Recommendation to receive and file the 2018 City of Long Beach Workforce Demographics Report.  (Citywide)
Great. Thank you. Next up is item number 22. Report from Human Resources recommendation to receive and file the 2018 City of Long Beach Workforce Demographics report citywide. America. We're going to do the report. Yeah, I think staff is going to the report first. Mary Council members, this is our annual diversity report for our citywide hiring between the city's H.R. department and also civil services. In the honestly, I've got David Honey behind me, the acting director of Civil Service, Alex Vasquez, our director of H.R., and Christina Kostin, who is one of our managers in H.R.. So I'll turn it over to Alex. Good evening, Mayor, and members of the city council. As indicated, I'd like to introduce Christina Kostin, who's a human resources officer who oversees our city's Equal Employment Opportunity and training division. Christina will give a presentation today covering the 2018 City of Long Beach Workforce Demographic Report. After our presentation, we'd be happy to. Answer any questions you have. Good evening, Mayor. Members of the City Council, thank you for this opportunity to present to you the 2018 Workforce Demographics Report. In 2017, members of the City Council requested the city manager to report on workforce and applicant diversity data on an annual basis until such time an online dashboard is implemented. Since presenting the 2017 Workforce Report to City Council, H.R. and the Technology Innovation Department met to discuss potential vendors for the online dashboard and next steps for moving the project forward, noting the dashboard will not be ready for public release until 2028 and Civil Service worked diligently to release this report, which we are here to present to you today. The 2018 City of Workforce Demographics report examines the city's workforce as of December 31st, 2018. The report covers all city employees summarizing statistics by gender, ethnicity, age and salary as an enhancement to last year's report. Civil service applicant flow data is presented by EEO job categories. Looking at the data on the city's workforce. The city remains one of the largest employers in Long Beach, with 6104 employees represented across 23 departments and 2018 employees, earning a median annual salary of $72,401. It is noted that in 2018 the city increased ethnic minority representation in the workforce from 59% to 62%, a 3% increase. Currently, 60% of our workforce is classified. Ah. Sorry. Currently, 6% of our workforce is classified service. As such, human resource collaborates with civil service because our ability to have a diverse workforce is dependent on the availability of a diverse and qualified civil service candidate pool. Drilling down on race and ethnicity. The city's ethnic minority workforce is divided as follows Asian, 14%, black, 13%. Latina, 34%. And Native American 1%. Recently, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission revised racial categories to include two or more races. The city anticipates incorporating this new category after the launch of LBE Coast. In terms of gender. 38% of our total workforce is female. Compared to City of Los Angeles, city of Santa monica, city of Sacramento and City of Oakland. The city of Long Beach ranks number two for female representation. In comparing our 2017 and 2018 Workforce Demographics report, we identify several areas of improvement. The data indicates we have made great progress with workforce diversity to include increasing our total minority representation in the workforce from 59% to 62%. A 3% increase. Increasing staffing levels by 8% through strategic succession planning. And streamlined efforts to decrease timelines for filling a vacancy. Decreasing the pay gap between women and men for permanent full time employment from $0.81 to $0.85 a 4% increase. Increasing total ethnic minority representation in police recruits from 60% to 70%. A 10% increase. And increasing ethnic minority representation in top management from 28% to 46%. An 18% increase. And increasing representation of female applicants for police recruit by 6%. And females hired by 2%. The city's ultimate objective is to establish a diverse workforce that is reflective of the relevant labor market in the community we serve. To achieve this objective, the city will continue outreach efforts in recruitment to obtain a qualified applicant pool that is representative of all ethnic and gender categories. While the overall picture of city workforce demographics is headed in the right direction, we drove the data down further to identify areas that warrant an additional look in an effort to be proactive in our efforts, creative in our approach, and adaptable to the ever changing demographic realities of Long Beach, the city intends to monitor the following four areas for opportunities to grow. One Hiring and retention of black and Latino employees. While other ethnic minority groups held steady or increase, blacks seen relatively slow growth, with nearly 2% decline in overall representation in the workforce. Also, hiring of black applicants into classifieds service decreased by 4% despite the reduction in black workforce. Citywide representation of black employees in the civilian workforce still meets or exceeds relevant labor market data for the Latino population. The city experienced a 4% increase in citywide representation. While this is a step in the right direction, the city has yet to align current staffing with relevant labor market data for Latino populations. The city will continue to monitor progress in these areas to ensure adequate representation compared to relevant labor market data. A second area we identified is the recruitment of females into male