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Community Engagement Plan

What is the Hornsby Shire Council Community Engagement Plan?

This Community Engagement Plan is your guide to how you can help to plan our future by providing feedback on items placed on exhibition for formal public consultation.

Community Engagement Plan

The Community Engagement Plan supports the Policy and provides a guide for staff and consultants in the deliverance of best-practice community and stakeholder engagement with high-quality outcomes.

You can participate in a diverse range of projects. You can provide feedback on a new neighbourhood playground or a development matter. You can also participate in developing new council policies and strategies.

Your participation informs and guides the decision-making functions of Council.

The draft Plan was exhibited from 16 April to 28 May 2021. Based on feedback from the community, a number of amendments were made to the document.

The final Plan was adopted by Council at its 14 July 2021 General Meeting with an amendment to the resolution (recommendation 5) to refer the documents to the new Council for consideration of further inclusions.

The Local Government’s Integrated Planning and Reporting (IP&R) Guidelines, stipulate that the Community Engagement Plan must be reviewed by 31 December in the year of a local government election. This timeframe was extended by 12 months due to the delay of the election from September 2021 to December 2021.

As a result, the Plan was reviewed with the following proposed housekeeping amendments:

  • minimum mandatory exhibition periods added for the IP&R suite of reports
  • key stakeholder groups within the Hornsby Shire community included as a table
  • other minor text edits.

In addition, minimum and recommended exhibition periods for Council documents including major projects, strategies and plans were added to address the amendment to the Council resolution on 14 July 2021.

The revised plan with the proposed housekeeping amendments was exhibited from 16 February to 16 March 2023. No submissions were received, and the Housekeeping Amendments were adopted at the 10 May 2023 Council Meeting.

Community Engagement Policy

Council’s Community Engagement Policy outlines Council’s commitment to building open, transparent and active relationships with the community.

The draft Policy was exhibited from 16 April to 28 May 2021. Based on feedback from the community an amendment was made to the document.

The final Policy was adopted by Council at its 14 July 2021 General Meeting.

Community Consultations