The way St. Albert residents provide input on council decisions could be updated and simplified as early as next spring.
At the Dec. 12 council meeting, members of a committee tasked with recommending how to update the policy presented their finds to council. Councillors will provide feedback by early January, with the final policy scheduled to come before council in the third quarter of 2017.
Among the committee’s recommendations are creating a single public participation policy and hiring a staff member to oversee consultation rather than contracting surveys, as is the current practice.
Coun. Tim Osborne, who served on the committee, argued it would be beneficial to have a staff member specifically dedicated to public participation in city processes.
“It’s a critical skill set to have on staff, to successfully engage with the public and gather that feedback,” he said.
Coun. Sheena Hughes said while she appreciated that the committee recognized “some serious weak points” in the city’s current process, she was skeptical of the need for an additional staff member, arguing instead that an existing staff member could receive training.
“I think it would cost us far less to put that person into training than to hire someone for a new role,” she said.
Councillors unanimously accepted the documents for information and committed to providing feedback in the new year.
The new public engagement policy is part of a three-phase process that began in 2014, with the intention of defining, standardizing and implementing public engagement in the city.
As part of the final phase, the committee held several public engagement sessions to gather input, reviewed the city’s existing practice and reviewed what other comparable communities are doing.
Although there are regular opportunities in the city for public participation, the committee identified the lack of a standard, consistent approach as being a hurdle to overcome.
“Our practice is fragmented, and the individuals involved currently don’t have formal training,” corporate business planning lead Darija Slokar said.
Members of the public, through surveys and discussion, reported which methods of participation they did and did not like.
When asked their top four preferred methods, 80 per cent preferred an online survey, 67 per cent preferred engagement at a location, 64 per cent preferred email, and 64 per cent preferred an open house.
The methods of participation people said they were least likely to use are coming to council meetings, public hearings, town-hall meetings and working on committees.
The public engagement committee’s recommendations were split in two parts – advice to council about the policy and input to the city manager about how best to implement the policy – and all emphasize the need for a straightforward, easily understood policy and process.
“Overall as a committee the general observations are really simple,” committee member Trina Johnson told council. “Think simple language in the documents that are coming out.”
Advice to council includes having one overarching public participation policy, with simple reader-friendly language, which includes a public participation spectrum as defined by the International Association of Public Participation, which complies with the Municipal Government Act.
Advice to the city manager includes hiring a staff member to build internal capacity for public participation, use the public’s preferred methods of communication, and emphasize consultation with diverse groups of people.
