Gushing OT for sewer staffers
Half of top 10 earners work for DEP
New York City’s sewers ran with rivers of gold for Department of Environmental Protect workers last year.
The department tasked with managing the city’s water and sewers was swimming in overtime — with five of the city’s top 10 overtime earners working for the DEP, city payroll data shows.
In the No. 1 spot, Staten Island-based stationary engineer Bhavesh Patel brought home $237,389 in over time pay during fiscal year 2018, which ended June 30, according to the data. That’s on top of the $234,407 in regular pay he grossed for the fiscal year. And on top of that, he earned another $67,301 in what the city calls “other pay,” such as differentials.
Four other DEP workers — three other stationary engineers and one senior stationary engineer — are also in the top 10 spots for overtime recipients for the year.
The DEP said that’s in part due to its workers receiving nine years of back pay in 2017, after going without a new contract since 2007. The overtime figures reflect nine years of overtime differentials, the agency said. The employees also get double-time plus when working overtime on holidays, the DEP noted.
Still, Patel clocked a staggering 1,960 hours of overtime in fiscal 2018 -- or 81 days worth of overtime. And it comes on top of 2,085 hours he worked at his base pay rate. All told, the sheer amount of hours Patel put in during fiscal year 2017 would translate in working 11 hours a day all 365 days of the year.
“It’s definitely sort of something to be concerned about when you have that level of overtime one city agency — and there are also potential concerns for the well-being of employees and the work when they’re working those hours,” Ana Champeny, director of city studies at the Citizens Budget Commission said.
Attempts to reach Patel were unsuccessful.
The DEP acknowledged it had been short-staffed in 2017, with a high number of vacancies in top engineering positions at wastewater treatment plants that operate around the clock. The DEP has so far hired 31 senior engineers in 2018, a position that requires a high-level operator license and proficiency with highvoltage equipment.
“New York’s sewers run 24 hours a day with more than 1 billion gallons of wastewater, and these engineers protect public health by ensuring it all flows in the right direction,” DEP spokesman Ted Timbers said.
All told, the city paid $1.89 million in overtime for more than 33 million hours clocked by workers at city agencies and the New York City Housing Authority, payroll records released after a Freedom of Information Law request show.
That is down just slightly from fiscal year 2017, when the same agencies and authorities clocked 33.8 million hours of overtime for $1.96 billion.
Despite paying for more than 33 million hours of overtime, City Hall characterized it as “occasionally necessary.”
Still, overtime spending has risen quickly since 2009, when it was around $1 billion, she said.