The Human Resources and Information Technology Committee met 04/12/2023. After voting to approve the proposed reorganization of the Public Works and Community and Economic Development Departments, the committee then received a recruitment status update. A few items from the report were highlighted.
A transcript of the discussion is available for download:
HVAC TECHNICIAN POSITION – The city has been having a difficult time filling this position. They ended up running a recruitment campaign that included a sign-on bonus for the new employee as well as a referral bonus for an existing employee who brought in a person for that position. During the March meeting, Human Resources Director Jay Ratchman had reported that this program had brought in a promising candidate; however, now he reported that, after getting to the end of the hiring process, the candidate withdrew because he wanted to find a position that was closer to his home.
The city was running the recruitment campaign again. The current application deadline was April 23, but it was possible they would extend that. They did have one candidate that was looking favorable. If they were unsuccessful in filling that position, they planned to step back and reevaluation how they were doing this because that position has been posted a few time without generating many candidates or successfully bringing in a new employee.
BUS DRIVER POSITIONS – I looks like the city has had 8 openings for bus drivers for a long time, but that didn’t necessarily reflect the fact that they have hired people and also had employees leave.
In 2022, they introduced a sign-on bonus for the bus driver position which applied to any driver who had a Commercial Drivers License with a passenger endorsement. Since August of 2022, Valley Transit had hired 8 qualified drivers, and the program was considered very successful in that it had resulted in a lot of quality hires. Unfortunately, they had also lost employees. Some had completely left Valley Transit, two moved from being full-time drivers into a different position within Valley Transit, one full-time driver chose to go part-time, and one driver was no longer qualified to be a driver and also transferred to a different position at Valley Transit. So, they needed to work on retaining their employees.
Director Ratchman noted that the pool of part-time drivers was really important because it allowed Valley Transit to fill in the schedule when they didn’t have a full-time driver to do so.
He also mentioned that Valley Transit had cut back on staffing during peak hours and cut around 100 hours of staffing time out of each week. They were also looking into a new software program to help them review their route assignments.
In 2022, Valley Transit had hired a Safety and Compliance Specialist who started in November. That was a new position that would not only focus on safety and compliance but also provide some training for employees who do not have Commercial Drivers Licenses. Their vision was to hire drivers who don’t have a CDL, train them, and get them on the road. That training will entail around 100 hours of classroom instruction as well as hands-on driving experience.
SEASONAL EMPLOYEES – Director Ratchman said that seasonal employee recruitment was going really well, and that was because of the changes implemented as a result of the compensation study. He wryly noted that a nearby municipality that had not utilized Appleton’s compensation consultant had implemented a seasonal compensation plan that reflected exactly what Appleton’s plan was.
FORESTER – The city’s former forester had retired and that position was filled by a different City of Appleton employee. The city had two Operation Supervisor positions, one which focused on safety and one which focused on forestry. The forestry position had been the dream job for the operations supervisor who was focused on safety, so he was now moving into the forestry role.
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=1091886&GUID=84DAEC97-9BD1-466F-9A27-D589FF4D56DA
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