Wilmington Mayor Mike Purzycki said Monday the city’s former residency requirement for City employees was undermining the efficiency of City government because critical positions could not be filled.
Purzycki said Wilmington is hiring new employees without enforcing a residency requirement. The Mayor recently sought legal advice from the City Law Department regarding whether residency exists because City Council has not affirmed its position about residency.
Purzycki’s decision is already receiving blowback from some members of the City Council who want to keep the residency requirement but have not acted on an ordinance. The group scheduled a press conference on Monday.
Purzycki thanked Council Member Al Mills and other members of Council who are supporting the Ordinance that will be voted on at Thursday’s meeting. The Ordinance would affirm council’s decision to eliminate any remaining references to residency.
Wilmington, like many local governments, is struggling to fill key positions and has a shortage of affordable housing.
“There are critical government positions open such as engineers, planners, attorneys, sanitation drivers and collectors, a water lab supervisor, 911 emergency dispatchers, and police officers among others,” said Mayor Purzycki. “We are hopeful that there will now be applicants for these positions where there were none before now that residency is not a factor. These vacant positions are undermining the efficiency of our government. I am proud that we are moving forward to fill much needed positions to ensure we can provide the services that residents expect from their government.”
The Mayor’s Deputy Chief of Staff John Rago today provided the following information regarding the issue.
- Early in 2022, the City Administration and Council asked the Delaware General Assembly (GA) to amend the City Charter to allow the City—and not the State—to determine if the City should have a residency requirement.
- In July of 2022, the GA amended the Charter and granted the City authority to determine the issue of residency.
- The following month, August of 2022, Council President Trippi Congo introduced an Ordinance to end the residency requirement for appointed City employees, which was further amended to include all employees.
- The Administration has been waiting for the Council to act on this issue for the past 14 months.
- In the interim, jobs critical to the efficient operations of City government have gone unfilled.
- Today, 92 city jobs are vacant, and many can’t be filled because applicants will not accept a residency requirement.
- Public Works can’t hire sanitation drivers and collectors, or traffic engineers, or equipment operators, or information systems staff, or a water quality lab supervisor, among other positions.
- The Planning Department can’t find planners who will accept the residency requirement.
- 3 out of 10 attorney positions in the Law Department were vacant (30% of that office) for the greater part of the past year. Two of those three positions are not yet filled. When we have vacancies in the Law Department, legal work has to be sent to outside attorneys who charge much more for their services causing a budget problem.
- The current police academy has only 7 recruits in the class. Despite continually improving recruiting efforts that even the Council has applauded, police agencies around the country are not able to attract candidates and residency adds to the hiring burden locally. The WPD is also having difficulty hiring 911 call takers. There are 18 Emergency Call Operator positions. Of those, 4 are currently vacant (20%). These positions have been vacant ranging from about four months to nearly a year.
- The Council just approved the Administration’s Compensation Study to improve our salary structure, but even higher salaries can’t overcome the residency requirement.
- Mortgages are over 7%. It is highly unlikely that a person seeking a City job would uproot their family and their 4% mortgage to move into the City for five years. For many job seekers, the burden of a residency requirement is just too much.
- In addition, many job seekers have spouses who may not wish to relocate and children they would prefer not to move from their local school system.
- Job applicants have other job options today. It is no longer an employer-driven job market. COVID changed a lot of things, including leaving the door open for job seekers to demand more in order to hire them.
- The Administration views the City’s inability to fill critical City jobs as a crisis. Absent Council action for more than a year, it recently sought legal advice from the City Law Department, which confirmed the Administration’s position that once the State granted the City the authority to act, and it failed to do so for over a year, a void was created regarding residency. The Administration can’t manage the hiring process without rules related to residency. Because there is currently no residency requirement, department directors have been given the authority to fill positions without regard to residency.
- The Administration appreciates the effort by Council Member Al Mills and other co-sponsors or supporters to approve an Ordinance on the October 19 Council agenda that would eliminate the residency requirement for all employees and end the City’s inability to fill jobs.
- There are 1,079 authorized City positions in the budget, 987 of which are filled and 92 are vacant, of which 15 are currently posted for applicants. Of the total number of positions currently filled, 686 employees, or 70% of the City’s workforce, have five or more years of service and have met the former five-year residency requirement.
