Underground overtime

The Ottawa Sun – October 14, 2009

By Derek Puddicomb

City sewer maintenance workers pulling long hours because department can’t fill jobs

The city is having a tough time attracting sewer maintenance workers and that’s leading to higher-than-expected overtime and stressed out employees.

Dixon Weir, the general manager of the city’s environmental services branch, told the planning and environment committee this morning that staffing levels in his department remain low despite efforts to attract workers.

Weir doesn’t know exactly how many workers he needs but job notices have been posted and no one has applied for the entry-level positions.

In the case of other positions, the candidates aren’t qualified.

Weir said he’s not yet concerned the city’s waste water collection system is in jeopardy of failing because that can occur even if there is a full complement of staff.

Concerned

However, he’s concerned about employees doing work normally performed by others.

“It’s resulting in a higher degree of overtime than we would like which is adding stress on employees,” said Weir. “This isn’t sustainable and we need to address this.”

The shortage of staff is also affecting the inspection of sewage pumping stations. A pumping station failure was partly responsible for the flooding in the Glen Cairn neighbourhood in Kanata earlier this year.

The department needs a wide range of workers to help maintain the city’s network of sewers, including those willing to climb down into the bowels of the sewer system to inspect it. The city also needs electricians, millwrights and engineers.

The union representing employees working in that city department said the city wouldn’t be in its predicament if it had proper training programs in place for current employees.

Offer training

“We’ve been saying for years it’s the direct result of gapping and they don’t offer training to attract internal people,” said Clarence Dungey, media spokesman for CUPE Local 503. “They don’t want to spend the money to develop training programs.”

Weir told committee members it does have programs in place to train employees from within.

Beacon Hill-Cyrville Coun. Michel Bellemare wants the city to reassess its recruiting practices and has requested the city find out exactly how many employees it needs to make sure the department is fully staffed. He also said it’s not wise to make employees work overtime to fill the void.

“It’s a stopgap measure and not appropriate for the long term,” said Bellemare. “It’s a problem. We just don’t know how big it is.”