Career Opportunity

Sewer Repair Supervisor - Wastewater Enterprise - SFPUC (7246) - (103013)

Recruitment: REF25111C

Published: April 28, 2023

Apply using SmartRecruiters, the City and County of San Francisco's application portal.

About:

This is a Position-Based Test conducted in accordance with CSC Rule 111A.

•    Application Opening: April 28, 2023
•    Application Filing Deadline: May 11, 2023
•    Annual Salary: $115,128 - $139,906
•    Recruitment ID: PBT-7246-103013, RTF0103011

WHO ARE WE? 
San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC)
Headquartered in San Francisco, we have 2,300 employees operating across eight counties serving more than 2.7 million customers in the San Francisco Bay Area – 24 hours per day, 365 days per year.

Our Mission: To provide our customers with high quality, efficient, and reliable water, power, and wastewater services in a manner that values environmental and community interests and sustains the resources entrusted to our care.

Our Vision: We are an innovative utility leader, recognized for excellent results in service, safety, stewardship, and inclusiveness.

We are an award-winning and industry-leading utilities organization committed to our customers, community interests, and the environment. To learn more about our organization, please visit our website at https://www.sfpuc.org/.

We are proud of our infrastructure and programs, but most importantly, we value our highly qualified and dedicated workforce which ensures that this vision becomes a reality. 

To learn more about working at the SFPUC, visit our career site at https://www.sfpuc.org/about-us/careers-sfpuc

Role description

The Wastewater Enterprise operates and maintains San Francisco's combined sewer system to protect public health and the environment. These services extend across eight urban watersheds, over 1,900 miles of pipe, and benefit every resident and visitor of San Francisco.

Under general supervision, this position supervises several crews of skilled and semi-skilled workers engaged in the maintenance and repair of side and main sewers; makes regular contacts with the general public, departmental personnel and outside organizations relative to sewer maintenance and repair matters.

The essential duties of this position include, but are not limited to the following:

• Supervising a staff of workers performing sewer service, maintenance and inspection of municipal sewers
• Assigning, planning and scheduling work, completing performance evaluations and performing other personnel functions including exercising the progressive discipline process
• Developing and enforcing codes of safe practices in compliance with CAL OSHA and SB 198 and other relevant codes and provide training to staff on a regular basis to ensure that staff is trained on all areas of their work as well as able to maintain required certification
• Communicating and interacting with the public, departmental personnel and outside organizations in response to requests for information, service and complaints
• Preparing various reports and correspondence using word processing, database and e-mail; issuing and maintaining records of materials, work performed, tools and supplies received and used in sewer maintenance and inspection operations
• Supervise the response, mitigation and reporting of Sewer Overflows from the Combined System (SOCS) and Sanitary Sewer Overflows (SSO’s); fulfill Data Submitter rolls and responsibilities for reporting overflows in the California Integrated Water Quality System (CIWQS)
• Inspecting maintenance and repair work in the field to assure conformance with instructions and departmental methods and procedures
• Investigating complaints of inoperative sewers, reporting findings, taking corrective action and providing recommendations for repairs
• Provides technical direction and assistance to field staff on complex work assignments
• Determining service priorities, estimating resource requirements and availability, including materials and supplies and costs involved; Initiate and assists in processing requisitions for equipment, materials and supplies; assists in preparing equipment specifications
• Assisting in developing and implementing goals, objectives, policies and priorities for assigned section, and assists in the hiring of staff in assigned section
• Other duties as assigned

Nature of Work
Essential duties require the following physical skills and work environment: sustained physical effort involving considerable standing, bending and working in confined spaces; exposure to working conditions where moderately serious injuries may occur; continuous exposure to extremely disagreeable working conditions involving work with and in raw sewage and in the presence of vermin. Requires on call duty and emergency response within one hour.

How to qualify

1. Four years of experience as a lead worker of a crew (crew leader) installing, constructing, inspecting, repairing, and/or replacing large diameter (12 inches or above) sewer lines and structures; OR

2. Four years of experience comparable with the City and County of San Francisco class 7449 Sewer Service Worker inspecting and diagnosing problems in a municipal sewer collection system; OR a combination of the above.

