Monash Council has recorded an excellent result of 75 for overall satisfaction in the Community Satisfaction Survey of more than 800 residents.
This is the highest ever score recorded by Monash Council. Whilst the results of all Councils are not yet compiled, the score of 75 has Monash recording the highest level of satisfaction so far amongst metropolitan Councils.
This year's Community Satisfaction Survey began in March 2020 as a doorknock survey just prior to the first COVID-19 lockdown. The survey was postponed during lockdown and recommenced in May 2020 as a telephone survey, with final results provided in late June. The research was again undertaken by independent research company Metropolis Research Pty Ltd, with 800 randomly selected residents aged 15 years and over. The survey sample reflects the cultural and linguistic diversity of our community with 44% of respondents speaking a language other than English at home.
High scores were also achieved for community satisfaction with Council's governance and leadership, averaging a score of 73 for five key aspects:
- Maintaining trust and confidence of the local community (74)
- Community engagement and consultation (73)
- Making decisions in the interest of the community (73)
- Responsiveness to local community needs (73) and
- Representation, lobbying and advocacy on behalf of community (73).
Each of these aspects rated significantly above the Melbourne metropolitan benchmark.
Monash Mayor Stuart James said the survey provides valuable information to Council about what Council services are working and where further improvements can be made.
"These are outstanding results at a challenging time for our community and give us confidence that our critical services and programs are valued and supported by the community, and that we are on the right track with how we are supporting the community and providing the services they value," Cr James said.
"It's great to see improvement in our results for maintaining trust and confidence and responding to community needs. Our commitment to the Monash community has always been that we are there for them when they need us and it's never been more important as we support them through the COVID-19 pandemic."
The survey also asks about satisfaction with, and the importance of 29 specific Council services and facilities. The highest community satisfaction across these areas continues to be with our local libraries and library services (86), our rubbish collection (88), green waste collection (87), recycling service (86), the Waste Transfer Station (83) and sporting ovals and outdoor sport facilities (81).
A number of issues were identified as needing attention but several reported less significant scores of dissatisfaction compared with the previous year. The issues identified by residents as needing attention in Monash are car parking, including commuter parking which is a State Government issue (down to 11% from 20%), traffic management (down from 12.8% to 10%), building, planning and development( 9.2% up from 8.3%), street trees (6.7% down from 9%) and street lighting street (at %5 down from 9.6%).
In this year's survey, Council also asked three COVID-19 related questions relating to how households were coping with the impacts of the pandemic and how it is was affecting them financially, and from a mental health and wellbeing perspective. On average, respondent households were relatively positive in terms of how well they felt they were coping with the impacts of COVID-19. These results were taken shortly after the first period of lockdown. The full survey results are available on Council's website.
