2025-06-24 Merit Appeals Board Minutes

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Merit Appeals Board June 24, 2025 Director’s Report (Item 5) MAB Monthly Divisional Activity Report: June 2025 (Administrative Services Division, Classification & Pay Division, Equal Opportunity/ADA Division, Health & Safety Division, Labor Relations Division, Personnel & Organizational Development Division, Recruitment & Examination Division, Workers’ Compensation Division) CHR. CABANAS: We now have the “Director’s Report” on our agenda—asking Ms. Tokihiro to come up to the dais. (At this time, Ms. Sommer J. Tokihiro, Director, Human Resources Department, came forward. CHR. CABANAS: And this is the MAB’s Monthly Divisional Activity Report for the month of June 2025, and listed on the agenda are the eight divisions in the department. Good morning, Sommer. MS. TOKIHIRO: Good morning. Okay. So, for the month of June a special shout-out to our th Classification and Pay Division. During—on June 9, I signed the remaining 180 Class Specification revisions where we removed specific degree disciplines from bachelor’s degree requirements. Unless there was a regulatory reason or a licensure reason that a position required a degree in a specific discipline, we removed the discipline so any bachelor’s degree would satisfy the education requirement. So, previously, the Class Specs. had a general statement that would require a bachelor’s degree in business administration or—and it always included the clause, “or other related field”—and that’s very subjective and could, in some instances, create an artificial barrier—like, if someone was screening an application and decided that that wasn’t related. And so, with the changing workforce, we have to look at what is the skill or aptitude that we’re trying to assess to see if the person meets the qualifications for a position. And so, by removing those specific disciplines, it is more incumbent upon our departments in their interview and selection process, to be making sure that they administer assessments that are assessing peoples’ aptitudes and abilities to perform the job, and they can also ask interview questions about someone’s specific educational background—but we just don’t want to create a barrier. If someone has completed a bachelor’s degree from an accredited university or college, it indicates that they have skills in analysis and research, et cetera. And so, giving credit for any degree from an accredited university, I think, is going to make a big impact in our recruitment efforts as far as seeing more qualified applicants referred to departments for consideration. So, that was a big project for them and happy to see that implemented. Page 10