The West Grey website now has the results of a survey of resident's priorities as part of it's 2020 action plan.
The responses found that people feel long term financial sustainability, and expansion of high speed internet as the most important issues.
Residents also suggested adequate Neustadt and Durham water supply, attracting new residents and visitors, as well as, exploring partnerships other municipalities for professional skills, waste
management, and economic development.
The opinion was split on issues like downtown appearances, industrial incentives, police facilities and tourism.
Consultant Dr. Brynn Winegard selected every seventh residential property on the assessment roll to ensure a completely random sample.
“The spread of opinion was also noteworthy,” explained Winegard. "On some questions, some replied 'not important’; some replied 'extremely important'; and everything in between. Examples of
that flat spread included the appearance of the downtowns, incentives for industry, police facilities, and questions related to tourism and retirees. On the other hand, there was much more
unanimous importance attached to questions dealing with bridges, financial sustainability, water supply, and partnerships with Grey County and neighbour municipalities."
"We asked several questions about assessing the current state and future costs of different types of infrastructure - libraries, community centres, bridges, and works yards - with a follow-up
question whether people favoured repair /replacement of all such infrastructure regardless of its utilization or cost. It was very clear from the low importance scores that -
while residents value these types of infrastructure - they do not say, even for bridges, “repair/replace everything regardless of utilization or cost".
Residents said they were most satisfied with the municipality's ability to attract tourists and retirees , promote fire prevention and study municipal partnerships.
Residents gave the lowest satisfaction score for economic development incentives, environmental impact of projects, availability of serviced industrial land and communication.
Says Winegard, "Naturally we don't typically see anygreat enthusiasm for more spending, even on issues that residents consider important. For each issue, we gave the option of less spending,
no more spending, a minor rate-of-inflation increase, up to a 5% increase, or more. On most questions the average response was somewhere in that 'minor rate-of-inflation' range, at most. A few
crept up a bit higher than the rest, such as supporting broadband internet, a long-term plan for bridges, expanding sources of municipal revenue, and a long-term municipal financial sustainability plan."
West Grey Mayor Kevin Eccles emphasized the survey's value. "Statistically, as we work on our 2020 Action Plan, these results give us a solid sense of the priorities of residents at large. The
County is working on a program to bring broadband throughout Grey, and the survey confirms the urgent need for broadband in our local economy. It emphasizes that we need to double-down on
our long-term financial planning, including cost and benefit analyses of our infrastructure. It reinforces Council's inclination to look at partnerships to help us do a more effective and more
efficient job. It indicates that people are not satisfied that everything possible is being done to attract new business and jobs. Council is very grateful to the residents who took the time to respond
to the survey. It will definitely help West Grey chart our path for the next few years."
The survey of a random sample of residents asked 30 questions rating the importance of issues.
177 of 734 surveys were returned.
