Public Works director proposes reorganization

Faced with the retirement of senior employees, recruiting difficulties and a list of upcoming projects that could take 10 years to complete, Newport Beach’s Public Works Director Steve Badum is opting to reorganize.

He’s proposed a major reshuffling of his department to combine two divisions, promote staff members to mid-level management spots, and create a new division to handle the $200 million to $300 million list of city facilities that will be replaced in the coming years.

The public works department provides engineering services, traffic management and budgeting for city projects.

The reorganization won’t cost the city anything. Money saved by eliminating some vacant positions will be shifted to new management employees, and some will cover contract employees to be hired when workloads are heavy.

Over the last eight months or so, Badum said, the top two city engineers and transportation manager have retired and another experienced engineer has been away for medical reasons. Two other positions in the department are vacant as well.

Recruitments haven’t yielded enough qualified people to fill the jobs — probably because the pool of candidates gets smaller as Baby Boomers retire, and it’s hard to lure seasoned workers away from other cities when they face long commutes and high home prices in Newport, Badum said.

“For an upper level position we’re going to want somebody that’s probably established, that has a family, that owns a home,” he said. “The ability of that person to move is probably not very good.”

The recruitment problem seems to extend to other skilled positions. Newport Beach Assistant City Manager Sharon Wood said four new positions in the planning department, intended to speed up the processing of building plans, have gone empty since January.

Badum’s solution for public works is to reorganize the workload and the positions. He proposed combining the transportation and engineering areas, and setting up a new division for building projects such as the Oasis senior center and a new city hall. Some division head positions would be eliminated and new mid-management jobs created.

The City Council will decide Tuesday whether to approve the reorganization of public works.