NOW LC SURVEY: Why do people move to Nova Scotia?

In working to develop a strategy to help grow Lunenburg County, we sent a survey out to our network and members of our community that have moved to the area.  What better way to find out the decision making process for moving to Lunenburg County than to ask the actual people who have moved here. 

We were fortunate enough to have 74 respondents (54 from Lunenburg County) to our survey. Below is a quick list of interesting results from the survey:

• We asked respondents to identify their top three priorities for moving to Nova Scotia.  Pace of life, cost of living and employment opportunities were the three major priorities in the decision to move to Lunenburg County. These top priorities had quite a large margin over education, recreation, and culture.  Diversity was the lowest ranked priority.
• 51 of respondents had lived in more than 2 other places prior to moving to Nova Scotia.  This may be an indication of the more globally connected society we live in, but it was refreshing to see that the majority of respondents have lived in Nova Scotia for over 5 years, which hopefully means that some roots are taking place in our beautiful province.
• There tended to be a theme of three major challenges faced by new arrivals to Nova Scotia; finding employment, gaining acceptance into the community, and working through red tape, for example getting a driver’s license or health card.
• All but 7 of the respondents have recommended to someone else that he/she should consider moving to Nova Scotia. For those not recommending Nova Scotia, the primary concern focused on the lack of employment opportunities in the area.

This survey was short and the sample size is relative but we were looking to gather information quickly as we continue to work through our focus on population growth in Lunenburg County.  Respondents provided us with excellent and thoughtful answers to our questions. This information will inform us as we continue our work.

---