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Northshore largely satisfied with quality of life, report says

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by Doug Mouton / Northshore Bureau Chief

Posted on December 16, 2009 at 6:22 PM

Updated Wednesday, Dec 16 at 6:31 PM

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ST. TAMMANY, La. – A new study shows roughly 70 percent of people on the Northshore are satisfied with their overall qualify of life.

The results of the Southeastern Louisiana Univerity Quality of Life Study for the Florida Parishes were released Wednesday.

Residents of five parishes were surveyed: St. Tammany, Tangipahoa, Washington, Livingston and St. Helena. There were not enough responses from St. Helena Parish to have a statistically significant sample, but those responses were used to calculate overall numbers.

In terms of overall quality of life, 74 percent of people in Livingston Parish responded they are satisfied or very satisfied overall. The response was 71 percent in St. Tammany and 68 percent in Tangipahoa, but significantly lower in Washington Parish at 44 percent.

"Washington Parish does have a lot of social problems," said Dr. Bonnie Lewis. "They have economic problems that really showed up on this survey."

Dr. Lewis is sociology professor at Southeastern, and the director of the school's Social Science Research Center. According to Lewis, the responses from Washington Parish differed greatly from the responses from the rest of the Florida Parishes.

The top issues in Washington Parish are unemployment, crime and poverty.

"They have a real problem developing businesses because people don't tend to go up that way unless you live there,” Lewis said.

For the other Florida Parishes, the top issues are traffic, over-population, the loss of forested areas and parish planning.

"Public citizen participation in planning was rated very low is one of the weakest areas," Lewis said, "so governments can involve the people more."

Lewis said that's one of the pieces of information political leaders can learn from in the report. Roughly half of all people responding said the quality of life has gotten worse in the past three years.

Public education scored very high in St. Tammany and Livingston Parishes, and much lower in Tangipahoa and Washington.

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silverfox3 said on December 16, 2009 at 8:08 PM

25 yrs. ago St. Tammany was clean, friendly and beautiful. Today it is over-populated, over commercialized and over-yuppified. People are not as friendly as before unless you belong to one of their "clubs" or are seen at "events" plugging this or that organization or charity. The traffic is outrageous and in spite of empty store fronts everywhere they are still permitting shopping centers. Our "leaders" have sold us out. Time to move.

eznews said on December 16, 2009 at 8:50 PM

St. Tammany in the wealthiest parish in the state. I guess money can buy happiness, at least for 71% of the survey respondents.

martyg1 said on December 17, 2009 at 6:20 AM

Guess the 70 odd percent came from the house hold of the politicos.. They are very happy with the taxpayer monies.

lagirl01 said on December 17, 2009 at 12:25 PM

Actually, most of that 70odd percent came from the people that moved there after Katrina. Yeah, I bet it is better than the 9th ward or the east!!!! Too bad that group of people ruined it for the rest of us.

lhanckes said on December 19, 2009 at 3:49 PM

I bought a home on an acre in western washington parish 4-20-07 . Worse mistake i ever made in my life.I'm surrounded on three sides by the meanest,dumbest, incestual scum you could imagine.If the bank owned it,I would have walked out of here long ago.Can't go into details, but i've been shot at twice. Six months ago, i got sucker punched in the face, in my car at a stop sign, within sight of the golden arches on hwy. 25 & 10. The DA does not handle these cases,You have to purchase police report from sheriff then go hunt down a justice of the peace from a list with no phone numbers.This place is a joke and its not a safe place to live.I'm tired of not being able to go out in my own fenced yard with or driving to store etc. without a firearm. Your safer in hollygrove because at least they have a police force and a district attorney. 44% is way to high. lh.