Survey: Van Arsdale potentially vulnerable
by David Benzion · 01/08/2008 1:04 pmSEE WED. MORNING UPDATE BELOW
Corbin Van Arsdale is the three-term incumbent State Representative for TX House District 130 (which roughly covers the Cy-Fair, Klein, Tomball and Waller areas of Harris County).
Allen Fletcher is a (Dan Patrick-endorsed) retired police officer and Tomball-area small-businessman challenging Van Arsdale in the March 4th GOP primary.
An hour ago, the Fletcher campaign sent out the following press release (click here for full pdf survey report):
HILL RESEARCH POLL SHOWS
CORBIN VAN ARSDALE “SERIOUSLY VULNERABLE”
Against unnamed opponent, Van Arsdale’s “deserves re-election” numbers “below freezing”THE WOODLANDS – Hill Research Consultants recently conducted a poll of likely Republican Primary voters in State Representative District 130 (Harris County: Cy Fair, Klein, Tomball and Waller). The findings show State Representative Corbin Van Arsdale as “seriously vulnerable.”
The poll was not commissioned by the Allen Fletcher campaign. However, the results have been shared, and the Fletcher campaign has been given permission to release the executive summary of the poll to the public.
Interviews were conducted December 15 – 17, 2007 of 300 likely Republican Primary voters. The margin of error is +/- 5.7%. The major findings include:
- After six years in office, State Representative Corbin Van Arsdale enjoys relatively high name identification (85%) among Republican Primary voters.
- While 52% view Van Arsdale as “favorable”, a majority of his support (32%) is a soft “somewhat favorable”.
- His “unfavorable” rating is high at 20%.
- In comparison, first term Senator Dan Patrick (who represents the same district in the Texas Senate) enjoys a much higher (97%) name identification.
- 80% view Senator Patrick as favorable, and of those 55% view him as “very favorable.”
- Only 12% view Senator Patrick as “unfavorable”
- While most in the district have heard of Rep. Van Arsdale, he does not enjoy majority support for reelection. When asked if Corbin Van Arsdale deserves reelection…
- Only 36% believe he deserves reelection
- Strikingly, the unnamed “give new person a chance” option is preferred by 33% (within the poll’s margin of error of “deserves reelection”)
- The other third of the respondents will wait to make up their mind after they learn about the alternative.
- Another trouble area for Mr. Van Arsdale is that 84% “can’t recall a single thing [he] has accomplished.”
- The poll then went into issue areas and offered respondents a series of policy options. Respondents were informed of Rep. Van Arsdale’s vote and the arguments on both sides of each issue (an extremely fair way of obtaining voter opinion). These results were even more problematic for Mr. Van Arsdale’s reelection hopes. The poll found:
- 80% believe the legislature should have honored the constitutional spending caps providing tax relief by cutting the budget in other areas. Van Arsdale voted to bust the constitutional spending cap.
- 75% are opposed to the new business “margins” tax. Van Arsdale voted for the business tax.
- The poll concluded by asking respondents an informed ballot question. The poll found:
- After learning of his voting record, only 18% now believe that Rep. Van Arsdale deserves reelection.
- A clear majority, 55% favor “a new person”. 27% are still on the fence.
Upon learning of the poll results, Allen Fletcher said “this poll confirms what has been said all along; Mr. Van Arsdale doesn’t vote his district and after six years most voters can’t name a single thing he has accomplished. Given the opportunity, I will represent the constituents of District 130…for a change,” Fletcher concluded.
Allen Fletcher is a security systems entrepreneur with 21 years of law enforcement experience. He is the Chairman of the Greater Tomball Chamber of Commerce.
As noted above, a 22-page pdf report on the survey’s findings can be downloaded here.
Disclosure: David Benzion, author of this blog-post, is a Senior Research Analyst with Hill Research Consultants.
UPDATED WED. MORNING
A seemingly credible caller to Edd & Pat Wednesday morning indicates that someone is in the field with their own, apparently “pro” Van Arsdale survey.
Will the findings be released to the public to the same level of disclosure?
Time will tell…
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Who commissioned the poll? Senator Patrick?
Another trouble area for Mr. Van Arsdale is that 84% “can’t recall a single thing [he] has accomplished.”
ROFLMAO
Donation made.