dominated fields from 2017 to 2018. The total female representation in the workforce remained unchanged at 38%. This is largely due to the city having several male dominated job categories, such as protective services, technicians, skill, track, skill, craft and service maintenance. In 2018, these categories accounted for nearly 59% of permanent full time hiring. Moving the needle for female representation and closing the city's pay gap will require strategic recruitment of FEMA applicants into male dominated fields, such as sworn and skilled craft. A third area we identified is the fire recruit diversity. In 2018, the number of ethnic minority applicants for fire recruit increased by 3%, despite a growth in the number of ethnic minority applicants. Representation overall hiring decreased. Currently, the city manager's office is collaborating with the Fire Department and Civil Service to review the selection process for fire recruit. This includes seeking to identify and implement best practices for improving diversity. As the fourth area we identified. We looked at retirement eligibility as of December 31st, 2018, 16% of the city's workforce is currently eligible for retirement. This number is expected to grow to 25% or nearly one in four employees within the next five years. This presents opportunity to increase diversity. As part of the 2017 request, Council requested the city work with Technology Innovation Department to implement an online dashboard. Currently, the Technology Innovation Department is diligently working with Openserve, the vendor used for budget LBE to build an online dashboard that will allow data on employee demographics to be easily visualized through interactive charts and graphs similar to those on the City of Portland and City of Boston's website. Staff anticipates going live with the dashboard no later than January 1st, 2020. So that concludes our staff report, and we're available to answer any questions. Thank you. Let me first going to the contrary, Ringo actually brought this to the council. First, let me start with the contrary, Ringo. Thank you, Mayor. This is an excellent report. It's something that I've been waiting for for a long time. I remember when I first brought this forward a few years back. It wasn't quite at the level that it is now. So I'm very happy that, you know, sometimes some reports are worth waiting for, and it is one of them. One of the things obviously that came forward is that we're still hiring more. Well, just explain to me a little bit. On page 91, you have the breakdown in white, Asian, black, black, Macs, Native American. When you say white in that category, is that white, male and female or just white male? What is it? What does that category explain? What point out. Are you referring to the bottom graph. That's race and ethnicity. Yes, that is concludes male and female. Male. Female. White? Yes. Okay. Male. Female. Everything else? Yes. Yeah. So, I mean, you could see those numbers that still more whites are being hired at twice the level of any other ethnicity by itself and more than all combined. So we still have some work to do in this area. Obviously. I think we still need to have outreach out there to into the people of color and the and disadvantaged communities. We need to reach out more to them. And obviously that this this needs to go through that. Obviously also is the fact that, you know, when we look at the hiring practices, it's no secret that we hire those that look like us. So I think we need to improve also our representation in the management ranks of minorities and women and people of color so that we can make some changes in those areas as well . Seeing the other the other data that's there, it's it stands out as well. So but overall, I can say that it's well done. I still would like an explanation as to what the dashboard would exactly provide and how it will be used in the future coming 2020. And what would that be? How meaningful will it be for the city council and having a dashboard of this nature? Can you can you sort of give an orientation as to what it's going to be or is it too premature? Well, last year when this item was brought. Out, there were a couple of examples that were given to us to look at. We also looked at other agencies that well as well. I think we're still working with Open with. T.I. and will be will be developing. What that dashboard is going to be. Is going to look at. But primarily what we're aiming for is. To provide that data so that individuals can go to the website and access the data. Readily, very. Easily. And we are also looking at having some ready made tables and graphs that are. Very popular for. People to access with these as well. So again, the goal is for is to allow folks to access the data and slice and. Dice it to suit their needs. A lot of the information that we have in here is about classified positions and jobs. I didn't see or be overlooked it in regards to how we're doing in the at will position to the non-classified positions. Is that information in here as well? It may put me out to it. So we also the report also contains. Information about. Management positions which. Are primarily. Unclassified. And in this area, we did report that we have significantly increased the number of ethnic minorities in this area over last year when we compared 2017 and 2018. Yeah, that's management. But I was talking about other unclassified positions in the general workforce, such as and classified analysts. As an example. Just for. Clarification, are you asking for the. Data to be provided. As on page 91. Or because they are included in the. Other charts that are is the bulk of the. Oh, you're in general speaking like for example, I would classify positions like refuge worker or recreation specialist. I