We asked members of our Residents' Panel for their opinions about ‘Your County', our residents' magazine.
Who took part
Only Residents' Panel members could take part in this survey by post or online. Find out more about the panel, and how to join:
The consultation was open from 9 July to 7 August 2010. We received over 850 responses, a response rate of 47%.
What you told us
The findings from this survey showed that:
- most (88%) felt that the magazine was easy or very easy to read
- over three quarters (76%) thought the magazine was well designed
- over three quarters (78%) found the articles useful
- four fifths (80%) recalled receiving the magazine at least once in the last 12 months
- two thirds (63%) felt that 12p per issue of Your County was value for money
- most were interested in seeing information about how we spend the council budget (91%), how we will cope with cuts in funding from central government (88%) and information about the services we provide (87%)
Topics that respondents would like to see more of included in depth articles, information about local areas and their issues, budgets and proposed cuts and specific council services.
Respondents would like to see less self congratulation, waffle and spin and articles about specific staff or services.
Recommendations
- Ensure that the magazine contains the information that respondents have told us is important to them.
- Investigate why Your County was not delivered to a number of households in the county.
- Use the additional comments that were received to identify any additional features that need to be included.
- Look at the style of reporting. It should be factual and not self congratulatory.
You can read the full results by downloading the report below.
What will happen as a result of this consultation?
We are reviewing Your County,and other council publications, to make sure we provide good value for money. Information needs to be easy to access, relevant and in a format that residents find most useful – printed and online. The results from this survey will be carefully considered as part of this review.
The actions that have been taken following the recommendations will be fed back to the residents' panel and published on our website.
Enquiries
If you have any queries about this survey, please contact our Consultation and Engagement Manager.
East Sussex County Council