Indicator Inbox - ISSUE 2 - Winter 2011

Welcome to the Community Indicators Victoria (CIV) Indicator Inbox

Welcome to the Community Indicators Victoria newsletter. It is hard to believe we are in June already! As the beautiful leaves in all their colours fall from the trees and the air gets cooler it is a sure sign that winter is upon us. This issue of the Indicator Inbox is packed with information, resources and tools that will hopefully assist you in strengthening your use and understanding of indicators in your work or interest area. In the local heroes section you will find an introduction to an exciting project happening in regional Victoria. In the International section you will find an inspiring speech on happiness and its value to both us individually and to society. Training wise RBA is on again in August, and of course it is always exciting to see what data releases have been added to the CIV website. So as we welcome in the winter, we hope you enjoy this edition if the Indicator Inbox. Warm regards, the CIV team.

VicHealth Indicator Survey 2011

It is with much excitement that CIV can announce that the VicHealth Indicators Survey went into the field on Monday the 2nd of May. Data collection is expected to be completed in approximately 3 months time and will continue until late July / August 2011. Data analysis will commence after data collection has been completed and CIV aspires to a late 2011 / early 2012 data release of all CIV Survey based indicators.

Data Releases

TAC Road Traffic Fatalities per 100,000 population.
2008 Victorian Population Health Survey - LGA based results are available for the indicators of Adequate Physical Exercise, Crime, Family Violence, Fruit Consumption, Vegetable Consumption, Obesity, Smoking Status, Risky Alcohol Consumption and Psychological Distress. LGA results according to gender are also available for the majority of these indicators with the exception of Vegetable Consumption, Psychological Distress and Risky Alcohol Consumption. Gender results have been withheld for these 3 indicators because the low levels of incidence resulted in high Relative Standard Errors above 25% (refer to Metadata section of website for more information).
Crime and Family Violence indicators have also been updated according to 2009-10 crime statistics and latest available Estimated Resident Population figures.
Australian Early Development Index data have been provided to CIV and are expected to be released and published online by the end of June once a Licence Deed has been signed.

Training Opportunities

Results Based Accountability 101: August 2011

Date: Friday 5th August 2011
Time: 8.30 am for a 9 am start. Finish time 4.30 pm
Venue: Graduate House (on Leicester Street) University of Melbourne
Cost: $375.00

This will be a facilitated workshop run by Louisa McKay and Athena Williams.

Mark Friedman the founder of Results Based Accountability describes RBA as:
“starting with the end and working backwards, step by step to the means”.
RBA is all about plain language, partnerships, moving from talk to action and using data to measure whether or not we are really making a difference
Please note numbers will be strictly limited to 30 participants.

Registration will close 22 July 2011. Please note registrations are filling fast. For course information and registration forms contact Athena on 9035 8279 or email athenaw@unimelb.edu.au for more information.

Working with Indicators – the basics

Working with Indicators is still a work in progress. We are really keen and excited about the opportunity to work with people about the best ways of using Indicators in their work through interactive workshops. At CIV we use indicators everyday for planning, measuring change, to help us think about what next, to begin discussions, to get a snapshot of an issue and the list goes on.

Please keep an eye on this space – in the interim if you would like to express your interest in this training opportunity please feel free to make contact with Athena at athenaw@unimelb.edu.au

Local Heroes

A place to recognise outstanding work in the Indicator space in Victoria

Regional Sustainability Indicators Framework for South West Victoria

The Regional Sustainability Indicators Framework for South West Victoria project is a partnership project between the University of Ballarat, Southern Grampians Shire Council and the Natural Assets Alliance of the South West Sustainability Partnership. This project aims to develop an agreed set of sustainability indicators and a framework for reporting on the sustainability of South West Victoria. Based on Getting Started: A Guide to Developing Regional Sustainability Indicators in Victoria (Byrne et al, 2010), this project will develop a Community Report Card for the south west region. The Great South West Community Report Card will report on the sustainability of South West Victoria (including its community and environment) to Local Governments, local organisations, industry and community, enabling informed decision making and a shared understanding of sustainability. The Community Report Card will provide information at the indicator and overall sustainability scale for each Council, and will have direct links into local government planning and the regional catchment strategies.

To help ensure that the Report Card will be adopted by the region, the project will involve a range of community and stakeholder consultation stages. Through community and stakeholder surveys, the indicators felt to be most important for the region’s sustainability were determined. These indicators will be presented to potential end users of the sustainability assessment this week to develop an agreed list of indicators. These indicators will then be used to develop the Great South West Community Report Card. It is hoped that the protocols for use and template developed for south west Victoria will be adopted by other region’s across Victoria and Australia. This project, which will run until June 2012, is funded through the Victorian Government's Sustainability Fund under the Victorian Local Sustainability Accord.

For more information on the Regional Sustainability Framework please contact:

Dr Michelle Graymore
Research Fellow
Horsham Campus Research Precinct
University of Ballarat
Baillie St | PO Box 300
Horsham 3402
Victoria AUSTRALIA
Email: m.graymore@ballarat.edu.au

If you are part of, or know of a project using indicators in Victoria that you believe others would benefit in knowing about please send information through to Athena.