3
Thats not unusual the 84% neither is the 20% unfavorable compared to Dans in the sample size they are statistically irrelevant
For Allen to win he has to convince 4,000 people to get to a poll to vote for him
Not so easy
Hill Research Consultants is a private polling firm founded in 1988. For the past 20 years it has been our consistent policy to NEVER discuss, reveal, or identify clients.
Our commitment to confidentiality–along with our reputation for crafting thoughtful and fair-minded surveys designed to gather genuine insights into the realities of public opinion (and not just “win the poll”)–is why we have been trusted by over half a dozen state governors, more than a dozen United States Senators, over two dozen members of Congress and in excess of 100 members of state legislatures, in addition to county and municipal governments, special campaign committees, state governmental agencies, Chambers of Commerce, not-for-profit hospitals, bar associations, conservation groups, think-tanks, daily newspapers, national religious organizations, museums, Fortune 500 corporations and educational institutions to meet their research needs.
In this case, our client decided to make portions of the survey they commissioned available to the public.
At our recommendation, the client agreed to release the questionnaire (with some questions redacted) to try to assuage public suspicions (and inevitable accusations) that the survey was biased.
The level of disclosure provided with this survey far exceeds what is standard with public releases of this type.
I’ve already decided to vote against him. Somewhere I read his voting record. Shoot, he wasn’t even there a lot of the time. He has to go.
Van Arsdale was unopposed in the 2004 and 2006 Republican primaries in which 5-6,000 people voted.
A Libertarian candidate in the 2006 General Election drew nearly 6,000 or 16.6% of the vote.
In the 2002 Republican Primary Election, Van Arsdale pulled in 3,470, or 58%, of the 5,974 votes cast.
In the 2000, Republican Primary Election, Van Arsdale lost in a hotly contested 3 way race in which he received the least votes and did not participate in the primary.
He can be beat if Fletcher supporters will just get out and vote. Van Arsdale is untested as an incumbent with any serious opposition.
I don’t think anyone was thinking that the survey was biased…….
Its just going to take 4000 voters to trip up corbin
According to the American Association for Public Opinion Research
Standards for Minimal Disclosure
Good professional practice imposes the obligation upon all public opinion researchers to include, in any report of research results, or to make available when that report is released, certain essential information about how the research was conducted. At a minimum, the following items should be disclosed.
1. Who sponsored the survey, and who conducted it.
2. The exact wording of questions asked, including the text of any preceding instruction or explanation to the interviewer or respondents that might reasonably be expected to affect the response.
3. A definition of the population under study, and a description of the sampling frame used to identify this population.
4. A description of the sample design, giving a clear indication of the method by which the respondents were selected by the researcher, or whether the respondents were entirely self-selected.
5. Sample sizes and, where appropriate, eligibility criteria, screening procedures, and response rates computed according to AAPOR Standard Definitions. At a minimum, a summary of disposition of sample cases should be provided so that response rates could be computed.
6. A discussion of the precision of the findings, including estimates of sampling error, and a
description of any weighting or estimating procedures used.
7. Which results are based on parts of the sample, rather than on the total sample, and the size of such parts.
8. Method, location, and dates of data collection.
From time to time, AAPOR Council may issue guidelines and recommendations on best practices with regard to the release, design and conduct of surveys.
I can’t recall a single thing that Dan has accomplished.
Except vote for legislation that places more of a burden of people wanting to file information requests on their government.
And comment on the Cy-Fair bond in a way that allowed CFISD to spin that he supported it.
bob42– yes, all of that is true– for PUBLIC polling.
This was not a public poll. It was not commissioned by a media organization or public non-profit. It was produced for private interests, who wished to understand whether or not Van Arsdale was, even in theory, vulnerable to a credible challenger.
Thanks David, I now am better acquainted with differences between private polling and PUBLIC polling.
“Hill Research Consultants is a private polling firm founded in 1988. For the past 20 years it has been our consistent policy to NEVER discuss, reveal, or identify clients.
I still have to wonder why Hill Research Consultants would seek to associate itself with AAPOR when they actually don’t seek to do “public” polls in the first place.
HRC is affiliated with a number of industry organizations… and there are times that we DO do “public” polls, in the sense that the client is a public entity or seeking to promote an issue or cause.
