The idea that a coach has to be a 'former skater' to be a good coach sounds like sour grapes that some former competitive skaters are losing students to other coaches.
Interesting point. In the past, experience vs. knowledge has become a contentious discussion. Most people point out that teaching/coaching is not the same as performing. Just become someone has won competitions doesn't make them a great coach, nor does it mean that you need a World Championship title in order to "teach tots how to lick the ice." (To quote Slusher, lol.)
The PSA requires that the coach has either skated at a certain level and/or taken a student to a certain level for each of their ratings levels. That already creates a barrier where the PSA matters to parents in selecting a coach. There are also coaches who've taken students to Senior, but never tested that high themselves.
Korey Aide, Jason Brown's coach, is talented and knowledgeable, although she was never an elite contender herself. One of the reasons she pursued PSA ratings was because she didn't have that high-level skating experience. If she had never become a coach, that would have been unfortunate.
It will be interesting to see if the survey addresses skaters like myself, who started late and skated ISI instead of USFSA. There was no place for me in the USFSA and the judges made that very clear back in the day. I had also mastered freestyle elements well above my highest test, but I stopped testing when life got in the way, so my ISI tests do not reflect my then-level of skating.