Tops in OT, ‘bar’ none
City’s jail workers rake it in
Employees of the city’s violence-plagued jails system topped the list of municipal workers pulling in loads of overtime, but the highest earners were largely maintenance workers rather than uniformed officers.
Correction Department employees accounted for 37 of the top 50 OT earners in the latest fiscal year, according to the city’s Office of Payroll Administration.
The data showed 22 of the 37 were not uniformed officers or supervisors.
Topping the charts was senior stationary engineer Fintan O’Donoghue, who made $191,488 in OT for a total pay of $344,771.
Three other jails maintenance workers followed O’Donoghue, earning between $160,000 and $187,000 in overtime.
They were followed by two uniformed captains, who each earned more than $153,000 in overtime.
Queens City Councilmember Elizabeth Crowley, chair of the Fire and Criminal Justice Services Committee, called the data the latest example of “persistent dysfunction” at the Department of Correction.
“While employees made up to six figures in overtime, jail violence continued to spiral out of control,” she said.
“This gross mismanagement must be handled so our jails can finally operate efficiently and safely for staff and inmates alike.”
Multiple calls to a number listed for O’Donoghue, a 17-year depart- ment veteran, were not answered.
The jails system had already undergone scrutiny from lawmakers after its overtime spending on uniformed members doubled over three years — from $125 million in fiscal 2014 to $253 million in fiscal 2016, according to the city’s Independent Budget Office.
The Correction Department’s OT funding in fiscal 2018 is $164.6 million for uniformed staffers, and $6.8 million for all other workers, officials said.
DOC officials emphasized that the extra maintenance hours were for emergency repairs that are of- ten needed because of the system’s aging infrastructure.
“We take the use of overtime seriously, and the department has policies in place to address any nonessential overtime for both uniform and nonuniform staff,” said DOC spokesman Peter Thorne.
DOC Commissioner Joseph Ponte departed amid significant criticism in late June and has yet to be replaced.
Mayor de Blasio recently announced a 10-year plan to shut down Rikers Island by halving the city’s jails population and building borough-based detention facilities.