Point is, there are certain guidelines that apply to ALL of our surveys, public or private (respecting respondent confidentiality, not manipulating data, etc.), and then there are voluntary practices that might be an ideal to shoot for, but are adjusted for our clients and the nature of the project (full release of every question asked, for instance).
Here’s an example– many pollsters, if they wanted to keep certain questions confidential, would have re-written and re-numbered the survey questionnaire made available to the public.
In this survey, for instance, we redacted questions 18 and 19. These questions addressed unflattering (but entirely accurate) information about Van Arsdale. No doubt those questions impacted respondents willingness to say he “deserved reelection” on second ballot. Our client wished to keep those questions confidential, so as not to tip their strategic hand.
If we had simply re-numbered the survey no one would know that the questions had been asked. But this would have given the public a false impression, because you would then assume that the +22 point jump in “new person” (and -18 point drop in “deserves reelect”) was wholly the result of the tax & spending vote questions, which isn’t accurate. These other questions had an impact too.
In this case, we’d argue that 75% of a loaf is better than none at all, or better than a “false” loaf.
Yes, those questions aren’t revealed, but we do at least reveal that we asked those questions.
I do appreciate your explanation, and the substantial differences between private and public polls.
Since you’re willing to admit that it wasn’t funded by by Fletcher, will you also publicly deny that it was funded by David Duke?
Heh–nicely done, but we’ve been authorized by our actual client to confirm that no, they are not David Duke.
fwiw, the “not commissioned by the Allen Fletcher campaign” language comes from a Fletcher campaign press release, not Hill Research. We consider ourselves responsible for what is written in the report; anything other people say is what other people say.
I don’t like anonymously funded polls that have a clear political agenda.
I know Dan has some bad history with Corbin, I know Dan is supporting Corbin’s opponent, hence it has the appearances of being connected with Dan. I am probably naive but when Dan ran I was hoping for “one of us” to shake up the establishment.
In my opinion, it seems like he’s become part of the establishment.
#16 So, you would prefer Dan Patrick silence himself about other candidates? Patrick needs like minded individuals to inact change. One man cannot do it.
Look at Van Arsdales record. Look at the times he was a no show. We deserve a lot better.
And before any Dan supporters jump on me (disclosure: I voted for Dan) I’m not making any accusations that Dan funded this. I’m just saying that my perception is that Dan is somehow connected.
#17 I just don’t like anonymous mud-slinging.
As I previously mentioned, I don’t like some of the legislative decisions that Dan made. I’ll forgive him for not getting the property cap reduced but when he makes a speech a year ago that people are made about the Berry Center and then a year later makes a comment that Cy-Fair’s bond proposal seems reasonable, he isn’t helping the cause. CFISD took that statement and practically suggested that Dan supported the bond.
Dan Patrick said the bond proposal seemed reasonable, but he hadn’t read it. He told them to trim all fat. He went on the radio speaking against the bloated issue. What more do you want? There will never be a perfect politician…. because they are human. Van Arsdale needs to go. He is lazy and thinks he is entrenched.
AW
Dan, despite many people begining not to - his sub committee passed Cy-Fairs approval for their over the top bloated wasteful bond issue with out so much as a peep
State government has got to stop these bond proposals
Bannable, Shouldn’t the local government and the local voters have the final say on bond proposals rather than the State? I don’t like all the bonds, but it is the responsibility of the voter to vote them down rather than the State.
Corbin’s Mom came my door this weekend asking for votes.
What did she have to say?
So, maybe you guys can fill me in on this, but I don’t see Fletcher as a registered voter in Harris County, but I do see a Penny Sue Fletcher, which is not in District 130, but is in CYF ISD. I thought you had to own property and be registered in the district that you are wanting to represent. I know since he is a small biz owner, is he using the biz address to be able to run in the district?
He wasn’t officially registered in 130 until January 1st of 2008.
Corbin Van Arsdale has missed three days in the Legislature since he was elected. He is known as one of the hardest working legislators there. That is why he was assigned to some of the most demanding committees. Every single bill in either the House or Senate must go through this committee which sometimes meets when other committees meet. Only when a committee chair has enough members available for the vote does he call for it. No bill did not pass because Van Arsdale was not there. He has been very accessible to his constituents. I heard people complaining about that because Dan told them. When I asked if they tried calling Van Arsdale they had not. They called, they talked to him and were very happy. Don’t listen to Dan Patrick - find out for yourself.