2011 UBCM Community Excellence Awards

/ 2011 COMMUNITY EXCELLENCE AWARDS
Best Practices, Civic Engagement
Category Worksheet

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Name of Local Government: City of Surrey

Project/Program Title: Community Consultation Project

PROJECT SUMMARY

The Community Consultation Project (CCP) was initiated in early 2010 to refine and formalize the City’s engagement process with residents. As the City of Surrey continues to work towards meeting the demands of a growing community and the needs of its citizens, the expectation on the City to involve and engage its various Community Associations and concerned residents has increased.

To ensure meaningful and equitable consultation, the CCP worked collaboratively with Community Associations to create principles and a standard protocol for community consultation. The CCP will enable citizens to provide more direct feedback to the City.

Based on the discussions and collective work with the group, a draft Consultation Principles document was created and is currently being refined by all the Community Associations. It is anticipated the Consultation Principles document will be taken to Council in fall 2011 for consideration and endorsement by Council to establish a formalized engagement process.

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PROJECT ANALYSIS

  1. INSPIRATION

The City is Surrey is one of the fastest growing cities in Canada, with approximately 1,000 people moving to the City each month. The population, currently 474,000, has grown 25% over the past 9 years. In response to the rapid population growth, the City has experienced a significant amount of development – over $6 billion in construction value in 5 years. This period of rapid growth offers a unique opportunity to build a vibrant, urban City with the help of citizens. To ensure the City develops in a way that aligns with the values of residents, effective public consultation is essential.

In early 2010, the City of Surrey determined that in addition to the various Advisory Committees to Council, further opportunities for engagement were required to enhance the ability for members of the public to provide direct feedback to the City.

  1. GOALS

Major goals for the CCP include:

  • Ensure the City of Surrey is committed to public engagement that is relevant, proactive, equitable, partnership-based, ethical, responsive, accessible, available, balanced through education and communications, and guided by the following principles:
  • Two-way communication
  • Respectful partnership
  • Inclusive public process
  • Balanced
  • The City of Surrey supports the open flow of timely information amongst government, Community Groups and the community at large based on the following principles:
  • Early involvement
  • Transparency
  • Accountability
  • Knowledge and education

The challenge for City Council is balancing the ability to commit sufficient time to meet with all of the various community associations to meet the ever-growing demands of the community. The CCP has helped to co-create a protocol that will maximize the opportunity for public consultation and establish principles that confirm expectations and commitments for consultation of both the City of Surrey and stakeholders.

  1. PARTICIPATION

In May 2010, five area meetings were held with the various Community Associations located within the areas as follows:

  • Cloverdale (5 );
  • Fleetwood/Guildford (3);
  • Newton (11);
  • North Surrey (7); and,
  • South Surrey (12).

In total the City of Surrey met with 38 Community Associations and their many representatives, including concerned residents. The objective of the five regional meetings was to seek direct feedback from the community associations relative to how consultation should be undertaken and what it means to each organization. The participating groups were asked to provide feedback on where they saw opportunity for community engagement with the city, specifically what is working, and what is not working. A further overriding goal of the consultation program was to improve the customer service process so when individuals do contact City Hall, they are satisfied their concerns have been handled, reasonable solutions are provided, and to seek suggestions on what can be done to make things even better.

Following the five regional meetings, two follow-up meetings were held in January and April 2011 with all the Community/Neighborhood Associations. The two meetings were used to review the “raw data” originating from the five regional meetings in order to draft formal Consultation Principles to be adhered to by both the City and the various Community Associations.

  1. ECONOMIC IMPACT

Once the Consultation Program is formally in place, the ability for the City to undertake consultation on various initiatives with community groups and the community as a whole will be based on established guidelines and will enable timely communication. Once consultation principles are clear and understood by both sides, efficient and timely communication will ensure that resources are well-used. There are several opportunities for cost savings through the CCP including:

  1. Clear protocol for consultation should reduce staff time required to organize and manage the consultation process.
  2. Improved consultation and planning should reduce the number of unanticipated issues, and staff time required to create solutions after the fact.
  3. Reduce the time citizens spend advocating and researching for issues of concerns by creating better linkages with staff, increasing information flow and increasing certainty around opportunities for input.
  1. ACCOUNTABILITY

The very step of working towards establishing Consultation Principles that both the City and Community Associations endorse and undertake to follow when communicating is a demonstration of not only improving but formalizing accountability. Establishing formalized Consultation Principles clearly identifies the joint-responsibility on behalf of the City and its Community Groups to communicate and be accountable.