License: Requires possession of a valid state motor vehicle operator's license.

One year of full-time employment is equivalent to 2000 hours. (2000 hours of qualifying work experience is based on a 40-hour work week.) Any overtime hours that you work above forty (40) hours per week are not included in the calculation to determine full-time employment.

Applicants must meet the minimum qualification requirement by the final filing date unless otherwise noted.

Desirable Qualifications: The stated desirable qualifications may be considered at the end of the selection process when candidates are referred for hiring:

• Experience with responding to, mitigating, and reporting sanitary overflows and sewer overflows from the combined system as data submitter
• Four years of verifiable experience as a Supervisor in related field
• Five years of verifiable experience performing maintenance and/or repair work on active sewer systems or structures on a regular basis
• Confined space training
• Working knowledge of: Department of Public Works (DPW) excavation code, DPW permitting process, Muni overhead line restrictions, and the Municipal Transportation Agency's (MTA) "Blue Book" restrictions and guidelines
• Experience with computer management systems, such as Maximo

Verification: Applicants may be required to submit verification of qualifying education and experience at any point during the recruitment and selection process. If education verification is required, information on how to verify education requirements, including verifying foreign education credits or degree equivalency, can be found at https://sfdhr.org/how-verify-education-requirements.

Note: Falsifying one’s education, training, or work experience or attempted deception on the application may result in disqualification for this and future job opportunities with the City and County of San Francisco.

All work experience, education, training and other information substantiating how you meet the minimum qualifications must be included on your application by the filing deadline. Information submitted after the filing deadline will not be considered in determining whether you meet the minimum qualifications. 

Resumes will not be accepted in lieu of a completed City and County of San Francisco application. 

Applications completed improperly may be cause for ineligibility, disqualification or may lead to lower scores.

Selection Procedures: After application submission, candidates deemed qualified must complete all subsequent steps to advance in this selection process, which includes the following: 

Minimum Qualification Supplemental Questionnaire (Weight: Qualifying): Candidates will be required to complete a Minimum Qualification Supplemental Questionnaire (MQSQ) as part of the employment application at a later time. This MQSQ is designed to obtain specific information regarding an applicant's experience in relation to the Minimum Qualifications (MQ) for this position. The MQSQ will be used to evaluate if the applicant possesses the required minimum qualifications.

Supplemental Questionnaire Examination (Weight: 100%): Candidates who meet minimum qualifications will be invited via a separate link to complete the Supplemental Questionnaire Examination. The purpose of the Supplemental Questionnaire Examination is to evaluate the experience, knowledge, skills and abilities that candidates possess in job-related areas, which have been identified as critical for this position and include, but are not limited to: 

• Knowledge of sewer maintenance and repair methods and procedures, their application to practical field problems, and the equipment related to such repairs, including sewer TV inspection equipment, combo sewer cleaning equipment, confined space entry equipment
• Knowledge of applicable safety practices and procedures relevant to sewer repair, including trench excavation and confined space entry
• Ability to effectively plan, organize, assign and review the work of subordinate employees including training of subordinates as necessary, enforcing regulations, and the ability to lead and coach staff by overseeing projects, delegating responsibility, and setting priorities
• Ability to communicate clearly, coherently, and effectively with subordinates, members of the staff and other city departments, and the general public orally and in writing, including maintaining records and preparing reports using basic computer skills
• Ability to establish and maintain effective working relationships with subordinates, staff, and the general public, including coordinating with other units, and responding to concerns of the public tactfully and courteously
• Ability to identify and solve problems, including the ability to gather, interpret and analyze information from appropriate sources to formulate and execute effective solutions
• Ability to stand, bend and work in confined spaces and continuous exposure to extremely disagreeable working conditions involving work with and in raw sewage and in the presence of vermin

A passing score must be achieved on the Supplemental Questionnaire Examination in order to continue in the selection process and be placed on the eligible list.

Candidates will be placed on the eligible list in rank order according to their final score. Candidate scores on this examination may also be applied to other announcements involving other job titles, when directed by the Human Resources Director.

