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CAO reports 12% civilian vacancy rate citywide; committee expedites hiring for wildfire response
Summary
The City Administrative Officer presented an update on the Prioritized Critical Hiring (PCH) process showing roughly 3,200 hire requests since implementation and a civilian vacancy rate around 12 percent; the committee agreed to expedite wildfire-related position requests and voted to receive and file the report.
The City Administrative Officer (CAO) reported to the Budget and Finance Committee that since the city's Prioritized Critical Hiring (PCH) process began, departments submitted roughly 3,200 requests to hire, and the civilian vacancy rate across city departments is approximately 12 percent.
CAO representative Melissa Velasco told the committee the PCH process has handled thousands of requests since implementation and that the Office of Public Accountability was an outlier with a particularly high vacancy rate (about 89 percent) because it currently has one of nine authorized positions filled. Velasco said departments should flag urgent wildfire-related positions so the PCH committee can expedite review and approvals.
Committee members pressed the CAO on when a separate analysis about wildfire-exempt positions would be returned. The CAO said staff are expediting that report and that departments have already submitted expedited requests for wildfire-related positions. "We're working on that report. I'm not sure I have an exact date, but I do know we're expediting it because of the concerns about the wildfire," Velasco said.
The CAO also addressed costs of overtime versus hiring. The CAO—s analysis noted that because hiring a new employee entails salary plus pension and benefits, in many cases paying overtime to existing staff is less costly in the short term than a full hire. Velasco and committee members discussed the tradeoff between short-term cost savings and long-term service continuity.
Councilmember McCosker expressed broad concern about PCH and said he would continue to press to exempt wildfire-response positions from PCH limits where appropriate. The committee voted 5-0 to receive and file the CAO report.
Committee members also urged departments to submit requests and to flag urgent wildfire-related hiring to CAO budget analysts to ensure immediate consideration by the PCH committee.
