Development and validation of a community concerns report method

Although survey research and needs assessment methods have been applied in communities, few systematic and practical methods for structuring the involvement of neighbors in community improvement are available. Systematic procedures for identifying perceived strengths and problems of a locality might be used by neighborhood improvement associations, block organizations, and other citizen groups to set local agendas for community action. The development and validation of a Community Concerns Report method to identify strengths, problems, and ideas for improvement from the perspective of neighborhood residents are described. The validity of the method is examined in a discussion of rating data from consumers and relevant judges, from measures of internal validity, and from measures of correspondence between the concerns identified with this method and with that of a city survey. Test-retest reliability of the method is examined in measurements from repeated administrations of the instrument. The steps of the method are detailed, and its usefulness as a tool for locality development is discussed.