Mayor Eric Adams announced a plan on Monday, October 23rd, to extend remote work options to thousands of additional city employees, allowing them to work remotely two days each week.
The program, initially implemented for city employees represented by District Council 37 (DC37) in June, allows eligible workers to work remotely.
The new remote work program will last two years and include around 16,500 non-union city employees.
Starting December 1st, this remote work option will not apply to essential workers who must be physically present, such as police officers and teachers.
This expansion of remote work is seen as a response to the city’s ongoing struggle with employee attrition, which was made worse during the pandemic.
The city is currently facing difficulties filling around 24,000 vacant positions, with several observers linking this challenge to the absence of a remote work alternative.
Adams remarked in a statement that following the “success” of the remote work pilot program for unionized employees, the decision to extend it to non-represented employees is another measure aimed at bolstering the city’s workforce.
Mayor Adams said, “Public servants deliver for New Yorkers through the city’s most urgent crises, and now it’s time for us to support them as they have supported us.”
“With the success of our initial remote work pilots for tens of thousands of union-represented employees, we are proud to expand this benefit to the thousands of non-represented public servants who work tirelessly for our city day in and day out,” Adams added.
This development comes after Mayor Adams celebrated the state’s Department of Labor data last week, indicating that the city has successfully regained all of the nearly 1 million private-sector jobs lost during the pandemic.
