In June 2006, the Dunedin City Council adopted its community plan which identified the community's vision.
Indicators to measure the city's progress towards that vision and significant council projects that contributed to each of the visions, or outcomes, were identified.
Council chief executive Jim Harland said the outcomes fitted under four "wellbeing" areas: economic, environ-mental, social and cultural.
On Wednesday, three invited groups met to discuss how well the council was doing on its community plan.
The groups were asked whether the city was heading in the right direction and did it have its priorities right for the future.
The groups were also asked if there were any specific programme changes that could be recommended for the council or other agencies.
Strangely, the accompanying booklet, "City Indicator Information", contained graphs and information that stopped in 2006.
Around the walls of the Dunedin Public Art Gallery auditorium were some of the same graphs including ones that the city council should have been hard pressed to call its own.
Participants in the economic forum were asked to comment on how well the council had done on things like GDP growth, number of new businesses, total employment, average household income, visitor nights, net positive migration, building consents, tertiary students, length of cycleways, bus use, motor vehicle ownership, passenger loadings through Dunedin International Airport and the value of goods loaded at Port Otago.
Given that the Otago Regional Council owns Port Otago Ltd, which operates at arm's-length from the council, and the ORC also puts out the tenders for the bus routes, it seemed difficult to measure how well the city council had performed in those areas.
The recently announced 650 Otago redundancies were not part of any measure of employment or job creation pinned to the wall.
Also, the University of Otago would seem to have the most say on attracting and retaining tertiary students, although the council could have a role in either providing some accommodation or encouraging businesses to employ graduates and retain them in the city.
The forum was told the university was pushing to attract the "quality" end of the student spectrum - postgraduate students - while still getting backsides on seats at the undergraduate level.
A participant pointed out that not enough was being done to capture the 8000 or so annual graduates from tertiary institutions and place them into high-value jobs in the city.
Questions were asked from the assembled group of business people as to why the length of cycleways was included in an economic forum.
The answer related to having the city accessible to all residents through cycles, cars and buses.
Visitor numbers had increased from 655,980 in 2000 to 901,232 in 2007 but appeared to have flattened off from 2005.
Accompanying notes said Dunedin had experienced the same growth rate in visitor nights as the rest of New Zealand, which suggested that nothing Tourism Dunedin had undertaken had made any difference to the number of people staying in the city.
All growth could be seen as coming from a natural progression of the tourism industry.
It was suggested that measuring the empty beds would give a better indication of when a bigger marketing push should be made to attract people to the city.
Like the Otago Daily Times, others were concerned that the measures participants were asked to comment on and rate went back to 2006.
Why was not more up-to-date information available, some asked.
A general consensus seemed to emerge that perhaps the city council was not using the right indices for measurement but no agreement was reached on what the right index could or should be.
PricewaterhouseCoopers director Barry Timmings said he was philosophical about the process after realising it was part of the legislative requirements put on the council.
"It's not that relevant to what the city is like now or will be in the future. It's up to us to change things - the royal us. Each individual has to want to do something to make a change then get on with it."
Mr Timmings also questioned why the visitor numbers did not include the 111,000 cruise ship passengers who called during the summer season.
Although they might not have contributed much financially, they did contribute something.
It was questionable whether the city was using the right measures to gauge economic performance, he said.
Otago Chamber of Commerce chief executive John Christie told the ODT in an interview the council was in an unenviable position.
On one hand, it was tied by the processes required by the Local Government Act and committed to consult in an effective way with the local community but, on the other, it wanted to have "meaningful dialogue" with specific parts of the community.
Mr Christie used the council's parking strategy as an example.
The chamber put in a submission, along with just 31 others.
"You can't tell me that only 32 people are affected by the city's parking strategy. The submission process did not engage the community so it has to be more strategic."
With parking, a focus group was formed, and came up with some ideas that were put into the strategy, he said.
The chamber often felt the community was overconsulted and that the council needed a change of direction.
The business community needed to become more involved in the process along with other parts of the community.
The attendance on Wednesday by a group of business people showed there was willingness to participate.
"I have never heard business people in this city say no, they won't contribute. The goodwill is there for the council if it wants to have the contribution. Often, it is overcomplicated by bureaucracy."
Mr Christie was critical of the old data put up for participants to consider as a measurement of the council's progress.
"Are we patting ourselves on the back for something we did three years ago or do we want the vision for the future. What do we want for the next five or 10 years? That's where we want the energy to be harnessed."
Most business people were out doing their jobs, getting on with creating wealth.
The council needed to be clever in the way it engaged those people, he said.
The discussion on Wednesday was valuable but once it strayed into areas where there was some traction about creating economic growth, it was pulled back to the process of council.
"It should have been about where we are going, not where we have been," Mr Christie said.
The ODT asked several of the participants why they did not make submissions to the council's annual plan hearings and why they did not attend the hearings to put a business perspective on the process.
Most said they were on first-name terms with Mr Harland and economic development committee chairman John Bezett and sent them short emails with ideas, comments or criticism.
However, some were critical of the newspaper's coverage of the hearings, saying it only reported the negative comments. But as Mr Harland said, the paper could only report what was presented at the hearings.
Cr Bezett said yesterday he was in regular contact with business people both within and outside of council.
Generally, they were much more positive about long-term prospects in the city than was indicated by surveys issued by the banks.
But the bad news had forced some people to retrench and cut back on spending.
"Then I go out to Taieri Print and see the millions they have spent upgrading. They are so gung-ho about the future. It depends on the business.
"There is a sense here that now could be a time to build businesses for the future."
Asked if he would appreciate business people being more vocal in their support for council activities, Cr Bezett said he needed support from people outside of the council when they thought it appropriate.
"Comment from outside council carries much more weight than a councillor saying it."
While he appreciated the comments made to him privately, public support showed that the council was heading in the right direction.
Sometimes, the council took the lead in development because entre-preneurs within Dunedin, or from other areas, had failed to step up.
The prime example was the Wall St retail development, in George St.
The building had sat there underutilised for years but no-one had indicated they were willing to take on the project. So the council did.
He questioned whether the forums on Wednesday were the best way of communicating with the community.
When the council distributed its resident survey, it usually showed a lack of understanding about economic development.
"People don't understand a lot of the economic development that is going on. Some councillors don't understand. That is not a criticism as we can't know everything. But how do we get the message across and how do business people get their ideas across?"
The Government was employing a research and development officer in Dunedin to seek out businesses to which funds could be applied. The officer would be looking for opportunities in Otago and Southland, something the council had done for a long time, Cr Bezett said.
"Most have been associated with the university and most have been successful, but when we talk to the people, they don't want to mention they had a grant from the council for $10,000.
"The council has to look at opportunities to see where it can get positive mileage. It hasn't been easy."
