Monash Council encourages members of our community to be informed and to have a say on plans and projects that are important to them, or which have an impact on their daily lives.

Community engagement provides Council with a better understanding of community views and values, and helps us to make more informed decisions and deliver better services.


What we heard about community engagement

We interviewed 750 randomly selected residents about their preferences for community engagement.

We found that one in four residents are willing to engage with Council on decisions that are important to them.

Decisions about the physical environment

26%

Council plans and policies

20%

Community wellbeing services

20%

Research and evaluation

15%

Council regulations

12%


One in 20 are willing to participate on a community panel and about half are willing to complete a survey. We also found that online participation is enjoyed by one in three residents.

Survey

48%

Online interactive participation

37%

Informal conversations

13%

Workshops or meetings

11%

Community panel

4.50%

We invited 40 members of Council's advisory groups to participate in two workshops to tell us how we should conduct community engagement. This is a summary of participants' advice to Council:

  • Make sure diverse groups are engaged
  • Build capacity in the community to engage with Council
  • Provide enough information to base our feedback on
  • Tell us how much influence we can expect
  • Allow enough time to take part
  • Provide a choice of engagement methods
  • Get back to us with the outcomes of our feedback