Sunshine Coast Community Plan

Council endorsed the Sunshine Coast Community Plan at its Ordinary Meeting on 18 May 2011.

Purpose

The Sunshine Coast Community Plan will shape decision-making in the region over the next 20 years, and provide a strong footing for promoting the community's priorities to all levels of government.

Overview

In partnership with the community, council has developed the first Sunshine Coast Community Plan.

The plan, which is a requirement under the Local Government Act 2009, captures the community’s vision and hopes for the future of the region and will guide all other planning processes for council.

The plan was adopted by council following 12 months of extensive consultation with the community.

During the consultation process, it became clear that the community is committed to the Sunshine Coast becoming Australia’s most sustainable region, and that the plan should be carefully considered by all decision-makers.

The community recognises that to become more sustainable, there is a need to:

• protect the region's precious natural assets and lifestyle
• build and diversify the economy
• create employment opportunities
• ensure there is social cohesion
• seize new opportunities as they arise.

To coordinate the delivery of the plan, council is proposing to set up the Sunshine Coast Community Partnership comprising local businesses, not-for-profit organisations, community groups, resident's associations and all levels of government.

This partnership will develop and coordinate strategies and actions to achieve the goals outlined in the Community Plan.

Community engagement

The first stage of the Community Plan was an analysis [PDF 271KB] of significant community consultations from the past seven years including:

• feedback from the 2009 Our Place Our Future consultations
• community feedback on council's 2009/14 corporate plan
• Maroochy 2025
• Noosa community sector board plans
• Caloundra Social Plan.

Market research

Council commissioned Nielsens to conduct thorough market research across the region in July and August 2010. 

View the summary report [PDF 474KB] and full report [PDF 599KB].

Zooming into 2030

In late 2010, council's Zooming into 2030 project gave residents the opportunity to submit an image and a caption to show what their 2030 looks like. Council has used some of these images and captions to illustrate the plan.

Community conference

As part of developing the plan, council held a community conference at the Big Pineapple, with non-government organisation representatives, community organisations and individuals on 6 and 7 October 2010 to:

• review the data and market research
• identify community values and ways in which we will work together
• identify priorities
• identify the community's aspirations.

Online discussion

The online discussion held early in 2011 was the final community engagement step in completing the Sunshine Coast Community Plan. The online discussion and submissions on the draft plan closed on 30 March 2011, however you can still browse the site and view the discussions.

Contacts

For information, please contact council's Project Director, Partnerships and Engagement on (07) 5441 8233.