The department may administer additional position-specific selection procedures to make final hiring decisions.

What else should I know?

Eligible List/Score Report: A confidential eligible list of applicant names that have passed the civil service examination process will be created, and used for certification purposes only. An examination score report will be established, so applicants can view the ranks, final scores and number of eligible candidates. Applicant information, including names of applicants on the eligible list, shall not be made public unless required by law. However, an eligible list shall be made available for public inspection, upon request, once the eligible list is exhausted or expired and referrals resolved. The eligible list/score report resulting from this civil service examination process is subject to change after adoption (e.g., as a result of appeals), as directed by the Human Resources Director or the Civil Service Commission. 

The duration of the eligible list resulting from this examination process will be of 12 months, and may be extended with the approval of the Human Resources Director. 

To find Departments which use this classification, please see https://sfdhr.org/sites/default/files/documents/Forms-Documents/Position-Counts-by-Job-Codes-and-Department-FY-2021-22.pdf. 

Terms of Announcement and Appeal Rights: Applicants must be guided solely by the provisions of this announcement, including requirements, time periods and other particulars, except when superseded by federal, state or local laws, rules or regulations. Clerical errors may be corrected by the posting the correction on the Department of Human Resources website at https://careers.smartrecruiters.com/CityAndCountyOfSanFrancisco1/ .

The terms of this announcement may be appealed under Civil Service Rule 111A.35.1. The standard for the review of such appeals is ‘abuse of discretion’ or ‘no rational basis’ for establishing the position description, the minimum qualifications and/or the certification rule. Appeals must include a written statement of the item(s) being contested and the specific reason(s) why the cited item(s) constitute(s) abuse of discretion by the Human Resources Director. Appeals must be submitted directly to the Executive Officer of the Civil Service Commission within five business days of the announcement issuance date.

Additional Information Regarding Employment with the City and County of San Francisco:

• Information About The Hiring Process
• Conviction History
• Employee Benefits Overview  
• Equal Employment Opportunity 
• Disaster Service Worker
• ADA Accommodation
• Veterans Preference
• Seniority Credit
• Right to Work
• Copies of Application Documents
• Diversity Statement

HOW TO APPLY
Applications for City and County of San Francisco jobs are only accepted through an online process. Visit https://careers.sf.gov and begin the application process. 

•    Select the “Apply Now” button and follow instructions on the screen 

Applicants may be contacted by email about this recruitment and, therefore, it is their responsibility to ensure that their registered email address is accurate and kept up-to-date. Also, applicants must ensure that email from CCSF is not blocked on their computer by a spam filter. To prevent blocking, applicants should set up their email to accept CCSF mail from the following addresses (@sfgov.org, @sfdpw.org, @sfport.com, @flysfo.com, @sfwater.org, @sfdph.org, @asianart.org, @sfmta.com, @sfpl.org, @dcyf.org, @first5sf.org, @famsf.org, @ccsf.edu, @smartalerts.info, and @smartrecruiters.com). 

Applicants will receive a confirmation email that their online application has been received in response to every announcement for which they file. Applicants should retain this confirmation email for their records. Failure to receive this email means that the online application was not submitted or received. 

Exam Analyst Information: If you have any questions regarding this recruitment or application process, please contact the exam analyst, Stefanie Lim, at SMLim@sfwater.org or 415-916-6632.

CONDITION OF EMPLOYMENT:  All City and County of San Francisco employees are required to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 as a condition of employment. Someone is fully vaccinated when 14 days have passed since they received the final dose of a two-shot vaccine or a dose of a one-shot vaccine. Any new hire must present proof of full vaccination status to be appointed. Any new hire who will be routinely assigned or occasionally enter High-Risk Settings, must provide proof of having received a COVID-19 booster vaccine by March 1, 2022, or once eligible.

The City and County of San Francisco encourages women, minorities and persons with disabilities to apply. Applicants will be considered regardless of their sex, race, age, religion, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition (associated with cancer, a history of cancer, or genetic characteristics), HIV/AIDS status, genetic information, marital status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, military and veteran status, or other protected category under the law.