By Jonty Ralphsmith
Greater Dandenong City Council has suffered a decline in satisfaction among Keysborough and Noble Park residents across multiple categories, according to the latest official community survey.
Responsible for the Keysborough ward, Cr Dark is addressing the result, having requested the raw data to find out the vicinity and specifics of the issues raised.
“I think it is surprising given the capital investment into the area over recent years but it is a clear sign council needs to do better across many different services,” Cr Dark said.
“I’m having conversations at the moment about how we need to improve and in which angles we need to improve but if there is a perception that we’re not functioning to the highest standard that needs to be investigated.”
In the 2021-’22 proposed budget, $10.2 million was committed to the Keysborough South Community Hub with Tatterson Park’s Community Sports Complex being recently completed prior to that budget.
Resident Gaye Guest, however, raised the lack of activity centre and dog parks, and the state of footpaths and nature strips as other areas that could be improved to increase value for money.
Noble Park ward councillor Sophie Tan was contacted multiple times for comment but could not be reached.
Noble Park and Keysborough residents are less positive than the municipality’s average in most areas: value for money for infrastructure services (a reduction of six index scores but still well above the state average), overall council direction (a reduction of four index scores to a record low), community consultation and engagement performance (down two index scores to an equal record low), decisions made in the interest of community performance (two index scores down), sealed local roads performance (seven index scores down), waste management performance (three index points down).
Customer service ratings among Noble Park and Keysborough residents experienced an 11-point decline – a record high rating to a record low rating while the municipality declined just one index point.
Lobbying on behalf of community importance was up four index points, however, among Noble Park and Keysborough residents suggesting issues were dealt with appropriately.
Although Noble Park and Keysborough lag behind the rest of the municipality, it is still generally on par with the metro average.
Residents in those suburbs also had significantly less contact with council than in 2021.
Generally, overall community satisfaction has remained relatively steady across the board.
As per previous years, the municipality scored highly in the state-wide survey which assesses each council’s performance across a range of measures including value for money, consultation, engagement, community decisions and more.
For overall performance, council’s score of 68 was well above the state average of 59 and there were no areas where council performed significantly lower than the state average.
The municipality is known for its value for money and it ranked 11 points higher in this area than the state average with overall council direction also well above the state average.
Waste management was also highlighted as an area the council is taking positive action and is rated the most important individual service area for council to address for the third consecutive year.
Parks and gardens (11 per cent), customer service (11 per cent) and diversity (10 per cent) were labelled the best things about the council.
