Community engagement in the recent past comprised only a small portion of most environmentalassessments. As stakeholders have become increasingly aware and informed of local projects andregulations, many questions are raised concerning how a potential project will affect theenvironment, if there will be any impacts to the community’s health and safety and if the projectwill be sustainable. A negative community reaction can delay or stop projects, damage therelationship between the project proponent (client) and community in which they are workingwith and harm the company’s reputation. Thus, the price of halting or delaying a project can bevery costly to the client.An effective engagement strategy emphasizes the need to have a transparent process that levelsthe playing field for those potentially impacted by your project. This paper addresses the need forsuch a strategy and provides a tool (The Allan Community Engagement Assessment Tool) whichhas been developed to assess the nature of the stakeholders’ current relationships, and the projectteam’s expectations of the stakeholders. The results of this assessment will lead to a communityengagement strategy that reflects realistic expectations for budgets, resourcing requirements andlikely outcomes.
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