What residents like -- and dislike

By Susan Strother Clarke, The Orlando Sentinel

Mary Donnelly is keeping her fingers crossed.

Despite stock market losses, a sluggish economy and the threat of war, Donnelly recently opened her own business, spending $30,000 to prepare and equip the offices of Zero Gravity in Winter Park.

Her "float spa" allows customers to relax in tanks of warm water loaded with Epsom salts. So far traffic is slow, but the 43-year-old Donnelly is hopeful that word of the treatments will spread.
"I'm expecting it might take some time for people to learn about us, but it's like that for all small businesses," she said.

For the newly minted entrepreneur, things in Central Florida seem to be moving in the right direction -- and that's a feeling shared by a majority of the people in this region.

According to a survey to be released later this week, residents of the Orlando area are relatively happy to be living here. They consider Central Florida a friendly community and a good place to build a business, raise a family or retire to.

Yet enthusiasm about the area is tempered by local problems. Residents are concerned about traffic congestion and schools. They think the region is growing too fast. And there is some disparity between counties, with Brevard residents seeming the happiest and those in Osceola the least happy by some measures.

Moreover, personal finances are deteriorating: Two-thirds of those polled say their financial situations are the same or worse than a year ago, and nearly one-third have postponed a major purchase such as a home or car.

The comprehensive survey, and another just like it from the Tampa area, will be released this week by the Orlando Regional Chamber of Commerce at its three-day Regional Leadership Conference. About 400 people are expected to attend the event, which begins Wednesday at the Gaylord Palms Resort and Convention Center in Kissimmee.

The two polls cost $100,000 and have been paid for by the Orlando chamber and the Tampa Bay Partnership, an economic-development group on Florida's west coast. The surveys took the pulse of registered voters in the Orlando and Tampa areas Oct. 15-24. Identical questions were asked of about 1,100 people in each area. The surveys' results will provide a foundation for some of the discussion at the regional conference among community and business leaders.

"Before we begin to talk about solutions, we need to talk first about where we are. That is what the research does," said Jacob Stuart, the Orlando chamber's president.

The Orlando-area survey seems to show that the region's residents feel generally optimistic -- even as consumer confidence has dropped both nationally and statewide.

Most interestingly, analysts said, consumer sentiment in Central Florida hasn't dropped as dramatically as might have been expected since last year, when the chamber commissioned a similar survey just five weeks after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

For instance, 51 percent of residents this year said the Orlando region is moving in the right direction. That's down substantially from the 68 percent that said the region was moving in the right direction last year -- but that drop is not as big as it may seem, said John Sowinski, a partner at Consensus Communications, an Orlando company that conducted the survey and analyzed the results with Hill Research Associates, a Texas firm.

Last year's "right direction" results were artificially high because the question was asked soon after the terrorist attacks, when the nation was literally rallying around the flag, Sowinski said. This year's survey, in contrast, was taken just weeks before Tuesday's election, as voters were bombarded with negative campaign messages about how things could be better if another person or party were in charge.

In that context, this year's numbers are "very, very good," Sowinski said. "The right-direction, wrong-track [question] is pretty comprehensive. It's good, considering we are in the middle of an election."

The Central Florida survey reached into seven counties, including Orange, Osceola, Seminole, Lake, Volusia, Brevard and Polk.

By some measures, residents of Brevard County seemed the most upbeat: Sixty-three percent said the region was headed in the right direction, and fewer than one in five said their quality of life was below what it had been three years ago.

By contrast, Osceola County had nearly the smallest share of "right direction" responses -- 44 percent. The county also tied with Lake as having the largest number of "wrong track" responses at 40 percent.

Still, across the region, a number of quality-of-life issues rated fairly high. Most people -- in some instances, more than 80 percent -- rated Central Florida as a friendly place with good race relations. They said the region was a good place to raise a family and a good place to retire to. They wanted to see more manufacturing and high-tech jobs -- and even more tourism jobs, despite the low pay associated with that industry.

The community is fairly well wired, with more than 70 percent of respondents reporting that they have Internet access at home. And nearly three-quarters thought the region was a good place to build a new business.

That's certainly the hope of Donnelly, the Winter Park business owner. After spending much of her career in Chicago, where she worked in human resources, Donnelly moved to Central Florida three years ago and pursued her creative side. Opening her own business was something she always wanted to do.

"Instead of working for someone else and putting in the hours, I really wanted to do it for me," she said. "The risk is greater but the rewards can be, too."

Still, she conceded that her financial situation is in some ways weaker than it was a year ago. "Especially right now, I have a lot of money sunk into the business. I am in some debt. I am juggling things."

Others may be making similar adjustments. In the past year, Central Floridians have watched the stock market shed billions of dollars of worth, and seen their portfolios and retirement funds similarly decline.

Despite historically low interest rates, nearly one in three residents -- more than in last year's poll -- postponed a major purchase, electing not to buy a home, automobile or major appliance as they had planned.

Additionally, one of every three residents said their personal financial situations was better now than a year ago -- but the remainder evenly split between things being worse or about the same.
Meanwhile, 18 percent said the main income earner in their household would change jobs in the next five years -- and of those, nearly one in three expected the change to be a result of a layoff or other financial problem with the employer.

Analysts generally view the region's financial confidence as "mixed." In light of current economic conditions, that's considered a relatively positive situation.

"The numbers are similar to last year," Sowinski said. " . . . A lot of people have lost half of their net worth in the stock market, but still they have the same level of confidence. That to me is really remarkable."

Certainly that optimism has extended to Steve Rivers, 42, senior vice president and general manager at Hardin Construction. His company has seen big contracts recently, including the Mall at Millenia and the Waverly highrise at Lake Eola.

The general contractor did not see all the business he was expecting this year. Some clients, including Walt Disney World, postponed work because of the economy. But Rivers thinks the area is a somewhat better place to do business than most other locations in Florida and parts of the Southeast. And he's hopeful the postponed work will materialize next year.

"In Orlando," he said, "things recover a little quicker."

Survey respondents said crime, quality health care, and clean air and water were high-priority issues -- and they gave local officials high marks for handling those issues.

Still, there are problems across the region. Residents ranked managing growth and easing traffic congestion as relatively high priorities. Sixty-eight percent said the region is growing too quickly, while 61 percent said traffic was either a major problem or somewhat of a problem.

That's no surprise to Lorenzo Smith, 30. The Orlando landscaper thinks traffic is one of the biggest problems in the area. He spends as long as an hour each morning getting his children to school before he goes to work. He often travels some of the region's busiest roads, including Interstate 4, Orange Blossom Trail and John Young Parkway.

"I am on the streets all the time. It's hard to maneuver," said Smith, who often drives his work truck while towing a landscaper's trailer.

"It holds our community back. More and more people are moving here," he said. "They are so behind on building roads. They can't keep up."