The Squamish-Lillooet Regional District (SLRD) has officially adopted a new engagement policy which will guide the organization, its staff and elected officials through a more robust public engagement process.
The policy, along with formal training and a toolkit for staff, is part of a raft of new measures to bring the SLRD’s engagement in line with best practices provincially.
To achieve that, the new policy will follow the International Association of Public Participation (IAP2) framework, which is used by member municipalities in their own engagement approaches.
The IAP2 works on a spectrum of engagement, ranging from informing people on issues to empowering the public to decide on matters itself. The new SLRD engagement policy sets out how public engagement is applied to projects and helps define where the public can, should, or must be engaged.
Speaking to the policy and the various resources developed to back it up, the SLRD’s communication and engagement manager, Patricia Westerholm, explained the rationale behind the work done, and what the SLRD heard from the public during surveys.
“It was really clear from the survey results that we have a lot of opportunities to improve our work in this space,” she said at the SLRD’s Dec. 14 Committee of the Whole meeting.
“The public were not satisfied with the level of engagement opportunities that we were offering, they didn’t feel like they had a lot of communication around opportunities when they were available, and that there were not necessarily creative opportunities to engage in SLRD decisions.”
Survey results did a lot to inform the SLRD: More than 58 per cent of respondents said they don’t believe the SLRD clearly communicates its decision-making processes; more than 55 per cent said they don’t believe it adequately considers community feedback; more than 61 per cent said the SLRD doesn’t communicate what can and can’t be influenced by community input; and 47 per cent don’t believe the SLRD even welcomes the public’s input at all.
Westerholm said the survey results show the community wants to be involved and to know more about projects underway, but there are barriers to engagement ranging from lack of awareness to timing and accessibility of engagement events.
“We know obviously that the public wants opportunities to participate and provide input. The SLRD wants to encourage and facilitate that work, and there’s lots of room to improve, so we’re looking at the opportunities to provide more opportunities for engagement,” said Westerholm, adding newly applied online engagement tools are already helping move the dial on that item.
The response from SLRD directors was overwhelmingly positive towards the new engagement tools and policy, with discussion kicking off on a need to balance community expectations and desire to be engaged with the SLRD’s capacity to make engagement happen—and the cost of that engagement.
Councillor Jenna Stoner of Squamish articulated her thoughts by drawing on the survey results.
“The survey results are interesting in that 20 per cent believe they should be empowered on at least some topics … and another 25 per cent believe they should be involved or collaborated with. That’s a really high-level expectation of engagement … the cost, the time, the capacity to do that is huge,” she said, stressing it’s not something the SLRD shouldn’t strive for, but the district needs to balance cost against those expectations given the community’s well-known desire to limit tax increases.
“[The engagement approach is] super robust and I think it’s where we want to be, but if I think about the operational side of implementation, it’s a little bit terrifying.”
Area D director, Tony Rainbow, also indicated support, and stressed the need for a solid engagement approach.
“Building trust is one of the things this will do, and we don’t have that at the moment,” he said. “In my view, based on interactions [with the public] in Area D … we are not a trusted organization.”
Rainbow said he believes the SLRD board of directors is also not a trusted body, citing a lack of engagement with the board from the public.
“The only voice that area residents have is through their area director. They don’t know the municipal directors and they have no opportunity to engage with them or very little opportunity to engage with them, and they see you as meddling with events that they don’t want you to meddle with. That’s the kind of comment that I get to deal with,” said Rainbow, explaining he is often defending the SLRD board and explaining the role of municipal directors.
“I am forever making that sort of defense, and I shouldn’t have to, because the way that the board operates should be in a way that the people get to see that happening,” he said, adding putting board meetings online has gone a long way to improve the situation.
The SLRD started streaming and recording its various meetings online during the pandemic. Previously, meetings had to be attended in person. The meetings are most often held in Pemberton.
Rainbow said with a new engagement policy and clear framework, more can be done to educate the public on the SLRD’s role and reach, and the public’s influence over its decisions.
Area C director, Russell Mack, said he agreed, citing his own experience.
“I spend a lot of time defending the regional district with my constituents. An awful lot of them … don’t have a clue what we do here, and they’re very negative about our existence,” he said.
“I think it’s extremely important to get that positive communication out there as to what we do, and how we work together and all that kind of stuff, because people out there, for whatever reason, they don’t pay attention unless it actually affects them.
“I think it’s really important to get a positive spin out there so they know if they need to ask a question, who to come and ask and all that sort of stuff. I don’t think we’ve been very good at that over the years. We’re moving towards that, and that’s a good thing, because I think that will really help our position.”
The rest of discussion around the item hinged on setting expectations and the potential the new engagement policy has to increase public education about the SLRD’s role and ability to affect change.
The board voted unanimously to approve the new engagement policy at the Dec. 14 board meeting.
