The Westmoreland commissioners said a residency requirement for all county employees will be lifted in an effort to find candidates for more than 200 vacant government jobs.
Officials said the county has struggled to replenish its workforce and suggested that the residency requirement, which has been in place for years, has limited the pool of candidates.
“We are having issues finding employees,” Commissioner Sean Kertes said.
Alexis Bevan, director of human resources, said the county has a roster of 1,738 employees and 225 vacancies.
Over the past several years, the county has dropped its residency requirement for hard-to-fill jobs such as 911 dispatchers, nurses at Westmoreland Manor and guards at the county jail. The residency requirement also was waived for staffers in the county’s children’s bureau and area agency on aging.
Commissioners waived the residency requirement this year when they rehired juvenile detention center Director Rich Gordon, who returned to the job after a stint running the now-shuttered Shuman Juvenile Detention Center in Pittsburgh.
Bevan said 63 county workers live outside of Westmoreland County.
Vacancies remain throughout most county departments, but the hiring of staff for the Manor and jail guards continue to be the most difficult, Bevan said.
Commissioners last month increased signing bonuses to $7,500 for nurses and $4,000 for nursing aides at the Manor to help fill what officials said was 35 vacancies.
Controller Jeff Balzer, a member of the county’s salary board, praised the plan to lift the residency requirement.
“There are a lot of people who live just over the border and could work here,” Balzer said. “The requirement restricted our ability to find employees.”
Commissioners are expected to vote to officially remove the residency requirement this week, but on Tuesday they defended the plan as necessary.
“We already have so many departments where we had waived it,” Kertes said. “We thought it was only fair to remove it for everyone. We’ll see if there are any changes (in the ability to hire) in the next 12 months to see if it makes a difference.”
