Government: Public Personnel

Goal:

A public personnel system based upon merit principles and enlightened practices. (1969)

The League supports:
• efforts to ensure a personnel administration adequately staffed and financed, directed by qualified persons, and ultimately unified in a single agency (unification enacted in 1974)
• improved and expedited methods of recruitment, examination and appointment
• improved incentives, such as proper remuneration, in-service training, and wider opportunities for promotion
• modification of veterans’ preference

The League opposes:
• improper extension of civil service coverage

League action

Organization
Special commissions in 1938, 1967 and 1979 made comprehensive studies of the personnel system. The League was represented on these commissions and served on the Special Civil Service Commission that submitted its recommendations to the Legislature in 1980. These were incorporated into a bill that was signed into law as Ch. 767 of the Acts of 1981. The law provides for performance evaluation, a career executive service, decentralization of the state system, improved recruitment programs and examination procedures and a local option, Ch. 31A, which gives cities and towns the option to manage their own personnel system subject to state standards and guidelines. The commission’s recommendation to modify absolute veterans’ preference was removed by the Legislature. A separate management pay bill intended to improve salaries of management personnel was enacted in 1981.

Evidence indicates that the legislation has not accomplished all the commission had hoped. The success of the law depends upon adequate funding and a commitment of both the executive and the legislative branches to a personnel system that recruits, retains and rewards state employees based on merit alone.

Administration
Administrative changes were made in 1974 with the unification of the Bureau of Personnel and the Division of Civil Service in the Division of Personal Administration (DPA) within the secretariat of Administration and Finance. The five-member Civil Service Commission retained its appellate and rule-making authority, the division its administrative function. Ch. 767 elevated the division into department status and created three divisions within the department.

Recruitment and training
Efforts have been made to improve recruitment procedures, to recruit on college campuses, and to recruit under-represented groups such as minorities, women, people who are economically disadvantaged and people with handicaps. Management-training programs have been instituted; some are in conjunction with colleges and universities. The DPA works with community organizations to expand representation of people taking civil service examinations.

Examination
Ch. 767 attempted to address the problems of long delays in giving and grading examinations and in preparing lists of people eligible for appointment due to excessive appeals of examination marks. DPA has made progress through better test construction, examination administration, scoring and preparation of lists of people eligible for appointment. Inadequate funding has hampered efforts to improve examination procedures. In 1973, legislation was aimed at reducing unnecessary and time-consuming appeals. Statutory prohibition against education qualifications for some positions, including a high school diploma for police officer candidates, was abolished in 1967, but some prohibitions still exist. Walk-in examinations for certain positions are given, and training, education and experience may be used in place of written examinations.

Provisional appointments
More than 18,000 state and municipal employees had provisional appointments in 1980. These employees entered public service without taking examinations and were placed on a certified list of people eligible for appointment. These appointments were partly due to the excessive delays in giving and marking examinations and preparing lists, but also represent circumvention of the system by appointing authorities. The goal was to have all such designees tested by June 1986.

Performance evaluation and appointment
A standardized objective performance appraisal method aids in determining promotion, compensation, retention and dismissal. It is an important tool in achieving a merit system and is an opportunity for individual employee development.

DPA began a pilot for implementation of the Performance Management System for state managers; a performance evaluation program for non-managerial employees is a long-term objective.

Delegation and decentralization
The decentralization of the state civil service system would give greater responsibility to state agencies for administering their personnel systems. This should be done under supervision of the DPA and according to merit principles. Ch. 767 allows the Personnel Administrator to expand the decentralization program to give state agencies greater responsibility for personnel management.

Through the Home Rule positions, the League advocates giving greater flexibility to local personnel systems either by delegating more responsibilities to local personnel administrators or by giving local communities the option to completely decentralize their systems from state supervision while retaining state guidelines. The League believes this must be done only when communities demonstrate an ability to administer their systems according to sound and equitable merit principles.

Ch. 767 established Ch. 31A that allows a local option provision to permit local communities to establish their own personnel systems subject to approval by the DPA. Budgetary limitations imposed by Proposition 2 1/2 make it unlikely that many communities will take advantage of Ch. 31A. DPA established the Bureau of Local Government to improve its services to local communities and to provide technical and training assistance either for their personnel systems or to decentralize under Ch. 31A.

Modification of veterans’ preference
A point preference system is preferable to the absolute veterans’ preference in the appointment of public employees. Presently, any veteran with a passing score is placed on a list for appointment above any other applicant who may have a higher score. Disabled veterans are placed at the top of the list.

A 1975 lawsuit (Feeney vs. Commonwealth) charged that the veterans’ preference law discriminated against women. A U. S. District Court twice ruled the Massachusetts law unconstitutional for that reason, but the U. S. Supreme Court upheld the state’s absolute preference law.

Efforts to modify absolute veterans’ preference have not been successful.

Affirmative action
The League opposes discriminatory hiring practices and supports affirmative action programs that would aid people who are disadvantaged, such as minority populations, women and people with handicaps. A program included in Ch. 767 provides flexible employment hours. Ch. 682 of the Acts of 1983 continued earlier legislation to provide training programs for disadvantaged populations. The Civil Service Commission, the appellate and rule-making authority within the DPA, has promulgated rules designed to correct past discrimination in public employment.

Background

• 1979-80: Local Leagues, studying civil service, found some improvements in the system, but determined that much remains to be done.