Department of Health Policy and Management, Indiana University Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health, Indianapolis, Indiana (Drs Yeager and Burns); and Newcomb-Tulane College, Tulane University, New Orleans, Louisiana (Ms Demosthenidy).
J Public Health Manag Pract. 2024;30(5):E230-E238. doi: 10.1097/PHH.0000000000001943. Epub 2024 Jul 22.
Governmental public health agencies have experienced longstanding challenges in recruiting individuals at the state and local level. Understanding civil service laws as they relate to the hiring processes is an important component of recruitment and increasing public health workforce capacity. This study presents state hiring laws and regulations governing the public health government workforce.
Legal mapping techniques were employed to collect and code data on current hiring laws governing governmental public health employees across all 50 states. The review of laws included constitutions, statutes and regulations, and searches of administrative code.
In 12 states, the laws do not specify civil service exam criteria or they have no mention of civil service exams in the law. Almost a third of states have laws that establish civil service exam requirements without specifying conditions for when exams must be required, or which positions allow which types of exam/criteria. Similarly, almost all of the states that have civil service exams denoted in their laws have unspecified language about whether there are exam fees. Requirements for the maintenance/use of state hiring lists are in place in 36 states and 26 states have a non-public health agency managing this process. Nearly all states (n = 48, 96%) require hiring preferences for certain types of individuals, most commonly veterans (n = 48, 96%) and family members of veterans (n = 30, 60%). No state laws provide hiring preferences for individuals from public health fellowships or special training programs.
Key findings suggest that the laws governing the merit system and civil service vary and often lack clarity, which may be difficult for public health agencies and for potential employees to understand, navigate, and successfully recruit key employees. The recruitment and hiring of new governmental public health staff are complicated by the management of hiring by other state agencies and the vague civil service exam requirements and process. Developing preferences for hiring individuals who have additional practical training in public health (eg, public health fellowships and AmeriCorps) should be considered.
州和地方各级政府公共卫生机构在招募人员方面一直面临着长期的挑战。了解与招聘流程相关的公务员法律是招聘和增加公共卫生劳动力能力的重要组成部分。本研究介绍了管理政府公共卫生劳动力的州级招聘法律和法规。
采用法律映射技术收集和编制了有关所有 50 个州管理政府公共卫生雇员的现行招聘法律的数据，并对法律进行了审查，包括宪法、法规和规章以及对行政法典的搜索。
在 12 个州，法律没有具体规定公务员考试标准，或者法律中没有提到公务员考试。近三分之一的州制定了公务员考试要求的法律，但没有具体规定何时必须要求考试，或者哪些职位允许哪种类型的考试/标准。同样，在其法律中规定了公务员考试的几乎所有州都有关于是否有考试费用的不明确语言。36 个州规定了维护/使用州级招聘名单的要求，26 个州由非公共卫生机构管理这一过程。近所有州（n=48，96%）都要求为某些类型的人提供招聘优惠，最常见的是退伍军人（n=48，96%）和退伍军人的家属（n=30，60%）。没有州法律为公共卫生研究员或特殊培训计划的个人提供招聘优惠。
主要发现表明，管理功绩制和公务员制度的法律各不相同，而且往往缺乏明确性，这可能使公共卫生机构和潜在雇员难以理解、驾驭和成功招聘关键员工。新的政府公共卫生工作人员的招聘和雇佣受到其他州机构管理招聘以及公务员考试要求和程序模糊的复杂化。应考虑为招聘具有公共卫生方面额外实践培训（例如公共卫生研究员和美国服务队）的个人制定招聘优惠。
