Another strong result in annual community survey

 Wodonga Council has built on its strong performance in the 2020 annual community satisfaction survey with another positive result in the 2021 results, despite the many impacts of COVID-19. 

The council’s overall performance measure was 67 – up two points on the previous year - compared to 60 for regional centres and 61 for the state averages.

On all measures evaluated, the council’s performance was in line with or significantly higher than the regional centres and state averages.

The statewide survey shows appearance of public areas, emergency management, waste management and art centres and library as councils’ top-performing areas.

The survey also asked about the posts council’s COVID-19 response with the council receiving a score of 75 in line with the regional and state averages of 73.

Wodonga Mayor Cr Kev Poulton thanked the community for their feedback and for acknowledging the hard work of the council – both current and the previous councillors - and staff.

“The results reflect the work that council officers particularly have put in to ensuring our community has been informed and updated throughout the pandemic but also how they have continued to deliver a range of essential services across the city,” Cr Poulton said.

“I also want to acknowledge the decisions of the previous council as well my fellow councillors in our ongoing commitment to making decisions and advocating in the best interests of our community.

“This is a shared effort through what has been a challenging 12 months.”

Chief Executive Officer Mark Dixon welcomed the results following a transitional year in the community.

“We’ve had many disruptions over the past year in the ways in which we inform, engage and deliver services to our community so it is really pleasing that the community continues to acknowledge that our staff are continuing their hard work in making this a great place to live and work,” he said.

“We are coming to the end of the present Council Plan and developing a new one and it was a year in which we had lockdowns, changing restrictions and council elections.

“So it is pleasing for us to still perform so strongly and even improve in some of those areas that faced the biggest impacts.

“As always, there is much we can take away from these results and where we will continue to improve, recognising that some scores have been affected by events that were out of our control.”

Please note, results shown are index score out of 100. This polling, organised by Local Government Victoria, was undertaken in February and March this year. This is the sixth consecutive year the council has been participating in the state survey. In 2021, 66 of 79 councils took part.

Read the report here.