put out periodic surveys asking residents how they feel about the community they live in. We ask the same questions every other month — about the direction of the city, about confidence in the future, about how connected people feel to the place they call home. Only since last September though, have there been enough responses in Piqua to actually analyze.
The first thing that stands out is the wrong direction number. In September 2025, 75 percent of Piqua residents said their city was heading in the wrong direction. That was not a number we expected to hold. Strong opening signals in surveys sometimes soften as more residents engage with the process and the questions become more familiar. That did not happen here. In November 2025, the wrong direction number rose to 80 percent. In March 2026, it came in at 81 percent.
Over six months, the share of Piqua residents who say their city is going the wrong direction has moved in only one direction — up.
The right track number has stayed in a narrow range the entire time — between 8 and 16 percent. At no point in our three surveys has even one in five Piqua residents said the city is on the right track.
The confidence data follows the same line. This publication asks residents whether they believe things will improve in Piqua over the next year. The combined “not confident” response — including both somewhat not confident and not confident at all — has run at 55 percent or higher in every survey period. In November 2025, 40 percent of residents said they were not confident at all. That is the single sharpest response in that category across all three surveys.
What is just as telling is the “no change” response. In each survey period, roughly 20 to 24 percent of residents said they expect things to stay exactly the same. Add that to the not confident numbers and you find that in every survey, more than 75 percent of Piqua residents either expect things to get worse or expect nothing to change at all.
That leaves a narrow slice — typically fewer than 25 percent — who believe improvement is coming.
The awareness numbers give this context. Last month, 74 percent of Piqua respondents said they are extremely or very aware of local government and community affairs. That number was 70 percent in September 2025 and 73 percent in November 2025. What does this tell us?
Piqua has a well-informed resident base. The negative direction and confidence numbers are not coming from people who are disconnected from the facts. They are coming from people who are paying close attention.
Community attachment has softened slightly over the six months we have been surveying. Last September, 65 percent of residents said they love or like Piqua. That held at 65 percent in November but shifted internally — more residents moved from love to like, and the share who said they do not like their community reached 19 percent. In March, the combined love and like number recovered to 74 percent.
The overall picture is of a community that still has a connection to this city but is running low on confidence that anyone is steering it in the right direction.
Six months of data is not a long track record. But when consecutive surveys land within a few points of each other on the most critical questions, the trend is hard to argue with. Piqua residents are paying attention, they care about this city, and they believe it is headed the wrong way.
That is the baseline we are working from. Civic Capacity will keep asking the questions.
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