Report 2021-104 Recommendation 17 Responses

Report 2021-104: Metropolitan Water District of Southern California: Its Leadership Has Failed to Promote Transparency or Ensure a Fair and Equitable Workplace (Release Date: April 2022)

Recommendation #17 To: Metropolitan Water District of Southern California

To better analyze its workforce demographics and identify potential barriers to employment, by April 2023 MWD should develop formal procedures for analyzing employee demographics and taking appropriate action based on those data. As part of this process, MWD should report to its board on the results of these analyses and actions.

1-Year Agency Response

Metropolitan fully implemented the recommendation to develop formal procedures for analyzing and acting upon employee demographics data to better analyze its workforce demographics and identify and address potential barriers to employment. The formal procedures were also socialized with various internal stakeholders, including Metropolitan's Diversity Council, in order to solicit broad feedback on any improvements or changes needed. We will continue to evolve our workforce analytics practice in alignment with this procedure and report findings and actions taken to the Board on an annual basis. Workforce demographics were presented to the Board on December 12, 2022 and will be reported again to the Board later this year.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 1-Year Status: Fully Implemented

MWD provided us with written monitoring and evaluation procedures that expand upon its existing utilization analyses by examining, on a quarterly basis, demographic statistics in hiring, transfers, promotions, terminations, and more. The procedures also direct MWD staff to prepare a report based on its analysis of this data, to be discussed with human resources and presented to MWD's board annually.

6-Month Agency Response

To better analyze its workforce demographics and identify potential barriers to employment, Metropolitan developed formal procedures to evaluate employee demographics and take appropriate actions as needed based on data.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 6-Month Status: Partially Implemented

MWD provided a draft version of the procedures that will govern its approach to analyzing employee demographics. We will continue assessing the status of this recommendation as MWD finalizes those procedures and begins reporting to its board on this matter.

60-Day Agency Response

To better analyze its workforce demographics and identify potential barriers to employment, Metropolitan is planning to initiate development of formal procedures for analyzing employee demographics and taking appropriate action based on those data.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 60-Day Status: Pending

All Recommendations in 2021-104

Agency responses received are posted verbatim.