Job Information
City of New York Senior Director of Field Operations, Bureau of Food Safety and Community Sanitation in New York, New York
Job Description
Open to candidates who meet the minimum qualification requirement for Administrative Public Health Sanitarian or permanent DOHMH employees who are permanent in the civil service title of Administrative Staff Analyst due to the active promotional civil service list of Administrative Staff Analyst.
Established in 1805, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (the NYC Health Department) is the oldest and largest health department in the country. Our mission is to protect and improve the health of all New Yorkers, in service of a vision of a city in which all New Yorkers can realize their full health potential, regardless of who they are, how old they are, where they are from, or where they live.
As a world-renowned public health agency with a history of building transformative public health programming and infrastructure, innovating in science and scholarship to advance public health knowledge, and responding to urgent public health crises from New York City’s yellow fever outbreak in 1822, to the COVID-19 pandemic we are a hub for public health innovation, expertise, and programs, and services. We serve as the population health strategist, and policy, and planning authority for the City of New York, while also having a vast impact on national and international public policy, including programs and services focused on food and nutrition, anti-tobacco support, chronic disease prevention, HIV/AIDS treatment, family and child health, environmental health, mental health, and racial and social justice work, among others.
Our Agency’s five strategic priorities, building off a recently-completed strategic planning process emerging from the COVID-19 emergency, are:
1) To re-envision how the Health Department prepares for and responds to health emergencies, with a focus on building a “response-ready” organization, with faster decision-making, transparent public communications, and stronger surveillance and bridges to healthcare systems 2) Address and prevent chronic and diet-related disease, including addressing rising rates of childhood obesity and the impact of diabetes, and transforming our food systems to improve nutrition and enhance access to healthy foods
3) Address the second pandemic of mental illness including: reducing overdose deaths, strengthening our youth mental health systems, and supporting people with serious mental illness
4) Reduce black maternal mortality and make New York a model city for women’s health
5) Mobilize against and combat the health impacts of climate change
Our 7,000-plus team members bring extraordinary diversity to the work of public health. True to our value of equity as a foundational element of all of our work, and a critical foundation to achieving population health impact in New York City, the NYC Health Department has been a leader in recognizing and dismantling racism’s impacts on the health of New Yorkers and beyond. In 2021, the NYC Board of Health declared racism as a public health crisis. With commitment to advance anti-racist public health practices that dismantle systems that perpetuate inequitable power, opportunity and access, the NYC Health Department continues to work in and with communities and community organizations to increase their access to health services and decrease avoidable health outcomes.
PROGRAM AND JOB DESCRIPTION:
The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) is one of the premier local health departments in the world and works to protect and promote the health of all New Yorkers by combating racial inequities, promoting social justice, and building capacity. The Environmental Health Division works to prevent, and control illness and injury related to environmental health risks through outreach and education, surveillance, and enforcement. The division's Bureau of Food Safety and Community Sanitation (BFSCS) protects the public from a broad range of hazards that may pose a threat to health or safety, including hazards related to food safety wherever meals are served to the public, including restaurants, cafeterias, mobile food vending units, schools, senior centers, and soup kitchens; second-hand smoke in workplaces, including restaurants and bars, and most other enclosed public areas; and conditions at senior centers.
New York City is home to a world famous, vibrant food service industry that includes nearly 27,000 restaurants serving its residents and visitors. Ensuring proper sanitation in food service establishments is important to public health, including for the prevention of food-borne illness. The Department has a long history of public health innovation including requiring high food safety standards; using the restaurant setting to combat chronic disease; offer outreach, education and communication programs for industry and consumers; and develop technology to create efficiencies, encourage industry best practices, enable research, and promote transparency.
DUTIES WILL INCLUDE BUT NOT BE LIMITED TO:
*Oversee the inspection program for all food service establishments that include restaurants, mobile food vending, public and private schools, senior centers, shelters, food commissaries, to include the pre-permit inspection process, routine cyclical and letter grade inspections and complaint inspections. Make determinations about enforcement action for establishments failing to comply with legal requirements.
Oversee the Bureau's enforcement and preventive programs by evaluating systems, including statistical analysis, setting priorities, overseeing scheduling, ensuring that established targets are met and adjusting targets as appropriate to meet bureau's objectives.
