New York City’s public school custodian engineers* were paid an average of $109,467 in fiscal 2014, making them the city’s highest-paid group of municipal employees last year, according to newly released payroll data posted today at SeeThroughNY.net, the Empire Center’s government transparency website.

Out of 799 custodian engineers on the city payroll during the fiscal year, 634 received more than $100,000 in salary and added pay, official records shows. The custodian engineers are among the 509,000 employees whose names, titles, base pay rates and total pay can be found using the searchable database at SeeThroughNY.

The latest New York City data also show:

  • John Murphy, an associate inspector for the city’s Department of Buildings, was the city government’s overtime champion, racking up $179,099 to bring his total pay to $265,498.
  • Twenty-four of the top 50 overtime recipients worked for the city’s Housing Authority.
  • Police officers and other Police Department employees received the most overtime pay, totaling $575.9 million.
  • Firefighters and other Fire Department employees had the highest average overtime pay at $20,650.

The updated database includes the names, titles, base pay rates, and total pay for individuals who worked at any point between July 1, 2013 and June 30, 2014. Taxpayers can search SeeThroughNY for New York City payroll records dating back to fiscal year 2009.

Not reflected in the data are the costs of pensions, health insurance for employees and retirees, and other benefits. Tables listing the 50 highest-paid employees, 50 largest overtime recipients and selected city agency data, including average pay, number of employees and overtime paid, can be viewed here.

SeeThroughNY allows the public to examine state and local government expenditures, including payrolls, pensions, state legislators’ office expenditures and pork barrel “member item” projects. It also includes a benchmarking tool that allows users to compare property taxes for a home based on its location. The site was launched July 31, 2008.

* The original version of this press release failed to give the full title of the employees in question.  It should also have noted that the title is “custodian engineer,” and entails supervisory-level responsibilities.  

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