Sturgeon County residents are happy with their quality of life and county services, but few could tell you who their councillors are or what divisions they live in.
Those numbers were contained in a countywide satisfaction survey done in December and released to council yesterday.
According to the survey, 87.2 per cent of county residents are happy with their quality of life and 78.6 per cent believe the county delivers efficient and effective services.
Despite those warm feelings, they are largely unaware of the people directing those services. A total of 60.7 per cent of the respondents couldn’t identify either their councillor or the division in which they live. When asked if they feel informed about county council 34 per cent of people said no, but only 3.3 per cent wanted to know more.
The most top-of-mind issue for county residents is the Heartland Transmission Project with 30.9 per cent of respondents identifying it as the top issue, followed by roads and transportation at 26.9 per cent, planning at 14.1 per cent and taxation at 9.4 per cent.
County departments also got fairly high marks from residents — fire and ambulance, the Roseridge landfill and recreational programs all got more than 90 per cent approval.
Water and utility services came in at 88.9 per cent, library services at 88.4 per cent, parks and trails at 88 per cent and bylaw enforcement at 83.9 per cent.
The lower rated county services still came in pretty high; resident communication hit 78.1 per cent and building permits 77.1. The lowest rated service was transportation at 65.9 per cent, but that is 18.5 per cent higher than two years ago when the county last did the survey.
A slim majority of county residents aren’t interested in any new neighbours with 52 per cent opposing any new residential development. Low support also exists for any new commercial development.
Sturgeon County Mayor Don Rigney told council he thought the numbers were very encouraging.
“Over 87 per cent of residents believe we have a very good quality of life.”
Calli Stromner, director of communications for the county, said the low recognition of divisional boundaries and councillors is a problem they hope to work on before the fall vote.
“That didn’t come as a surprise to us. We are enhancing our communications strategy when it comes to the municipal election.”
She said that while the numbers are disappointing, they aren’t all that surprising given voter turnout in the last election, which was only 32 per cent.
