CITY OF SANTA MONICA Employee Reviews

The first half of my tenure at the City was rewarding and really a relaxed fun environment. It went downhill significantly after Covid..but to be honest it was on its way down prior to that in part because of Council direction and City Leadership.

Pros

awesome environment, opportunity for mentoring

Cons

housing costs are high to live close to Santa Monica for a shorter commute.

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interesting workplace. Never a dull moment in Public Works

Lead Custodian (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - September 18, 2023

Either open everything up in the morning and get to maintenance work or special projects, or take over those duties later in the day and lock up everything at night

Pros

Fun place to work, (beach) and long breaks as long as your tasks were completed.

Cons

New management didn't care about our safety or well being. We were just an ID number.

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CITY OF SANTA MONICA insights

Based on 34 survey responses

What people like

Time and location flexibility
Ability to meet personal goals
Fair pay for job

Do not recommend

Motor Coach Operator (Current Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - July 31, 2023

Poor work life balance and horrible management . On call schedule when you start means no life and you get the worst routes. Supposed to get better with seniority but it doesn’t very minimal raises and things constantly changes for the worst.

Pros

Job security

Cons

Schedule

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5 stars

Distribution and Water Treatment Operator (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - February 3, 2023

What is the best part of working at the company?Great people to work with.What is the most stressful part about working at the company?Drive home from work.What is the work environment and culture like at the company?Friendly staffWhat is a typical day like for you at the company?Always an adventure.

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It was good

Santa Monica pier (Current Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - January 31, 2023

I really like working at the Santa Monica pier the Community was good in people also I love to work with ice cream in working together ask a group making sure things are together and in order have great team work.

Pros

Cons

Short break

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working in the parks and on the beach, you meet a lot of interesting people, public works is great if you like working

Lead Custodian (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - October 9, 2022

The only good thing about working for the city of Santa Monica was the salary. Working the parks during the day was cool, but the beach at night can be creepy. (weirdos loitering in the restrooms)

Pros

day shift=off @ 1:30 p.m., driving up and down the beach.

Cons

crime, aggressive drug addicted homeless, no help from the police, harassment from management, city hall cares more about the homeless than its own employees

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Santa Monica Big Blue Bus is a Customer Service Oriented Job that requires hard work and long hours.

Customer Service/Motor Coach Operator (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - August 27, 2022

Flexible work schedule, lots of growth opportunity with good pay and benefits. Perfect for a person or persons with family values and goals. The job comes with a lot of incentives , basically the only way to be fired is to fire ones self.

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Provides a decent salary without having a degree

Motor Coach Operator (Current Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - April 28, 2022

I love what I do, and enjoy being outdoors working with the public for the most part. But more times than often there are difficult people we come across and when we ask for help it’s very limited by the police, dispatch, management etcetera. It’s extremely frustrating to love your job but feel like it doesn’t love you back. The workdays are long (up to 8- 13 hour runs) 15-16 hours away from home per day, lots of split shifts (up to 3 1/2 hour breaks between work) Opportunities for overtime work. The employees are great to work with. Teamwork is getting better. Overall Comradeship is pretty much decent.

Pros

Great benefits & retirement, Tuition reimbursement, opportunity to advance within the city departments.

Cons

Employee appreciation/support is low therefore productivity is suffering majorly as a result, Not much room for professional growth, Extremely limited in promoting, The city itself is becoming more unsafe to work in, Lack of sufficient support regarding our safety.

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Great pay and benefits, archaic work culture, not great management.

Administrative Analyst (Current Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - February 18, 2022

This used to be a wonderful workplace but it's become chaotic and unpredictable. Very little guidance from management but a lot of reactionary firefighting.

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Good experience

Assistant Administrator (Former Employee) - Public works - August 7, 2021

Overall good experience, just make sure you work with the right department. Avoid CCS division at all costs. Public works is awesome and the people are so friendly.

