Shaping the Pyrenees

After receiving the report from the Community Panel, Council met to review and consider it. They had two workshops facilitiated by Liminal by Design to workshop a structure for the Council Plan in response to the Community Vision report. The decision was made to include the complete words from the community panel, and to write the Council Plan in response. Council officers then workshopped internally to flesh out priorities and initiatives that would be feasible to carry out.

Council workshopped a separate vision to the Community Vision for two reasons: 

1. The Community Vision is longer term (10 years) than the Council Vision (4 years)
2. The Council wanted a shorter vision that still included all of the sentiments of the Community Vision.  

Deliberative engagement is a process which involves recruiting a representative sample of the community and giving them the opportunity to consider an issue in detail and work together to develop solutions. It is different from gathering information from community through surveys, or feedback on draft documents, as it is much more involved and collaborative, and is supported by facilitators who are expert at getting groups of people to work together. It provides a great opportunity to put citizens at the heart of our decision-making processes. The Community Panel were engaged in a deliberative engagement process facilitated by external consultants, Liminal by Design. 

Advertisements were placed in newspapers, on facebook, on Council's website and in the Community Newsletter. Council officers also attended Beaufort Market when COVID restrictions permitted. People who were interested in being part of the community panel, were asked to complete an Expression of Interest (EOI) questionnaire, to provide information about themselves. Council then engaged external assistance to carry out selection of participants. Selection was: 

• Blind - Names and email addresses will be hidden from the person selecting participants
• Stratified - The selection will make sure that the participants make up a representative panel as much as possible, in terms of aspects like gender, age, location, industry/occupation. 
• Random - People in each category or group will be selected at random.