• social development organizations, such as schools and school boards, social services, youth drop-in centres, parental support services, community support service agencies and Elderly Persons Centres, to collect information on the people they serve;
• cultural organizations serving new Canadians and/or ethnic minorities, including Francophone organizations; and
• private sector, including but not limited to bankers, realtors, insurers, service organizations, employers, local business improvement areas, local business leaders and owners, to collect information about the local economy.

“Develop an engagement strategy that is manageable and achievable given the resources available – you won’t be able to engage every single possible partner, so focus on a good variety of community organizations, agencies and individuals and look for patterns.” - Lianne Sauter, Town of Bancroft

Planning partners should consider keeping a record of the groups that they have reached through community engagement, as well as their identified concerns, to support the analysis of community risks for inclusion in their plan.

See Tool 5 for guidance on analyzing community risks.

Approach

In order to gain support and promote involvement, planning partners should think about how they can best communicate why they are developing a plan and what they want it to achieve. Some planning partners may do this through the development of specific communication tools for their plan. For example, one community that tested the framework and toolkit created a name and logo for the work undertaken as part of their plan – Safe Brantford – and put this on their community surveys, etc. This allows community members to recognize work being done under the plan and may encourage them to become involved.

Additionally, when planning for community engagement, partners involved in the plan should think about the different people, groups or agencies/organizations they plan to engage with, and the best way to engage them. They should ask themselves questions such as: what information do I want to get across or get from the community and what method of communication or community engagement would help me do this most effectively? For example, planning partners could have open town hall meetings, targeted focus groups by sector, one-on-one interviews with key people or agencies/organizations, or provide an email address to reach people who may be uncomfortable or unable to communicate in other ways. They may also distribute surveys and provide drop-boxes throughout the community. It is important to consider not only what planning partners want to get from engaging with community members, stakeholders and potential partners, but also what they might be hoping to learn or get from this process. As much as possible, partners to the plan should use these considerations to tailor their communication/community engagement approach based on the people/groups they are engaging.

See Appendix B for guidance on engaging youth and Appendix C for guidance on engaging seniors.