EHQ Staff Pick: Town of Victoria Park, Western Australia

The Town of Victoria Park in Australia's West has published almost 50 projects since October last year. While not all projects are aiming to engage the community - many projects are about documenting the town's progress with their marquee project "Evolve" - it highlights the staff's commitment to promote inclusion and transparency to the community.

The staff pick this time is no different. The proposed sustainability fair is organised by a working group, but the project page aims to find ways to include the community in this process and to showcase the work of the group, which, without EHQ, may have been done behind closed doors.

Client: Town of Victoria Park, Western Australia.

Template: Whitehaven

Project: Victoria Park Sustainability Fair

Publish Date: 06 July 2016

Topic: The Council is looking to organise a sustainability fair in a few months time and is involving a working group and the wider community early in the process.

Tools: Survey, Brainstormer, Q&A, News Feed

Widgets: SignUp Banner,FAQ, Document Library, Who's Listening

We love:

1. Idea: Sustainability Fairs have increased in popularity over the last years and they are an important event to educate the community about sustainability and sustainable living. The Town is on the front foot this year and is engaging the working group and the wider community in the early stages.
   
   
2. Working group: The working group, which consists of internal stakeholders from the town and external stakeholders from the public, is introduced beautifully via the Who's Listening widget. This gives the project a a personal touch, promotes transparency and gives everyone involved in the project a chance to build their profile.
   
   
3. Method of engagement / Mix of tools: The team at Victoria Park have clearly thought about different ways to include the community in the process. Apart from an EOI form for potential vendors and/or volunteers, the project also features a News Feed, to keep everyone up to date, a Q&A tool to answer questions and a Brainstormer to gather ideas on what the fair should ultimately be named.
   
   It shows that there are usually options to involve the community in one way or another.
   
   
4. Simple set up: Depending on the topic of consultation, most projects that involve the community early do not need a lot of supporting documents or FAQs and the team has kept the site deliberately simple. Nevertheless, a couple of tweaks (see below) could have given the project the perfect touch.

For further consideration:

1. Key Dates: There are a few key dates in this project. This includes the close of the EOI form and the event itself. Although all dates are outlined clearly, the Key Dates widget could have helped collate all dates in one space.

2. Links: The project description as well as the FAQ section makes reference to the one document as well as the various tools on the site. It could have helped to hyperlink these references to make navigation easier for the participant.

OVERALL: The Town of Victoria Park have been looking at finding as many use cases for EHQ as possible, thereby getting enormous value out of their license. The "Sustainability Fair' project is another such example. The working group could have worked behind closed doors, but in the name of good community engagement, the town has decided to open the door and make the organisation a transparent process. Well done!

NOTE: The article above is based on a visit to the site on 11 July 2016. Changes made to the project after that date may have altered the appearance of the project.