The Australian Journal of Public Administration, vol. 68, no. 2, pp. 152–166 doi:10.1111/j.1467-8500.2009.00627.x RESEARCH AND EVALUATION Community Consultation in Victorian Local Government: A Case of Mixing Metaphors? Nicola Brackertz and Denise Meredyth Swinburne University of Technology This article draws on a three-year collaborative research project investigating how commu- nity consultation is practised by Victorian councils, especially in relation to multiple publics and groups that councils can find ‘hard to reach’. Based on an analysis of consultation docu- ments, this article looks at councils’ understanding of community consultation and underlying assumptions, the expected outcomes and how this is translated into guidance for practice. The research demonstrates that councils aim to consult to provide a range of outcomes, but there is a lack of clarity about how to choose and use the appropriate combination of consultation tool(s) and public(s) to facilitate these. Councils are also unclear about how the outcomes of consultation feed into existing decision-making processes and the implications of this for democratic legitimacy. This is in part due to the fact that the conceptual tensions around consultation and the democratic process are apparent not so much by virtue of what is said about them, but of what is not said. The article begins by outlining the conceptual and definitional problems associated with consultation using typologies of public participation. We investigate how typologies inform the consultation documents developed by councils and in how far they support practice. We then address the need to involve multiple publics and the vexed issue of who is hard to reach and why they should be consulted. Key words: Victorian councils, community consultation, practice guidelines Project Background and Methodology This article draws on research conducted for the Community Consultation and the Hard to Reach project, which investigated how community consultation is practised by Victorian councils, especially in relation to multiple publics and groups that coun- cils can find hard to reach (http://sisr.net/daj/ projects/community.htm). The project was a three-year collaborative venture with eight councils, the Victorian Local Governance As- sociation (VLGA) and researchers from Swin- burne University of Technology. It was funded jointly through a grant from the Australian Re- search Council and participating councils: the Cities of Boroondara, Darebin, Maribyrnong, Melbourne, Moreland, Port Phillip and Whit- tlesea, and the Shire of Nillumbik. The study was concerned with conceptual and practical reasons for non-participation and how to extend community and service planning to become more inclusive and representative. Recent history (amalgamations; focus on con- stituents as consumers rather than citizens; out- sourcing and rationalisation of many services and functions; ‘best value’; and a renewed fo- cus on community) has deeply affected the way municipalities interact with community. This is being felt in the realm of the skills and knowl- edge about public participation that are avail- able within councils, as well as their attitudes towards the community. The eight participating councils comprised inner city as well as city fringe locations, ho- mogenous and highly ethnically and culturally diverse populations, economically advantaged and disadvantaged areas, well established C  2009 The Authors Journal compilation C  2009 National Council of the Institute of Public Administration Australia