Most understand council’s work

The majority of people know what Environment Bay of Plenty does, according to a recent survey of community perceptions.

But 11 percent said they had no idea, or had misconceived ideas of what the Regional Council did.

This month’s Environment Bay of Plenty council meeting heard that these results could be interpreted in two ways - either indicating that the public were not entirely informed about what the council did, or that that the Regional Council did a good job of carrying out its mandated duties. Whether the public had intimate knowledge of this or not was irrelevant.

The Perceptions and Attitudes Survey has been undertaken every three years since 1992, alongside a Community Outcomes Survey, to fulfil a number of legal obligations as well as find out long-term trends in the community’s perceptions of the council. Staff will use the results to examine shifting community view patterns and the best means of engaging with the community, as well as gauge council performance against measures in the Ten Year Plan.

A total of 1300 regional residents were interviewed by phone and asked a range of questions about what they thought of the council and what it did.

One third said the council was responsible for State of the Environment monitoring. Fifteen percent mentioned river scheme management and flooding, eight percent mentioned water and land management and seven percent mentioned coast and harbour management. Sixty nine percent of all respondents stated at least one role and 45 percent recalled two or more roles or responsibilities.

Chairman John Cronin said feedback from people who contacted staff at Environment Bay of Plenty was very positive.

Slightly fewer than a quarter had dealt directly with the council, six percent more since the 2006 survey. More than nine out of 10 people said the person they made contact with (often for resource consents, pest animals or plants or complaints) was respectful. Most also said the person was knowledgeable and that the information they received was helpful.

More rural people had dealt directly with the council than city or town dwellers.

Just over half those questioned said that in their opinion there were activities that were damaging to the environment in the region, nine percent fewer than in 2006. People from Rotorua and Eastern Bay of Plenty and rural residents were more likely to say there were activities damaging the environment.

More that one fifth said that farm run off was the most damaging for the environment. Eleven percent of respondents stated that motor vehicles and exhaust fumes were the most damaging and nine percent said people littering or being untidy were the most damaging.
Rotorua residents were more likely to state that farm run off was most damaging, while Eastern Bay of Plenty residents were more likely to say that paper mills were damaging.
Mr Cronin said residents seemed to have a high awareness of the council, and the most common places they saw or heard about the council were in the Backyard magazine (24 percent) and articles in other newspapers.
Most people – 29 percent - named the internet as the most common place to find out about the natural environment and 24 percent named their local Environment Bay of Plenty Office. Use of the internet as an information source had grown over the last seven years from only 11 percent of respondents using the internet in 2003.
The survey also showed that traditional forms of information gathering, such as the telephone book, libraries and information centres were declining, while word-of-mouth from local clubs, community and iwi groups remained static.
Mr Cronin said staff would be carrying out further analysis of the survey findings. Staff will also be comparing Environment Bay of Plenty’s results with results from other Regional Councils.

ENDS

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