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TAHLEQUAH, OK - Members of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma can expect a knock on the door from a familiar face in the next few weeks. Cherokee Nation employees are conducting a large-scale survey of tribal members as part of an ongoing strategic planning process.

"The idea is to let people tell us what their needs are," said LeeAnn Dreadfulwater, a planning analyst for the Cherokee Nation. "Right now, we can only make an educated guess at what people really want in the way of programs and services. With this data, we will be much more confident about what the true needs are."

The Cherokee Nation will use the input to restructure and redesign programs to meet the needs of their citizens. The strategic planning effort is a partnership with the Cherokee FIRST initiative.

"This is the first really comprehensive needs assessment that the Cherokee Nation has done in over twenty years," said Dreadfulwater, who added that preliminary focus groups were conducted in eleven communities earlier this year, in order to gather data to write the survey. Interviews were also conducted with the Nation's Tribal Council members. A cross departmental team of employees then worked together for several weeks to create the final survey instrument.

The Nation has taken care to make the process easy for survey participants. "We've matched up our interviewers with areas they are familiar with and communities that are familiar with them," said Dreadfulwater. "Many of our staff who have volunteered to be interviewers are bi-lingual, so Cherokee speakers will be comfortable."

Survey team members will interview approximately 1,000 Cherokees over a two-week period beginning in late July. The teams will rely on a list of randomly selected tribal members drawn from the Nation's registration database. Each tribal member above the age of 18 that lives in the 14 county jurisdictional area of the Cherokee Nation has an equal chance of having his or her name drawn to participate in the survey.

"Random selection ensures that we get an accurate cross section of Cherokee communities all across northeastern Oklahoma," said Dreadfulwater. "By conducting a scientific random survey and talking to people face to face, the data gathered can be used to give us a truer picture of the needs of all Cherokee Nation's citizens."