Equal Employment Practices Commission warns budget and staffing shortfalls limit audits

Jimmy Pan, executive director of the Equal Employment Practices Commission, described constraints the small oversight body faces in auditing more than 145 city entities and in turning audits into policy and operational change.

Pan told the committee EEPC is budgeted for about 15 full-time employees and a relatively small OTPS allocation; the commission recently completed an audit cycle and reported underutilization of marginalized workers in many agencies. Pan and staff said competitor agencieshigher pay and larger teams result in recruitment and retention problems for auditors and analysts.

Director-level staff described audit cadence and capacity: EEPC completed 35 audits in 2025 and planned to conduct about 34 in the current calendar year, with a small audit team (six lines in the audit unit). Staff said analysts typically handle 45 audits in a 45-month review window and then up to six months of compliance monitoring. Commissioners asked about staffing profiles and turnover; staff said analyst pay (city entry levels cited in testimony near $60k) contributes to churn.

Pan and deputies outlined five critical staffing shortfalls: communications capacity to translate research into actionable reform; legal and policy staff; intergovernmental-relations capacity to work with OMB, DCAS and other partners; backup operations and HR support; and salary parity to retain analysts and specialists. The commission asked the council to consider modest PS and OTPS increases to support stable operations and effective audits.

Committee members acknowledged the oversight functionand discussed possible cross-agency shared services or pooled purchasing approaches to relieve small independent agencies of some operational burdens. EEPC staff said they are exploring streamlined standards for the next audit cycle and a closer pairing of research and audit work to measure whether training and other interventions improve outcomes.