Director of Intergovernmental Affairs

About the role

The New York City Department of Sanitation (DSNY) keeps New York City clean, safe, and healthy by collecting, recycling, and disposing of waste, cleaning City streets and vacant lots, and clearing snow and ice. DSNY is the nation's largest municipal sanitation agency, with nearly 10,000 employees, 59 district garages, and a fleet of more than 5,000 trucks, cars, and other types of equipment. The Department clears litter, snow, and ice from approximately 6,500 miles of City streets and removes debris from vacant lots as well as abandoned vehicles from City streets.

The Bureau of Public Affairs is responsible for communicating DSNY's policies, procedures, and services to all internal and external audiences and engaging with all New Yorkers to keep NYC clean.

DSNY is seeking a Director of Intergovernmental Affairs (IGA) to join the Bureau of Public Affairs. Reporting to the Assistant Commissioner of Mass Engagement, with varying degrees of latitude for independent initiative, judgment and decision making, the successful candidate will lead DSNY's engagement with City, State and Federal elected officials to share information about our work and ensure responsive, consistent, and high-quality service delivery. Responsibilities include:

• Implementing strategies that improve public awareness of, engagement with, and participation in Sanitation programs and services in coordination with executive staff.
• Regularly representing the agency in community forums, town halls, walkthroughs, and other public meetings.
• Overseeing event request coordination, prioritization, and scheduling process with other Mass Engagement unit staff.
• Managing official correspondence with elected officials in a prompt and responsive manner.
• Building close working relationships with Deputy Commissioners and program leads across DSNY to ensure the agency's IGA and community engagement strategy informs and connect to agency programming.
• Preparing the Commissioner and staff for legislative and budget hearings, meetings and other interactions in coordination with the Office of Policy and Planning, the Executive Director of Legislative Affairs and other teams.
• Providing elected officials with clear, timely, actionable and strategic communication regarding DSNY programs, services and priorities and work with their offices to distribute such communications to the wider public.
• Working with State and Local elected officials to maximize discretionary funding allocations to DSNY programs and ensure prompt, responsive implementation of such allocations.
• Resolving and responding to constituent inquiries and complaints via phone and email in a timely manner, ensuring accurate resolution.
• Supervising and coordinating the activities of staff assigned to work on specific initiatives.
• Supporting other Bureau functions and priorities as needed.

Title Informaiton

Candidates should be permanent Administrative Community Relations Specialist or should have taken and passed exam #6002. Candidates serving in similar titles may apply.

Qualifications & Requirements

• A baccalaureate degree from an accredited college or university, accredited by regional, national, professional or specialized agencies recognized as accrediting bodies by the U. S. Secretary of Education and by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) and four years of satisfactory, full-time community liaison, community organization or community relations experience, at least two years of which must have been in a broad administrative or policy-making capacity with responsibility for planning, organizing, coordinating, developing, evaluating and/or administering a large community service program or activity; or
• A four-year high school diploma or its educational equivalent approved by a State's Department of Education or a recognized accrediting organization and eight years of satisfactory, full-time experience as described in "1" above, at least two years of which must have been in a broad administrative or policy-making capacity with responsibilities as described in "1" above; or
• Education and/or experience equivalent to "1" or "2" above. Undergraduate education above the high school level may be substituted for the community liaison, community organization or community relations experience, but not for the two years of broad administrative or policy-making experience described in "1" above, at the rate of 30 semester credits from an accredited college or university (as described above) for each year of experience, up to a maximum of 4 years. Graduate education beyond the baccalaureate degree may be substituted for the community liaison, community organization or community relations experience, but not for the two years of broad administrative or policy-making experience described in "1" above, on the basis of 30 graduate credits from an accredited college or university (as described above) for each year of experience, up to a maximum of 2 years. However, all candidates must possess a four-year high school diploma or its educational equivalent approved by a State's Department of Education or a recognized accrediting organization and two years of full-time experience in a broad administrative or policy-making capacity with responsibilities as described in "1" above.