  1. AWARENESS

Through the five regional meetings within the five communities and the two follow-up meetings, great effort and commitment has been directed to ensuring the community is aware of the City’s various initiatives and to determine how best to communicate with the community. It is important to note that if proper and genuine civic engagement is in place, awareness of City activities and actions will be facilitated.

  1. INNOVATION

The end objective of the Consultation Program is to establish Consultation Principles that reflect the needs of the City and most importantly the wishes of the Community Groups. The Consultation Principles have been developed by the Community Groups and the City. The principles are unique and truly represent a long-term collaborative effort amongst the process’ participants. The City is not directing how consultation will take place; the City instead has taken a back-seat role and allowed the community groups to express their needs and wishes.

  1. SUSTAINABILITY

Following endorsement of the Consultation Principles, the principles will be applied by the City (i.e. individual departments) as a regular course of business. The staff time and resources to undertake proper consultation will be assumed by all departments. As the City continues to expand and grow, the need to invest time and resources for effective consultation will become greater. However, the Consultation Program does require efforts/commitment on the part of the Community Groups who are and will continue to be active participants in the process. The responsibility for proper consultation will not solely rest with the City, the various community groups will need to assign their own resources/representatives to meet the expectations of the Consultation Principles.

  1. BEST PRACTICES

The manner in which the Consultation Program was undertaken reflects an example of a Best Practice mode of engaging the public and establishing a formal model for communicating with the community as a whole and the various Community Groups. Communicating with groups and the community as a whole takes time and ensuring the process is genuine and community-driven requires much commitment and time on behalf of the City.

The City did not develop Consultation principles to be adhered to, the City went to the Community Groups and sought their views and opinions. Based on the feedback received, the “raw data” was compiled and used as the basis for the first draft of consultation principles. The initial draft of the principles was communicated back to the community groups/process participants for their review and feedback. Significant time has been taken to seek genuine feedback from the community groups. At the outset, there was no predetermined time set aside to complete the process and establish Consultation Principles – the process took as long as was required.

  1. TRANSFERABILITY

The fundamentals of working towards establishing Consultation Principles can be easily transferred to other local governments. In formalizing the communication model between a City and its community groups/citizens, the following components are required:

  • providing multiple opportunities for receiving feedback;
  • accurately recording all feedback received;
  • communicating outcomes to community groups;
  • ensuring consultation is collaborative;
  • putting into practice the mutually developed principles.
  1. KNOWLEDGE SHARING

Working with 38 community associations and various concerned residents, there is the acknowledgement that opinions will always vary and establishing consensus regarding a document such as the Consultation Principles will be challenging and time-consuming. Although the process cannot be dictated by the City, the City does need to take a leadership role to ensure the process maintains forward momentum. A genuine commitment by staff and stakeholders to the process, an acknowledgement of the value of the process,ashared understanding of the objectives and sufficient patience with the process will help enable success of a similar initiative in other jurisdictions.

  1. TELL US MORE

The CCP is one component of the City of Surrey’s commitment to improving communication with residents, transparency and accountability. A number of major initiatives compliment the CCP, including:

  1. The City’s website was redesigned in 2010 to improve access to information. Council meetings are now broadcast online, the search function for council reports has been dramatically improved and the website now includes significant youth-focused content. The City has also created a 3-person web office, located in the City Manager’s Office, to ensure high-quality web communication and to actively engage with citizens using both traditional on-line communication and social media channels.
  1. The City has shown a commitment to open data through its COSMOS Geographic Information System (GIS) online application. Citizens and business can access a breadth of map-based information such as zoning info, development applications, the City’s green infrastructure network and school catchment areas.
  1. The City is using video to communicate with citizens. For a single example, a citizen-generated video was posted online that was critical of a perceived lack of action by the City at an intersection. The City’s Engineering department created a video response, posted on YouTube, that explained the City’s assessment and actions at the intersection to date.

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