Big Apple lifeguards will get a pay raise amid the national shortfall that has left the city with half as many of them this year as compared to 2021, Mayor Eric Adams announced Wednesday.
In a deal City Hall has reached with the union representing the lifeguards, they will receive $19.46 an hour this summer, more than $3 more than the previous starting wage of $16.10.
“Every New Yorker deserves to safely enjoy our city’s public pools and beaches this summer and my team has taken extraordinary steps to make that happen,” Adams said in announcing the deal “to meet the immediate needs of our swimming pools”.
As of June 15, the city’s parks department said the agency had certified 516 lifeguards so far this season — a 49% drop from the 1,013 hired in 2021 and a 66% drop from the 1,530 lifeguards hired in 2016, The Post previously reported. The shortage has sunk New York’s free swim programs at its 52 outdoor pools this year, the department said last month.
To encourage New Yorkers not to give up their beach towels and pool chairs, the city government will in September offer a “retention bonus” to lifeguards who work weekly during the summer months.
The mayor explained that his administration reached an agreement with the union, District Council 37, to form a training program with the goal of adding staff to Gotham’s 17 mini pools.
The announcement comes after Adams on June 21 pledged to review city rules after reports documented that bureaucratic errors and union regulations are worsening the city’s shortage of lifeguards.
The pay hike also comes after Governor Kathy Hochul recently revealed she was raising salaries for state lifeguards. Lifeguards at downstate sites saw their wages increase to $22 an hour from a current wage of $18.15, while upstate water workers now earn $20 .
Additionally, nonprofit media outlet The City reported last month that, despite the shortage, officials with the city’s Department of Administrative Services are rejecting applications from paramedics and other first responders to work as lifeguards – even though agency employees have proven such claims in previous summers. .
Hizzoner said Wednesday morning that he and his team were working on other measures to keep beaches and pools safe for swimmers, including getting rid of unspecified “inefficient practices.”
“While these changes are a step in the right direction, our ability to safely open beaches and pools has been affected by a shortage of national lifeguards and has also been held back by inefficient practices that desperately need to be addressed. reformed,” he said in the press release.
“We will continue to work closely together to correct course on policies that are not serving New Yorkers and pool resources from all agencies to ensure a fun and safe summer.”
In mid-June, a teenage girl and a man drowned on the same day while swimming in the Rockaways. A few days later, a 21-year-old man from New Jersey drowned in a state park.
As of June 15, at least 21 people have drowned in New York and New Jersey waters since April.
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