Amended Draft Community Engagement Policy endorsed by Council

City of Ballarat’s amended draft "Community Engagement Policy" was endorsed by Council on Wednesday 24 February, 2021.

The Officer Report and amended Community Engagement Policy can be found on pages 144-157 here Council Meeting Agenda - 24Feb2021. The final endorsed Policy will be available for viewing on Council's website in the near future.

We thank all those who participated, and we appreciate your contribution towards continuously improving how we do engagement.

Consultation snapshot

• There were 65 responses to the online survey and six written submissions received.
• Feedback can be summarised by the following four statements:

The Policy should

1. explicitly state that its purpose is to outline Council’s commitment to engaging community in Council decision-making.
2. articulate that engagement is an inclusive process that seeks input from a diverse range of community members, particularly those most affected by a decision and including those who face barriers to engagement.
3. articulate that engagement must be authentic where community can influence decision-making.
4. outline how Council will report back to participants and the public following engagement. Community want to know what feedback was received and how it was considered in decision-making. This was the most common feedback received.

Actions implemented

Key changes made to the Policy based on feedback received as a result of the MySay consultation are:

a. Inclusion in Section 1 (Purpose) that the Policy ‘outlines Council’s commitment and approach to engaging community in decision-making.’

b. Inclusion in Section 1 (Purpose) that the Policy promotes ‘inclusive community engagement, recognising the rich knowledge and experience of Ballarat’s diverse community.’

c. More detail added to the scope of the Policy (Section 2), outlining where community engagement must be undertaken and where it may not be undertaken.

d. Introduction and definition of the terms ‘participatory engagement’ and ‘deliberative engagement.’

e. Collation of the IAP2 Spectrum of Engagement, and the table outlining examples of the use of the different levels of engagement, into a single table in Section 3.2.

f. Broadening of the list of potential stakeholders in Section 3.3.

g. Elaboration of Engagement Plan inclusions in Section 3.3 including prompts to consider accessibility for people that face barriers to engagement; prompts regarding the collection and storage of data; and prompts regarding the planning of evaluation and feedback processes.

h. Inclusion of the statement that ‘all engagement processes should involve the provision of feedback to participants’ (Section 3.4). Where a decision is to be raised at a Council meeting, the date of the Council meeting will be published online. The agenda for said meeting is also published online. Following the relevant decision, a summary of feedback will also be made available online for public viewing and sent directly to those who elected to leave contact details.

i. Inclusion in responsibilities of Councillors, Executive Leadership Team and Council Officers that they will consider community engagement outcomes in decision making (Section 3.5).

j. General editing and reorganisation of some content.

For more detailed information, refer to the Survey Results and Submissions Received under "Documents". Alternatively you can contact the Community Engagement team via email at communityengagement@ballarat.vic.gov.au