City Spending More To Cut Provisionals, Add Permanent Staff

The Department of Citywide Administrative Services will administer more civil-service exams and boost hiring of permanent civil servants following an adjustment to the city’s expense budget approved last week by the City Council. Over the fiscal year that ends June 30, $3.3 million is being spent to help the agency convert provisional employees to those covered by civil-service protections.

DCAS is responding to a 2007 State Court of Appeals decision, Long Beach v. Civil Service Employees Association, which compelled the city to limit provisional appointments to the nine-month maximum stipulated by law. In 2008, the Bloomberg administration planned to replace what then numbered more than 37,000 provisional employees, a program that Mayor de Blasio requested last fall to extend through next year. During a Council hearing in November, DCAS Commissioner Stacey Cumberbatch said the agency sought to reduce the time it takes from administering a test to establishing a hiring list—currently a median of 441 days, according to the most recent statistics.