City hiring ‘ chief diversity officer’
Alderman angry that 17.4% of city policymaking jobs exempt from Shakman decree held by Hispanics
Chicago will hire a $ 90,000- ayear “chief diversity officer” to attract a workforce that better reflects the city’s population, aldermen were told Wednesday, after learning that Hispanics have gotten short shrift in the 1,256 policymaking jobs exempt from the Shakman decree.
On the hot seat at City Council budget hearings, Human Resources Commissioner Soo Choi provided the racial breakdown of top jobs in Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration, which infuriated Ald. Ricardo Munoz ( 22nd).
Of the 1,256 “at will” jobs exempt from the federal ban on political hiring and firing, 46.2 percent are filled by whites, 26.5 percent are held by blacks, and 17.4 percent are filled by Hispanics.
Munoz was disgusted with those figures at a time when Hispanics are the city’s fastest- growing group.
He noted that Shakman- exempt jobs are not only directly controlled by the mayor, they are the most influential positions in city government.
Although the city is out from under the Shakman decree and the costly constraints of a federal hiring monitor, policymakers who can be fired at will are still known as “Shakman- exempt.”
“The bottom line is that, in the positions that this administration controls, Latinos are still woefully underrepresented in a city where we are 32 percent of the population,” Munoz said.
“The mayor should hire more Latinos within his administration in these policymaking jobs so he can have the benefit of their knowledge of this city’s Latino neighborhoods and issues that come up every day,” he said. “They’re bringing in a chief diversity officer when the commissioner of human relations should be the chief diversity officer. If you don’t change the culture of all of these 43 departments the city has, it doesn’t matter that you have one person filing reports.”
Choi openly acknowledged that the Emanuel administration needs to do a better job of attracting minorities. Which is why the city is hiring a chief diversity officer and a $ 62,448- a- year analyst.
“While we try our best to improve our recruitment strategies, when it’s not someone’s full- time job and other more pressing matters, such as hiring a position comes into play, that tends to take a back seat, and that’s just unfortunate,” she said.
“Rather than try and spread that responsibility out where it’s likely to not get addressed as directly, what we need is someone whose full- time job is to focus on this exact question,” Choi said. “How are we going to better recruit more diverse applicant pools for not just our entry level, but at every level?”