Social Media Policy

Type
Policy
Number
COM-2024-01
Adopted

COMMUNICATIONS DEPARTMENT POLICY

Policy Number: COM-2024-01
Policy Name: Social Media Policy
Adopted On: 03-06-2024
Resolution Number: 241-2024

1. Policy Statement

1.1. The Nation Municipality encourages and supports the use of social media to further the goals of the Municipality and the mission of its departments, promoting it as a tool to deliver effective and accessible communication about municipal news, programs, and services to the community.

1.2. The Nation Municipality is committed to using social media to promote the Municipality's objectives, initiatives, programs, and news through professional and strategic communications.

1.3. The Nation Municipality recognizes that the Municipality's website, www.nationmun.ca, will remain the Municipality's primary online presence; however, the Municipality acknowledges that social media is also needed to assist online audiences to visit the Municipality's website for further information.

2. Purpose

This policy serves to:

2.1. Protect The Nation Municipality's reputation and ensure consistency and professionalism with how the Municipality communicates with the public via social media;

2.2. Prevent inappropriate, irrelevant, inaccurate, or unproductive conduct on its social media platforms, ensuring that all interactions remain respectful, relevant, and constructive.

2.3. Ensure that third party content shared on our social media platforms adheres to established criteria for appropriateness, relevance, accuracy, and productivity.

3. Policy

3.1. Citizen Conduct

3.1.1. Social media platforms that allow page administrators to disable comments

The Nation Municipality will disable comments on its social media accounts where this option is available for the following reasons:

  1. Ensuring a Respectful and Safe Environment: By turning off comments, The Nation Municipality can protect staff and the public from harmful interactions. This measure ensures that our social media platforms remain a safe space for disseminating information and engaging with the community.
  2. Focusing on Primary Objectives: The primary purpose of The Nation Municipality's social media platforms is to inform the public about municipal news, programs, and services. Disabling comments ensures that important announcements and information are not overshadowed by potentially harmful or irrelevant comments, maintaining the focus on delivering essential information to our residents.
  3. Resource Efficiency: Managing and moderating comments on social media can be resource intensive. Eliminating comments reduces the time and effort required for monitoring and responding to inappropriate content, allowing staff to focus on their primary duties and improving overall efficiency in communication efforts.
  4. Legal and Ethical Considerations: Disabling comments helps avoid potential legal challenges related to free speech while ensuring compliance with the Canadian Human Rights Act and other relevant legislation. This measure ensures a safe and respectful environment for all users, preventing harassment and discrimination.
  5. Promoting Constructive Communication: While comments are turned off, it is crucial to provide alternative ways for the public to engage and communicate with the Municipality. Each post will include contact information such as phone numbers, email addresses, or links to the Municipality's official website, ensuring that citizens can still have their questions and concerns addressed constructively. This approach fosters a more controlled and constructive communication environment.
  6. Facilitating Public Sharing and Discussion: Residents can still share the Municipality's posts on their own social media pages and add their comments. This allows for public discussion and engagement to continue in a more personal space, while the official pages remain focused on providing clear and concise information. This ensures that while the Municipality maintains a respectful and safe environment on its platforms, the public can still engage in discourse and share their views on their own terms.

3.1.2. Social media platforms that do not allow hosts to disable comments

The Municipality reserves the right to remove any inappropriate, inaccurate, irrelevant, or unproductive comments from social media platforms where the option to disable comments is unavailable. If the user continues to post inappropriate, irrelevant, inaccurate, or unproductive content, the Municipality may ban/block the user from the site at the discretion of staff.

Comments, posts, or articles containing the following content will not be allowed:

  1. Comments not related to the topic and/or issue being commented upon;
  2. Account spamming, trolling or over posting;
  3. Comments that are meant to solicit sales, products, or goods and services;
  4. Comments that are harassing and vexatious, malicious, profane, false, misleading, inaccurate, or insulting;
  5. Any content that promotes, promotes, or perpetuates discrimination based on race, colour, age, religion, sex, marital status, welfare status, national origin, physical or mental disability or sexual orientation;
  6. Content that includes or includes links to objectionable material, as defined in this policy;
  7. Conduct or encouragement of illegal activity;
  8. Information that may compromise the privacy, safety, or security of the Municipality, public, or public systems;
  9. Comments or posts that includes inaccurate material or misrepresent facts as known by the Corporation;
  10. Comments that impersonate or misrepresent someone else, including public figures, Municipal staff, or Municipal officials;
  11. Content that violates a legal ownership interest of any other party.

