Nassau County Comptroller Jack Schnirman will email a survey to 9,000 county employees this week so that they can anonymously report incidents of nepotism in the county government.
The survey follows Schnirman’s April release of the first phase of a county audit into nepotism, which found that the prior county Board of Ethics did not educate employees on avoiding ethical missteps and took limited actions to enforce the Code of Ethics.
“This is the next step in our countywide nepotism audit series. It’s time to hear directly from the county workforce and gather the data we need to move this process forward,” Schnirman said.
Employees in all county departments will receive the survey, an online form that employees can fill out anonymously.
Questions on the form ask if employees have witnessed situations in which relatives helped each other get jobs, relatives who supervised one another or workers who have been approached to pay a person or entity for a job or to keep a job.
Schirman said his office is moving forward with the second chapter of its nepotism audit, which focuses on human resources, and chapter three, which focuses on civil service.
“There are thousands of hardworking, qualified employees working throughout the county who have dedicated their careers to public service — they’re the reason this is so important,” Schnirman said. “Nepotism has the potential to cost taxpayer money when the wrong people are hired for the wrong jobs for the wrong reasons.”
The comptroller’s office created an email, nepotismsurvey@nassaucountyny.gov, where anyone can provide confidential information pertaining to the nepotism survey.