know there are some administrative analysts who are assistant analysts positions out there that are unclassified. Are those also included in this report somewhere? Yes. So if they're. Full time employees, they were included in the report. Yes. Part time employees as well. Okay. All right. Thank you. In recruitment, there's are we still having people go visit colleges and universities and community based organizations to let people know about job opportunities with the city? Yes, Councilmember, we are actively attending. Job fairs, community events. For example, recently we were out at the Cambodian New Year Festival and a number of community events and job fairs each week. Okay. We are going to be having a table at the Long Beach Parade. Yes, sir. We will be out there all weekend. Wonderful. Glad to hear that. Well, one last thing. I know there was a statement made about the some of the positions are male dominated, or at least not many females go to those types of jobs. I think that especially when talking about public safety positions like police and fire, I think we can do better in those areas by having a targeted recruitment to get those individuals into our police and fire departments. One of the other things about that is that, generally speaking, I don't public safety has taken a big hit in the last couple of years, especially with all the incidents that have been taken or been taking place across the country. So maybe that a lot of people are not looking at those as as viable professions or careers. But I think that it's important for us to have the face of law enforcement and public safety out there. So I'm sure that you have some representatives from the police and fire departments who may be able to join you in some of these recruitment efforts so that they can provide a greater opportunity for explaining what they do and how they do it so that we could put more people on on that track for that kind of career. So are you working with the police and fire departments to have recruitment teams work with you and go out into these these areas? Yes. Councilmember, we are working closely with police and fire at these. Events and whenever possible we do bring out members of the police. And fire department who are representative. Of the groups that we are working to to target. Okay. Well, that's a lot of questions I have, but thank you for your report and looking forward to getting a dashboard to see how to how it comes out. Thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman Gonzales. Thank you and thank you so much to Councilmember Ranga for bringing this forward from the beginning. And I love this report. It's going to take me a while to them through it. But I will say the two data points that stuck out to me and we've addressed it in the beginning was the pay gap, $0.85 to every dollar on the woman and man side and then just the female representation. I would like us to look at, you know, just especially emphasizing the departments that I kind of listed here that are under that 30% representation overall, both in the management and the Non-Management side. I mean, I'm seeing some that are pretty big outliers. Like the airport only has 8% female employees fire 10%. Of course, public works 19%. Tech and innovation, 27%. Economic development, 17%. And I know we're working on that. But if there are specific. Specific marketing tools that we could. We can work on that could be specific to women in attracting employees women employees. That would be really great and know. Just recently, the tech and innovation team was at the Women in Tech Conference, which was really great and I hope to see more of that and I know we will. So I'll just emphasize that. But thank you again for the work. And I know that we're going to continue to create a profile that evolves here in the city. Thank you. Councilmember. I skipped councilmember austin who was a second or the motion. Thank you. I just want to thank staff for the great report. This is a lot of good data to digest today and tomorrow moving forward as we understand our workforce here at the city. I want to just say that one couple of points jumped out at me, and one is that we need to be developing a good bench when it comes to management. It shows that within the next five years, we're going to lose, you know, over 40% of the managers here in the city. And so certainly we need to be developing a good, good bench as folks are planning to be retiring. There was I agree with that. The number on the gender pay gap I think is improving, but shows that we still have room to improve significantly. And the one demographic group that I don't see here and would like to see in the future is disability recruitment. I mean, those with disabilities and how are we recruiting and providing opportunities for those in the workforce as well? Those are my brief comments. I want to commend Councilmember Durango for for his tenacity and making sure that this information was presented to us. I know this has been a pet project for his for for several years. And to have this report is is quite an accomplishment. So congrats. Thank you. On price. Thank you. I, too, want to thank Councilman Saranga for initiating this work. Staff did a great job. I will say that I feel that the city manager has really tried to make this a priority in recruiting. Of course there's more work to be done, but I want to commend him on understanding that this is a goal, while at the same time trying to find the best qualified candidates for each of these positions so that we're being efficient with our use of resources, not exposing ourselves to unnecessary liability and things of that nature. So I realize that, you know, his his ability to hire the type of diversity that we're looking for that represents the