The Municipality is not responsible for any comments or use of material posted by users. Moderation decisions are not open for discussion. Any content removed based on the guidelines in section - will be retained by the Social Media Account Administrator and have supporting documentation, including the time, date, identity of the poster, reason for removal, and any required incident reporting.

The social media accounts of The Nation Municipality are not monitored 24/7. Inquiries through comments and messages will be responded to within 3 business days (excluding holidays and weekend) during regular business hours (Monday-Friday, 8:30am-4:00pm.). This turnaround time may be impacted by staff availability and resources.

3.2 Content Sharing

3.2.1 Content that includes external links

When sharing or reposting content from a social media account not owned by The Nation Municipality that includes external links, at least one of the following criteria must be met:

  1. Connects the public with information and services provided by upper tier governments or government-funded agencies or boards in Canada.
  2. Provides further information on subject matter found on the Municipality's website. Such information must be provided by an official and/or accredited source.
  3. A Municipally affiliated organization, service club or registered charity (direct partnership by way of funding, sponsorship, staff resources or in-kind contributions).
  4. A business operating within the Municipality.
  5. Any organization approved by Council.

Any posts that include links to a personal account/website, individual business account/website, political party/candidate account/website, or objectionable material as defined in this policy must not be shared or reposted on a Municipal social media account.

3.2.1 Content Promoting Community Events

The Nation Municipality is committed to sharing events that are relevant and of interest to its residents. Event organizers and community groups are encouraged to follow the proper submission process to have their events considered for promotion on the Municipality's social media platforms.

Content promoting events must meet at least one of the following criteria:

  1. Organized or funded by another level of government;
  2. Organized by a government-funded agency or board;
  3. Organized by a The Nation Municipality affiliated organization/group;
  4. Funded in full, or in part, by The Nation Municipality;
  5. Sponsored by The Nation Municipality;
  6. Organized by a registered charitable organization operating within the Municipality or the United Counties of Prescott-Russell;
  7. Organized by a service club operating within The Nation Municipality performing work that benefits The Nation residents;
  8. Organized by a business or Chamber of Commerce located in the Municipality for general promotional purposes; and/or
  9. Located in a facility owned by The Nation Municipality.

Advertising for multi-level marketing gatherings will not be shared on The Nation Municipality's social media platforms.

Content must be in both French and English to be shared on the Municipality's Facebook page.

Community events and activities should be submitted to communication@nationmun.ca to be shared on The Nation Municipality's social medias and/or added to The Nation website (www.nationmun.ca). While the Municipality does not create posts, it can share already existing content. Including a link to the existing Facebook post in the email is recommended.

3.3. Use of Social Medias by Elected Officials

3.3.1. Elected Officials' Social Media Accounts

If a Member of Council, MP, or MPP representing The Nation Municipality or United Counties of Prescott-Russell has a social media account, the Municipality's social media accounts are permitted to like/follow the account.

Accounts belonging to Member of Council must be created and maintained by the Member of Council and not municipal employees.

3.3.2. Council Conduct

The municipality expects all members of Council who use social media to do so without breaching their duties to the municipality and adhere to their Code of Conduct. Members of Council should consider the following:

  • Do not circulate any organizational or confidential information, such as internal deliberations about how decisions are made, personal information, such as client or employee information, or negative comments about The Nation Municipality, Members of Council, employees, or residents.
  • Do not disparage or embarrass the Municipality, individual Member of Council, employees, and others associated with the municipality.
  • Do not engage in workplace discrimination, harassment, or activity that includes inappropriate comments, photographs, links, etc.

SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNTS OWNED AND OPERATED BY THE NATION MUNICIPALITY

FACEBOOK
La municipalité de La Nation Municipality
https://www.facebook.com/nationmun

The Nation Sports Complex / Complexe Sportif de La Nation
https://www.facebook.com/nationsportscomplex

The Nation Fire Department / Service d'incendie de La Nation
https://www.facebook.com/nationfire

LINKEDIN
Municipalité de La/The Nation Municipality
https://www.linkedin.com/company/nationmun/

TWITTER
@NationMun
https://twitter.com/NationMun

YOUTUBE
The Nation Municipality / La municipalité de La Nation
https://www.youtube.com/@thenationmunicipalitylamun4903/featured