Oversee the response to complaints through the 311 and Correspondence Tracking System and ensuring that staffs address these complaints, including, but not limited to emergency response capabilities within BFSCS to ensure rapid and efficient and expert response to environmental emergencies, such as power outrages or water main breaks, collaborating with senior management to provide expert opinion in field operation and deployment of staff.
*Use data and data infrastructure to accomplish mandates, measure performance, and to improve output as well as utilizing data to assess staff skills and deficiencies to improve organizational deliverables.
Develop written protocols and procedures for implementing policies and the enforcing applicable regulations; Create Compliance Guidelines for the regulated industry and assure that all staff involved in implementing policies and procedures are appropriately trained Arrange for routine inspections, sweeps and complaint-generated inspections of the Smoke-Free Air Act and ensuring that violations of the NYS Clean-Indoor Air Act nd the New York City Smoke-Free Air Act are followed up and remedied
Manage the Bureau's staff development and training activities to meet NYSDOH requirements and Bureau's objectives. Oversee the coordination, development and implementation and trainings for the bureau.
Develop written protocols and procedures for implementing policies and the enforcing applicable regulations; Create Compliance Guidelines for the regulated industry and assure that all staff involved in implementing policies and procedures are appropriately trained.
Manage supervisory and office staff of the Bureau of Food Safety ensuring the programs, procedures, processes, publications, and training materials are accurate, relevant, and updated as required and that the programs are provided with proper resources including properly trained staff
Represent the Department and Bureau at high level departmental, inter-agency and extra-agency meetings as necessary, and provide training and workshops for the regulated community
Manage emergency response capabilities within the Bureau to ensure efficient, rapid, and expert response to food-related emergencies, such as outbreaks of listeria, salmonella, or other food hazards, collaborating with senior management to provide expert opinion in field operation and deployment of staff.
Participate in the periodic revision of the New York City Health Code to ensure it remains aligned with current food safety science, best practices in the field, applicable city, state and federal laws, regulations and guidance, and serves to protect and promote the health of all New Yorkers
**IMPORTANT NOTES TO ALL CANDIDATES:
Please note: If you are called for an interview you will be required to bring to your interview copies of original documentation, such as:
A document that establishes identity for employment eligibility, such as: A Valid U.S. Passport, Permanent Resident Card/Green Card, or Driver’s license.
Proof of Education according to the education requirements of the civil service title.
Current Resume
Proof of Address/NYC Residency dated within the last 60 days, such as: Recent Utility Bill (i.e. Telephone, Cable, Mobile Phone)
Additional documentation may be required to evaluate your qualification as outlined in this posting’s “Minimum Qualification Requirements” section. Examples of additional documentation may be, but not limited to: college transcript, experience verification or professional trade licenses.
If after your interview you are the selected candidate you will be contacted to schedule an on-boarding appointment. By the time of this appointment you will be asked to produce the originals of the above documents along with your original Social Security card.
**LOAN FORGIVENESS
As a prospective employee of the City of New York, you may be eligible for federal loan forgiveness programs and state repayment assistance programs. For more information, please visit the U.S. Department of Education’s website at StudentAid.gov/PSLF.
"FINAL APPOINTMENTS ARE SUBJECT TO OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT & BUDGET APPROVAL”
“This position MAY be eligible for remote work up to two days per week, pursuant to the Remote Work Pilot Program.”
Qualifications
A baccalaureate degree from an accredited college or university, including or supplemented by 30 credits in the eh biological and/or physical sciences, and four years of satisfactory full-time experience performing inspections to assure compliance with pertinent laws, rules and regulations governing the areas of food, drugs, and general environmental sanitation, eighteen months of which must have been in an administrative, managerial or executive capacity, or in supervising staff performing food, drug and general environmental sanitation inspectors or related work; or
An associate degree from an accredited college or university, including or supplemented by 12 credits in the biological and/or physical sciences, and six years of satisfactory full-time experience as described in question "1" above; or
Education and/or experience equivalent to "1" or "2" above. However all candidates must have at least 60 credits from an accredited college or university, including 12 credits in the biological and/or physical sciences, and at least two years of experience as a public health sanitarian, including or supplemented by eighteen months of experience in an administrative, managerial, executive or supervisory capacity as described in "1" or "2" above.
Additional Information
The City of New York is an inclusive equal opportunity employer committed to recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce and providing a work environment that is free from discrimination and harassment based upon any legally protected status or protected characteristic, including but not limited to an individual's sex, race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, religion, disability, sexual orientation, veteran status, gender identity, or pregnancy.