Public Affairs Municipal Research Services

Environics partners with your municipality

Municipalities across Canada face unprecedented challenges. More than ever before it takes work, determination and planning to develop and maintain strong vibrant communities, while at the same time balancing budgets and juggling conflicting priorities. Ensuring a prosperous community requires a clear understanding of citizens’ behaviours and needs.

The payoff for success is significant. Municipalities with desirable amenities, lifestyle and environment have a competitive advantage—they attract the workers business seeks, investment follows and the community prospers overall.

Environics’ Municipal Research practice focuses on providing critical insights into key populations and groups (be they citizens, stakeholders, employees or consumers), in terms of how they view their role in society, how they want to be governed, and their expectations of, and experiences with, institutions and businesses.

With more than 20 years of municipal research experience, Environics brings an unparalleled capability to address your requirements. As a trusted leader in municipal research services, we can partner with your organization to provide the necessary data, the critical insights and the strategic direction that support effective management of the crucial issues facing your community.

Full service research solutions

Environics provides the essential expertise to help municipalities in such areas as policy and program development and evaluation, communications, public consultation, service delivery and long-term strategic planning.

We understand the challenges facing communities today. Our research is designed to provide valuable insight and guidance in the following areas:

Citizen and Customer Satisfaction Research -- tracking overall satisfaction with municipal services, programs and facilities, identifying key drivers to determine what actions should be taken.

Municipal Issue Management -- examining citizens’ perceptions regarding important issues facing their community (e.g., transportation, crime, urban planning and development, environmental concerns).

Quality of Life Measurement -- measuring citizens’ opinions, attitudes, perceptions and expectations with respect to the quality of life in their community, including benchmarking with other municipalities and the country as a whole.

Spending Priorities -- detailing citizens’ preferences regarding municipal spending priorities, efficiencies and budgetary planning.

Voter Turnout/Governance -- examining citizens’ attitudes and perceptions around elector participation to better understand underlying factors associated with turnout levels; designed with a view to encourage increased participation.

Employee Satisfaction / Performance -- providing in-depth and actionable assessments of municipal staff and government.

Future Visioning -- offering a unique approach that provides greater insight into citizens’ perspectives, expectations, social values and priorities related to the future vision of their community.

Public Policy Research -- providing a feedback loop between citizens and policy-makers.

Strategic Planning / Performance Measurement -- collecting and interpreting information that can be used to help guide future planning processes, as well as serve as a benchmark to evaluate the effectiveness of your municipality’s efforts.

The right tools for the job

Every initiative presents its own specific requirements and challenges, for which the best research solution requires careful consideration. Environics has developed a diverse range of sophisticated research tools with which to fully address the objectives of each project. Environics can draw on unparalleled expertise in:

Quantitative Research -- telephone (CATI), intercept and on-site, mail, panel studies, web-based

Qualitative Research -- focus groups (traditional and online), mini-groups, triads and dyads, town hall meetings, one-on-one executive interviewing

Syndicated / Omnibus Research -- Environics conducts a number of syndicated pubic opinion research surveys on public affairs and social trends, which can provide valuable context intelligence to municipalities, including how public opinion is evolving over time. Among our syndicated offerings is the semi-annual Focus GTA study, which surveys a representative sample of 1,000 residents of the Greater Toronto Area.

Benchmarking -- as a value-added component, Environics is able to provide benchmark data drawn from other municipalities to provide a comparative overview and context to study findings.

Unique research tools

Environics is Canada’s leader in social values and segmentation research. Environics can work with municipalities to better relate to citizens’ hearts and minds, and uncover answers to the central questions.

Environics Social Values Monitor -- For over two decades, Environics has measured the evolution of Canadian society though leading-edge social values research. This research is designed to provide insights into the changing social fabric of our nation and communities by measuring over 100 social values trends, covering elements of human interaction ranging from family relations, work motivations, tolerance for others, quest for learning, experimentation, and consumer behaviour.

Our social values research is used by governments, non-profit organizations and leading companies in the private sector to provide insights that allow them to connect with citizens in meaningful and innovative ways.

This powerful tool is effectively used by municipalities to support strategic planning and develop a vision for their community, today and in the future.

Environics Analytics PRIZM_CE -- Environics offers a unique geo-demographic segmentation system designed to provide greater targeting precision by answering key marketing questions. Municipalities can gain greater insight into specific subgroups within their community. PRIZM_ce is effectively used to generate a thorough citizen profile that describes predominant lifestyles, hobbies, product usage patterns, attitudes and beliefs.

Whether it is issues related to waste management, social services or new or changing facilities, this tool is used successfully by municipalities to target important portions of their community.

Read a detailed case study of an Environics Public Affairs project

Email Tony Coulson, Vice-President, Public Affairs, or reach him at 613-230-5089 or at 403-613-5735

Email Derek Leebosh, Vice-President, Public Affairs, or reach him at 416-920-9010