The District of Sechelt has reconsidered its stance on not releasing the results of the online citizen satisfaction survey and will have the results posted to www.sechelt.ca by the end of May, according to district staff.
The about-face came after Sechelt resident Graham Moore filed a freedom of information request for the results and ultimately lodged a complaint with the B.C. Information and Privacy Commissioner when his request was denied by the district.
On April 18, Moore received a letter from Jo-Anne Frank, Sechelt’s corporate officer, that read: “I am still refusing to disclose the information you have requested pursuant to section 20(1)(b) of the Act as the District will be releasing the results of the District’s online 2016 Citizen Satisfaction Survey publicly within 60 working days from the date we received your request. We will publish the results sometime before the end of May 2017 on our webpage.”
The news was a pleasant surprise to Moore, who has been pushing to have the online citizen satisfaction survey results released to the public for several months.
“I am glad they are complying with the freedom of information request and I look forward to seeing the survey results soon,” Moore told Coast Reporter this week.
Sechelt Mayor Bruce Milne had previously said council would not release the results because they were statistically unverifiable and more negative than results garnered through a telephone survey conducted before the online survey was undertaken.
“When council first considered the release of the online survey responses, the focus of attention was on the integrity and validity of municipal data. Council did not turn our deliberations to consider the context of the provincial Freedom of Information and Privacy Act (FOIPA),” Milne said this week.
“Staff responsible for administering FOIPA have judged that the responses would be subject to FOIPA and within that context should be released,” Milne added.
“The municipality has a number of options in such a situation, one of which is to simply agree to release the information within normal and routine practice. That will be the recommended approach. I expect that council will be asked to reconsider and rescind the earlier resolution not to release the responses,” he said.
“It is my understanding at this point that the online responses will be posted on the district website as originally intended – within the context of the telephone survey.”
