Help wanted: County, city groups hope project will lead to more interest in public-sector jobs

For several years, many Minnesota cities and counties have noticed a dwindling number of people pursuing government jobs. Now, three organizations are coming together to find out why that is and how to turn it around. 

According to Julie Ring, the executive director of the Association of Minnesota Counties, the shortage became very clear about 10 years ago with many openings across different county positions going unfilled. 

So Ring’s organization, along with the League of Minnesota Cities and the Citizens League (which focuses on public service, civic engagement and public policy) put together the Strengthening Public Service project, which aims to understand the challenges and barriers to public employment. 

The group has held several public meetings and has issued two surveys — one for current public-sector workers and another for former local government employees — that will be open until mid-December.

“We all live in communities where local government — our city, our county governments — provide all kinds of really essential services. And often, I think those are kind of overlooked or misunderstood until they’re gone,” said Jake Loesch, the executive director of Citizens League. “I think we really are, through this project, trying to take a look at what we can do to help strengthen public service and get more folks into those great career opportunities.”

Varied challenges

Ring said that in counties, the positions difficult to fill have been things like corrections officers, 911 dispatchers and social workers — especially those who work in child protection. 

“They tend to be jobs that are kind of high intensity, really challenging, stressful jobs that when, in general, there’s shortages everywhere, those really challenging jobs are even harder to fill,” Ring said. 

She said two things are at play: changes in the workforce as baby boomers retire and an increase in the responsibilities of local governments.

While challenges in recruitment and retaining employees vary depending on the job, pay is also a big factor, she said. That can also be a challenge for many Greater Minnesota communities, where many times salaries aren’t as high as in the Twin Cities region, Loesch said. 

Very rural areas also struggle with hiring for specialized jobs that require very specific training. 

“There just might not be that many people in the community that have that background, and there may not be people who want to move to rural Minnesota for those jobs,” Ring said. 

As an example, she pointed to county engineer positions. 

“It’s a well compensated job. There are certainly lots of people who get engineering degrees in Minnesota,” she said. “But it’s a matter of, ‘Are you interested in moving, you know, to, let’s say, Roseau County, up on the Canadian border, where they need someone to do that work just as much as they do in the metro?’” 

Ring thinks counties need to do more to educate the public about available jobs, which can vary from IT roles to snow plow drivers. 

“I think about this a lot for young people and friends I have who are looking for jobs,” she said. “If you’re interested in public service, you might think to go to the state of Minnesota and look, because they have an aggregate website where you can go look at state jobs. There’s not really something similar for counties.” 

What’s to come?

In 2022, the Citizens League released a report on why elected officials run for office and some of the factors that influence those decisions. Loesch said the current project is similar to that, but will focus on non-elected roles. 

The Citizens League, for example, had a public meeting with county commissioners with the help of the Association of Minnesota Counties, where Ring said people brought up issues they’ve faced, like struggling with remote/in-person culture and issues with pay compared with private sector jobs. 

The report will take information from the listening sessions and surveys, which Loesch said have been completed by 800 participants, to create policy recommendations. He anticipates the report would come out at the end of January.

Ava Kian

Ava Kian is MinnPost’s Greater Minnesota reporter. Follow her on Twitter @kian_ava or email her at akian@minnpost.com.

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