OSA Newsline - January 31, 2005

Any candidate who was disqualified from the recent Staff Analyst or Ed Analyst or Transit Management Analyst exam has to submit an appeal by Thursday, February 3rd at 12 midnight.

Over 400 candidates were marked disqualified by Personnel after having been graded as passing one or more of these exams.

OSA will offer free help to any disqualified candidate without regard to membership. If you or anyone you know was disqualified on a recent Analyst exam, call OSA at (212) 686-1229 for assistance on framing the appeal.

Act quickly.

The union is running an advertisement to this effect in Tuesday's issue of The Chief, but we also ask all members to spread the word. Download the advertisement by clicking here and give a copy to any co-workers who may need assistance. Please post a copy on the union bulletin board in your location.

OSA will have trained reviewers on hand to assist Tuesday through Thursday evening. Time is unreasonably short, so we have to move quickly.

We have some good news for our Transit Authority members. The MTA Board met and approved the contract. The $1000 lump sum should arrive as of February 10, 2005 and as of February 24, 2005 the 5% rate increase should arrive. Retroactive payment for the 3% and 2% raises should arrive by March 10, 2005. Please don't spend it until it shows up in your paycheck.

In the event we get any later word related to exam appeals, it will be posted here.

OSA Newsline - January 24, 2005

Results of the June, 2004 Staff Analyst exam are now released. You can download the final answer key by clicking here.

Candidates should be receiving their list results within the week, if not already. One answer was changed from the original tentative answer key. Question 57 on the AM test, Question 65 on the PM test, and Question 70 on the Sabbath Observer test all saw the proposed correct answer change from B to A.

A passing grade on the exam was a score of 70.03. We understand that this meant you answered 53 out of the 80 questions on the test correctly. This would suggest modest scaling of the results since 53 questions would normally equal a score of 66.25.

The Civil Service newspaper, The Chief, will publish the list of successful candidates in the issue dated February 4th.

You can also download the complete list by clicking here for pages 1-10, clicking here for pages 11-20 and clicking here for pages 21-27.

If a candidate is listed as not passing, check the code on the card sent to you. Code 11 signifies a failure on the multiple choice exam. You may appeal to the Committee on Manifest Errors, 1 Centre Street, 14th Floor, New York NY 10007 to request that your test be manually recalculated if you were close to a passing score.

If you were failed due to insufficient experience, it means you passed the written portion. The card will say "This is to advise you that you are not eligible to participate further in the examination for the above title. You do not possess the minimum qualifications stated in the notice of examination...." As instructed on the card, you must appeal to the Committee on Manifest Errors, 1 Centre Street, 14th Floor, New York NY 10007, within two weeks of the postmark of the disqualification notice. In such a case, immediately call Noreen at the union office at 212-686-1229 and we will assist you on your appeal.

Finally, if you moved since you took the test, you must write a letter informing DCAS of this fact. Include your social security number, the test name and number (Staff Analyst Exam No. 3045), your old address and your new address and address your letter to:

DCAS Certification Division
1 Centre Street 21st Floor
New York NY 10007

You can mail or hand deliver your letter.

January has been a busy month for lists. DCAS has also established the list for the Associate Supervisor of School Security promotional exam given last June. You can download the list by clicking here. You can also download the final answer key by clicking here.

See you at this Thursday's membership meeting.

OSA Newsline - January 17, 2005

In honor of Martin Luther King Day, the union office is closed Monday, January 17th.

Interesting news this week. One of our members, Larry Call, has two Associate Staff Analyst jobs available at the Human Resources Administration. Larry is setting up a Financial Data Warehouse for his section at HRA and he needs some very specific skills. If you are familiar with the Microsoft Access database, as well as the Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and have SQL programming language skills you are the perfect candidate.

Larry is in need of exactly those skill and if you have them, he will try to accommodate you. He says it is a good shop and since HRA's promotion list is exhausted, he is free to hire provisionally, to accept lateral transfers from other agencies ...whatever.

If you are interested and have those particular computer skills (or at least two of three), you can call Larry at 212-331-4079 or else Gordon Kraus Friedberg at 212-331-4075.

Otherwise, current news is in this month's mailing which you should have received by now. If not, call Noreen at 212-686-1229 so that she can check your address and send you a copy. The contents are on this website as the January 2005 edition of News From OSA.

OSA Newsline - January 10, 2005

The mailing is due out late this week (and the contents are already up on this website as the January 2005 edition of News From OSA), but some news was too late for the mailing. The PICA negotiations this past Friday seem to have resulted in an agreement to continue PICA as it is until this July. At that point, changes will be made – although exactly what changes are still to be negotiated.

The union office, recovering from the flood, has now reached the level of four working bathrooms out of six. The significance of this bit of news is that we can go ahead and schedule the January membership meeting at the union office. Members should probably come early and tour a bit since the place is mostly new and redone.
OSA Newsline - January 3, 2005

Happy New Year, 2005.

Negotiations are set for this Thursday and Friday as well. The Municipal Labor Committee is sitting across from the City to discuss the funding of the PICA prescription drug program.

The City feels it is unable to continue funding the program as it is, so various modifications are being proposed. The basic problem is the ever increasing cost of prescription drugs. In other words, this year is starting off a lot like last year.