Australian Community Indicators Network (ACIN)

In May, the Australian Community Indicators Network hosted its first national video seminar with key note speaker Associate Professor Meg Holden, Simon Fraser University Vancouver. Meg is Director of the Regional Vancouver Urban Observatory and is currently a visiting fellow at RMIT’s Globalism Institute.

Meg addressed the meeting with a presentation on Best Practice and Emerging Principles in the Community Indicators Movement. You can view a video of the recording of the presentation here.

The presentation provided an overview of new developments in the realm of community and urban indicators around the world, with a view to understanding the key alternatives available when designing and implementing an indicator system, and the implications of these decisions for the impact of the system on people, policy and trends. Themes were drawn from the community indicators, policy, and sustainable development literatures. Case examples were drawn primarily from North America, with an in-depth consideration of three key indicator system developments in the Vancouver region, innovative for different reasons: the Vancouver Foundation's Vital Signs project, the regional government's indicator initiatives, and the Olympic Games Impact system being conducted on behalf of the International Olympic Committee.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics hosted the seminar and linked people from across 8 capital city ABS offices, via video. More than 120 people participated. The seminar was recorded and will be downloadable from the CIV website in the near future.

The next ACIN seminar is planned for September 2011 and will focus on national community indicator initiatives in Australia. Further details on this event will be available in the coming months via CIV website and the ACIN network here.

The Australian National Development Index

The Australian National Development Index will develop clear measures of Australia’s progress. A business prospectus for the Index has recently been prepared and is available here.

International happenings

New Indicators Web Site in Viet Nam
www.papi.vn

Congratulations to Josh Martin (who developed and built the CIV website) who has been working with a civil institution in Viet Nam to capture the experiences of citizens.
The Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) is a joint research collaboration between CECODES, the Viet Nam Fatherland Front (VFF), and UNDP Viet Nam. PAPI systematically measures and monitors the performance of governance and the public administration system at the provincial level in Viet Nam. By capturing citizens’ experiences of public administration and comparing and ranking provinces, provincial governments will have strong incentives to improve their performance.

The index will also empower citizens to raise their voices about their preferences, frustrations and recommendations in terms of public services (including both public administrative as well as public services).

Visit the PAPI web site here to browse their data and reports - or even create your own custom reports

The PAPI web site and data visualisation was developed by Media Insights in Melbourne Australia.

Looking for Inspiration?

Have a look at this speech delivered by Christine Carter at Berkeley University. Christine Carter, a sociologist and happiness expert, gives advice to students on happiness in a graduation ceremony speech. Click here for details.

Up and coming Conferences

State of Australian Cities

The State of Australian Cities is a national forum, held biennially, to share scholarship directed at the complex and multidimensional issues facing us as an urban nation. This conference will seek ways of bridging the divides created by a focus on disciplinary based approaches to research, towards better cities in a better country for more information click here.

Papers and Journals of Interest

Journal of Social Inclusion

The Journal of Social Inclusion (JoSI) is a peer-reviewed academic journal that contributes to current knowledge and understanding of the social processes that marginalise individuals, families, groups and communities. The journal is published biannually in Autumn and Spring under the guidance of an International Editorial Advisory Board. The Journal of Social Inclusion (JoSI) is an initiative of the School of Human Services and Social Work, Griffith University. To view The Journal of Social Inclusion (JoSI) click here.

Redefining GDP and what we mean by growth

Many of us are exploring what it means to come up with 'measures of progress' that go beyond GDP. Assistant Professor Mark Edwards from Western Australia explores this in the new academic forum 'The Conversation'. Read what he says click here.

Community Indicators in Action

Chapter 14. Community Indicators in Action: Using Indicators as a Tool for Planning and Evaluating the Health and Wellbeing of a Community
Davern, M., West, S., Bodenham, S. & Wiseman, J. (2011). Community Indicators in Action: Using Indicators as a Tool for Planning and Evaluating the Health and Wellbeing of a Community. In Sirgy, J., Phillips, R. & Rahtz, D. (Eds), Community Quality-of-Life Indicators: Best Cases V. Springer: New York.

Reports of Interest

OECD Better life initiative

Are our lives getting better? How can policies improve our lives? Are we measuring the right things? The OECD Better Life Initiative and the work programme on Measuring Progress answer these questions. They allow understanding what drives well-being of people and nations and what needs to be done to achieve greater progress for all. Your Better Life Index allows you to visualise well-being outcomes in OECD countries. It is an interactive tool through which you can look at how countries perform according to the importance you give to the various components of well-being. Click here for details.

International Key Indicator Systems

A summary report of international Key Indicator Systems has recently been released by the United States Government Accountability Office. The team responsible for the report met with CIV in 2010 and CIV features in the report as a an example of a Comprehensive Key Indicator System Case Study Profile click here.

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