diversity of this city is really limited to the type of candidates he gets in the pool. And so anything that we can do to help proactively train, recruit. Route folks to these professions as a city, an early stage, I think we should do taking advantage of people who have interned here, people who have worked in staff positions and learned the culture and are looking forward to come back. I think that those individuals should really get some priority in terms of being considered for employment with the city, even if they are not an outside candidate. That has more qualification. I just think that's important. So thank you. Thank you, Councilwoman Councilmember Richardson. Thank you. I think this is a great report and and it's come a long way. And people have said this has come a long way since the beginning. You know, thank you, Councilman Ranga. Thank you to the H.R. department that prepared this. I think this is a great start for a good conversation. There's a few things I want to lift up just because I've found here. So. So the question is this. So tell me about the EEO plan. Are we that's that's the guiding document, right? The EEO plan. We have a EEO plan as a guiding document. Right. So we do. Have a EEO. Plan. Report and we're expecting to bring that next year. We brought. That to the council. With this diversity report in 2017. And again. This report was asked to be brought. Annually until we go. Online with the open data and the EO report is scheduled. To come back next year. And so the EEO plan will be what guides the movement. Right. Because the last EEO plan was 13 to 17. So the next one helps guide the movement, sort of how we move the needle in the future. Correct? This is a point in time report. But the EEO plan is where we make, you know, our suggestions on where we go. Is that correct? Yes. But the EEO plan also. Provides data a little differently. It does a more deeper dove by job EEO category. And we look into and compare the. City's workforce compared to the relevant labor market data. And the reason I ask is because when we look at the gender pay gap here, the appropriate place to set a policy or a goal around closing gender pay gap, what the appropriate document would be the EEO plan. And that could be a question for the city attorney. I'm sorry, counsel. Could you repeat that? City attorney or H.R.? So if we wanted to put forward a goal or a policy around closing the gender pay gap so it would be appropriate in the EEO plan or some other document. So I think it probably would be appropriate with the AEO plan. We can also take that back and come up with some recommendations. Sure. I will share that some of the challenges with the pay gap for a government. Agency like the city of Long Beach and we have looked at. Other agencies, is when you have a workforce that's heavily male dominated, especially in areas of. Public safety, which are usually higher. Paid positions. That can skew the. Data. So it is important when we look at this skill gap that we take account of that. Otherwise we. Could be. Skewing our data. And so we have to consider all those factors. Thank you. And that's that's why I think in the EEO plan, you look at specific like classifications where you can compare apples to apples, whereas this there cluster with officials, administrators or non-management management. So you can't really tell where the swing of the skew is. But in the EEO plan, you can see what women police officers make versus female police officers, white male versus female. And so that's where where I think I'd like to see how we can be creative about putting forth a goal or a policy or something when that comes. Next thing I'll lift up is on page 31. The Health Department, I think in most departments you'll see, you know, male dominated. And then on page 31, you see that it's incredibly, you know, female dominated. And I don't know that health is necessarily an issue that's, you know, gender specific. I think it's health. But why do you think that is? Most departments, many of these departments are really male heavy. And then the Helping Human Services Department is completely flipped. Why do you think that is? 87% female in officials, administrators and 73% in non-management. Why do we think that is? Well, that could be due to a number of factors. There are some job categories that are female dominated. If you look at, for example, office clerical type positions or accounting type positions. So there are some areas where like it's it's completely opposite. So I haven't dug deeper. On health. Department. But I mean, is it deep? It's it's. You know, I'd have. To look at the different job. Classifications. Well, I think I think they're doing something right. So we can we can certainly learn from that. The next thing on page 78, I just see a deep a deep racial pay gap in the harbor department. And so I'd like to just call out the Harvard Department. They should they should be thinking about are they under the same EEO plan as we are or do they have their own local plan? The port. So we do include them in our EEO plan when we report out. So we include all our city departments. Including Harbor. But they don't have their own local strategy that they deploy or they are accountable to this. On the plane. I'm not aware if they have there. We should look into that or else or just express that. I see a you know, a more significant gap here than other departments. Not quite sure why, but it is something I think we should address. And let's see. I think I'm fine. I'm pretty good here. I in general, I think there's again, this is this has been a really a, you know, really informative item. And I really look forward to the conversation around the the EEO plan where you can sort of set some set, you know, sets and take a look