The Swan community has made its priorities clear in an annual survey which shapes our City’s future.
The 2024 Community and Business Perceptions Survey was conducted in February with the support of independent consultancy CATALYSE.
The survey measures how residents and business owners views our performance and compares those results with previous years and other WA local governments.
It is delivered as two separate surveys – one for residents and one for businesses.
We use the results to track our progress against the five key result areas in our Strategic Community Plan – natural environment, economic, social, built environment and governance.
The City of Swan community has spoken – and we are listening
More than 830 people had their say in this year’s community survey in February, with their overall rating putting the City slightly above the WA local government industry average.
In natural environment, there were increases in satisfaction with our management of public open spaces near waterways (up 6% to 84%) and waste management (up 2% to 86%).
Economic results included improvements for development and activation of town centres (up 5% to 70%) and economic development and job creation (up 4% to 74%).
In the social space, the community reported improvements in services for youths (up 9% to 74%), families (up 3% to 85%) and seniors (up 5% to 80%).
Recognition of cultural diversity (up 3% to 91%) and respect for First Nations peoples (up 2% to 90%) continue to be among our strengths.
In built environment, our scores were steady, with most remaining above the industry average.
For governance, we improved our performance in advocacy (up 10% to 61%), communication of decisions (up 5% to 65%) and consultation (up 4% to 53%).
Seven key priorities emerged from the community survey, with safety and crime prevention far and away the top priority.
- Community safety and crime prevention
- Streetscapes, street trees and verges
- Playgrounds, parks and reserves
- Swan Active leisure centres
- Lighting of streets and public places
- Waste management services
- Climate change/sustainable practices.
Tanya Richardson, City of Swan Mayor, said we were already taking steps to address key safety issues raised in the survey, including strengthening our mobile CCTV program and rolling out major public lighting upgrades.
“We are working on keeping our community and businesses safer by developing our Community Safety Plan, which outlines key actions to make you feel safer in Swan,” Mayor Richardson said.
“We’ve just finished our second round of community consultation on the plan and that will be coming to Council in the near future. “
We have made a significant investment in greening the City, including more than $2.3m in tree-planting in the 2023/24 budget.
Playground renewals and shade sail installations are ongoing across the community, with a $6.5m play space coming soon to Ballajura.
Swan Active Midland has reopened after its $30m refurbishment and Swan Active Ellenbrook is in the design phase.
In terms of waste management and sustainability, FOGO is on its way to Swan, with the rollout of our new three-bin kerbside collection system to start in July.
More than 150 businesses took part in the business survey, and again, the overall results were above the WA local government industry average.
Notable results from the business survey included an industry-high for attracting investors and new businesses (up 13% to 68%), and improvements in businesses finding it easy to work with us (up 8% to 70%), Swan as a place to work or operate a business (up 4% to 90%), and tourism attractions and services (up 3% to 80%).
Businesses identified the following three priorities:
- Support and retention of existing businesses
- Safety and crime prevention
- Parking management.
Mayor Richardson said the City, which signed the Small Business Friendly Local Government Charter earlier this year, was delivering a range of initiatives for businesses.
These include enhanced training and networking, the Swan Business Engagement Program, the Buy Local campaign, and our Accessible and Inclusive Business Initiative.
Mayor Richardson said parking improvements were planned for 2024/25 for parts of Ellenbrook and Midland.