SURVEY: VOTERS STILL UNDECIDED

Cape Girardeau voters in favor of the city's purchase of the water system and new utility franchises for Union Electric far outnumber those against the measures, a Southeast Missourian survey shows.

But a majority of voters still are undecided on the issues.

A poll of 91 city residents who said they were registered voters showed that of those with a definite opinion on the water-system purchase, 81 percent favor the issuance of $11.8 million in revenue bonds to fund the transaction.

A similar survey conducted two weeks ago showed 74 percent of "decided" respondents supported the ballot issue.

Of the 91 city voters polled on whether they support new 20-year gas and electric franchises for Union Electric, 89 percent of the "decided" respondents said they favored the franchises, up from 68 percent two weeks ago.

The telephone survey, commissioned by the Southeast Missourian, was conducted Tuesday night by students in the marketing department at Southeast Missouri State University under the direction of Peter Gordon. It has a statistical margin of error of 7.4 percentage points.

Despite the apparent growing support for the utility issues, most voters said they don't know how they'll vote Nov. 5.

The percentage of voters undecided on the water system purchase increased from 43 percent in the previous survey, to 53 percent in the latest poll.

Overall, 34 (37 percent) of the 91 respondents said they favor the purchase, while eight (10 percent) said they would vote no, and 49 were undecided.

On the question of whether to approve the utility franchise agreements, 61 percent of the respondents said they were undecided. Only 39 percent were undecided in the earlier poll.

Overall, 32 (35 percent) of the 91 respondents said they would vote yes, four (4 percent) said they would oppose the franchises, and 55 were undecided.