at the policy around what we do in terms of recruitment. Oh, I remember the last thing was, I think we need to be I know there are some plans list listed on fire fighter diversity and I see the issue here. But I think. I think we need to take a closer look at that and and make some, you know, make some changes some make some real changes to to the recruitment process and the fire department to make sure that we're you know, that we're putting a real emphasis on diversity in our fire department because it's our police department. Looks like they've got some really positive progress from numbers. But I want to see better. I want to see more come out of our fire department. Thank you. So I do want to point out with fire that that is something that we recognize. We have a full effort going underway right now to do research on fire diversity. What can we be doing better? Where can we be doing outreach? How do we make sure we're bringing more diverse people into our fire department? So that's an effort headed up right now by the fire chief. Thank you, Vice Mayor Andrews. Yes, thank you. First of all, I would like to thank Councilman Elanga for bringing this report, you know, forward, because the fact that, like he said, it's a long time and we've been kind of waiting on it. It's here now. And so I think and and also the report is a fantastic report. You were just also. But I would just like to say in some of these and reading just quickly through this, I think some of these things are very, very, you know, way out of balance here. And so now that our city manager has a chance to see a lot of them, I think in time we will be able to bring a lot of these things closer, you know, where it should be. And thank you very much for this report, Councilman Durango. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I want to first thank Councilman Herring. I know you have really pushed and and pushed on this issue. And I think having the state in front of us is really important. And so I want to thank you for that. A couple of things I just wanted to ask staff of all the department from a I can see the the improvements happening on on the gender on with gender. And I love seeing that progress that we're making as relates to pay. I think there needs to be obviously a focus of us moving forward on ethnicity and on what what department is having the most issues around diversity. Is that? Which one is that? It could. I it's kind of difficult to answer that question because. When it comes to like the non man, the, the non management which is the largest group. I'm sorry. Can you repeat that? Of the Non-Management category, which department is having the hardest time recruiting diverse candidates and hiring them? So I would say fire department is challenge with diversity. I will just tell you that from my experience, fire service is one of the areas that's most difficult to improve. Diversity is especially with. Gender. And and diversity in general. So there has to be a concerted. Effort to try to. Address that. And as Tom indicated, we city manager is working. With the fire department to to to work on. That and take a closer look at what are the challenges and how how we can address that one or the other. So and so we have our largest challenges that you're seeing in the fire. And I think that, Mr. Monica, you had mentioned that there's a an effort within that department to to look at that as an issue. And I want I want to just echo that. That effort. I think, you know, it should be obviously supported. And and I'm sure the chief is pushing on that. Let me just also say, I want to lift up the police department. And I think that what I see here with the with the police department is really great diversity. And I think that's not always been the case. And I think one of the things you hear from the community is that that the department represents the community of which it serves. And I'm not saying that we have it exactly right, but I think that there is clearly been an effort from the leadership and from the the the recruitment that is that is quite impressive. I that's not something that you see everywhere. And so I just wanted to note note that and I want to thank the chief for for his efforts in that area. Let me also just ask. This the. And maybe you said it earlier and I missed it. Is this. Report? How are we tracking this? I feel like we should be getting an update regularly with this type of data. What? What what's the process for this? So we brought this report in 2017. And so this is the second time we brought this report. This this report. The data would change after you do hiring. So, you know, if you're looking at frequency, I think it is appropriate to look at it on an annual basis so you can capture and look at any meaningful changes one way or another. And I'd like to ask Customary Ranga for a friendly that this type of data and report be made to the council at a council meeting on an annual basis, and that we review it with this level of detail and that. What are the my concerns about the dashboard is that, you know, it would probably take that away because it's going to be readily available. I support and I support the dashboard. I have no issue to the dashboard. I think it's important for for this body to, on an annual basis, review the data as presented and so that we're able to track the progress and the goals that the management has set for the organization. So if you accept that as a friendly. Amendment, absolutely. Great. Seeing as there any public comment on this item. Mr. Mayor can make one comment. You mentioned about police and fire, if we can comment about that. Sure. So earlier this year in the past year, we really turned the Office of Civic Innovation loose with a partnership with the police department