Parrish comments on CFA 2020 survey insights report
The word is out: Arizona is awesome. Businesses and thousands of new residents are moving here. The key is to keep Arizona grand.
To that end, local nonpartisan nonprofit The Center for the Future of Arizona recently updated its groundbreaking data dive into issues important to Arizonans, as told by its residents through a detailed nonpartisan Gallup survey.
The 2020 edition of “The Arizona We Want” builds and expands upon the first-of-its-kind survey sponsored by CFA in 2009.
The current survey asked Arizonans to select the top three issues they consider to be most important for improving Arizona’s future. The issues that rose to the top include:
• affordable healthcare for all Arizonans
• quality K-12 public education
• more good-paying jobs
• a secure water supply for Arizona
• ending systemic racism
• affordable housing
“Data can get a bad rap as boring or cold, but data is knowledge and knowledge is power,” says MAP Strategies Group CEO Mi-Ai Parrish, who also serves in a leadership capacity at CFA as a Future Maker.
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MAP Strategies Group CEO Mi-Ai Parrish (left) and Glendale City Manager Kevin Phelps and Economic Development Director Brian Friedman host an elite developer breakfast at Camelback Inn in 2019, which launched unprecedented growth in the West Valley that continues today. Arizona Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill (standing at right), Sunbelt Holdings CEO John Graham and others addressed the group as well.
“The data in this report ground us in the lived experiences and perspectives of Arizonans and provide a foundation for productive conversations and action on critically important issues, like education, jobs, environmental sustainability, and social and racial justice,” Parrish says.
Parrish's comments appear on page 24 of The Arizona We Want, a comprehensive look at life in The Grand Canyon State. The results show that Arizonans share many of the same public values like a strong education system, quality affordable healthcare, sustainable environmental practices that protect our quality of life, and social equity for all citizens.