to really look at overall hiring. How do we speed the hiring process for police? How do we streamline that? And we also really looked at diversity. So we're taking that same model and using the diversity component for the fire department. So we're really getting into the data and that that'll be something that would be happy to report to you on later. So we are really excited by the progress that you noted in police and looking to replicate that in fire as well. Thank you for public comment. I just wanted to thank the city staff for the presentation and the report. It's good to see that as the demographics of the city overall is changing within time in time of the census into more minority representation, it's also being reflected in the workforce. Some of the points I wanted to bring up, maybe if you're maybe you guys, whenever 2020 it comes into public, I can look at it. But it was curious to see like the impact of means testing in regards to minority representation and hiring. I know that within certain departments. I spoke to Chief Luna a couple of weeks ago with him and I think I don't know Wally English. English. I don't want to speak his name about the impact of means testing in minority applicants to the police department. I'm sure that also impacts also the fire department and the fact that I don't believe that there is a African-American recruit recruitment officer there. So I was just curious to see how things like student loans or, you know, the impact of housing or lack of housing in a lower credit score impacts how many minorities actually pass rounds of the application process. And also in regards to minorities being reflected better within the workforce. Was curious to see what are incentives that city staff or the city workforce in general uses to bring, you know, younger minorities into the workforce. In terms of housing, I think like there's a maybe that might be a big issue why a lot of minorities don't come into working within the city because of the current housing crisis that we're living in right now. And the last thing I was wondering was also in response to the Latin next representation within the the workforce demographic was curious if this is or is this counting a non non-Hispanic what is the delineation between white Hispanic and non Hispanic white in terms of the makeup of it? So other than that, thank you for the report. Thank you very much, Councilwoman Mongo. Thank you. I want to say that I appreciate the comments of my colleagues. I went upstairs to pump and I could hear all of everything, everything said except for when I was in the elevator. So I really appreciate the staff report. I really think that an excellent job was done. And I am also very, very proud of the work our police department has done. I mean, it is really phenomenal when you read the numbers on a national level and see what's being done here in Long Beach, it's actually phenomenal. I think that another point of clarification with regard to fire is that the fire workforce and when we onboard people has a definite impact because most of our police and fire participants stay in our agencies for a considerable amount of time. And so that change takes a considerable amount of time. And something that L.A. County has recently visited is that the requirements for becoming a police officer and a firefighter have changed because the duties and responsibilities and technology available has changed. So an example of that is there's a current test component that the L.A. County fire chief was discussing that used to be required of firefighters because of the way that the equipment was made back in the seventies. And yet that test component had not changed. And that test component was the number one fail component for females joining the agency. And so I think that not just the recruitment side, but also the qualification side and making sure that the tests that we have are in alignment with the actual maneuvers that are performed on the job on a daily basis, so that once they become a member of our team, that they're successful, but that they're also not barred from becoming a member of our team by not being able to do something that's no longer necessary. So thank you for all the work on this. I think it's an exceptional report and I'm glad we postponed it a week so we could have the appropriate amount of time to weigh in and read the details. So thank you very much. Great work, everyone. Thank you, Councilman Supernova. Just want to quickly commend the Long Beach Fire Department for promoting the very first woman to battalion chief this year. Thank you. Absolutely. Thank you. And I want to as we go to as we go to close, I just I know it's been said a few times, I just have to say it one more time that these police rank and file numbers, comparatively to other cities are are incredibly impressive. So I just hope, Mr. West, that, you know, the chief's not here, but I just hope that you and I will personally just uplift that work and and support that goal. It's been, I know, important for many communities in the city for a long time. And so I want to uplift that work. So great work and look forward to the update a year from now. Councilman Ringo. Councilmember Mungo brought up a point. Maybe sometime during the future we could have a civil service give us a general presentation as to the testing process for police and fire so that to get a better, we will get a better understanding. Ever since we did the wood fire one on one, we haven't had an orientation like that since. So maybe bringing a civil service up here sometime in the near future to talk about the testing process, police and fire would be very helpful. Thank you very much. And with that, please cast your votes for the receiver for final report. Motion carries.