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Jobs at CITY OF SANTA MONICA

See more jobs

Customer Services Assistant

Santa Monica, CA

6 days ago

Wastewater Collections Worker I

Santa Monica, CA

10 days ago

Maintenance Assistant

Santa Monica, CA

3 days ago

Administrative Intern (As Needed)

Santa Monica, CA

30+ days ago

Police Cadet (As-Needed)

Santa Monica, CA

13 days ago

A lots of favoritism and politics.

Systems Analyst (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - March 13, 2021

Santa Monica used to be a good place to work untill they changed the culture since 10 years ago. They recruited incompetent managers and promote lazy people, and depreciated people who work hard. Currently, they have many chiefs, but not enough Indians to do the actual work. They are good on publicity to advertise how good they are, but it is not legit. Because of the poor management and bad culture, you need to bs a lot to stay hired or promoted. The culture is horrible and low moral.

Pros

Benefits was good but degrading every year.

Cons

No support from management unless you're good on politics.

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Great pre-covid

Staff Assistant III (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - March 1, 2021

Worked here pre-Covid. Great environment, great management and innovative environment. A great sense of taking care of their employees, and in my opinion a stress free environment most of the time.

Pros

Innovative employee support

Cons

Health care options for part time employees with families

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Political and uncaring.

Park Staff (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - January 17, 2021

City presents itself as being a progressive place to work but in truth, city department managers care little about employees welfare or providing residents with a quality level of service.

Pros

Benefits

Cons

Mass layoffs

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Loved the city, until we were laid off.

Program Specialist/Front Desk Specialist (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - November 20, 2020

I planned on retiring with the city of Santa Monica. Everything was great! Great pay, benefits, co workers, schedule, and overall just a great environment to be in. Next thing you know, "covid" hits and they are laying people off by April 2020. Other cities took paycuts and furloughs but still had jobs. The most disheartening part is that they never spoke of furlough or other options, they went straight for the kill, and for that I would say job security is definitely at risk. The union tried, but didnt try hard enough. They did give us severance though, but I'd rather have a job.

Pros

Great pay, great benefits, opportunity for growth and advancement

Cons

Job security, misbudgeting of city funds, greedy

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Fun job and get a daily work out

Comercial Driver (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - October 1, 2020

Great place to work. Will get a work out as an equipment operater daily. Can be a little job politics at the job site at times. Just ignore that out in the work and it will be noticed.

Pros

Pay

Cons

Can be work politics on the job site at times

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Chill overall but no real advancement

Administrative Assistant (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - September 18, 2020

It's job security and decent money. You'll be able to do pretty much whatever you want. You'll get bored and burned out after a few years. You should advance as far as you can go if you get a position that has levels to it.

Pros

Job security

Cons

boring

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Not Sobad

Librarian (Current Employee) - Santa Monica - September 18, 2020

Everything is well, except for the current mass layoff. Hope it will not happen again. Working environment is good. People are nice here. Not so much pressure this year.

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Great experience.

Parking Attendant (Current Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - August 2, 2020

Great to work with. Manager is well mannered and have a great relationship with their employees. Also you are able to grow within the company and get to learn new stuff.

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Hard to advance in the city

Labor Trainee (Current Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - January 7, 2020

Hard to advance in the city if you don’t have a class B license. Co workers are great, very friendly and helpful. Management can be difficult at times and can make the job more complicated than it needs to be. Since it’s an as needed job they only give you a certain amount of hours per year, so don’t expect to be working 40 hours a week.

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Fun yet challenging workplace

CCS Assistant (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - December 9, 2019

The best part of the day was playing games with the kids or helping with their homework. Keeping the kids busy after school was my number one job always, making sure their brains and body was always moving. I learned how to manage a large group of kids during activities, sports games, and during our homework time. The most challenging part of my job was dealing with parents and their concerns or requests, as well as working with challenging students whether it was learning or behavioral issues. Management could improve, I would have felt better continuing to work for them if I had felt more supported when it came to parents and dealing with consequences for kids OR parents (picking up students late daily, students not wanting to follow directions consistently, etc).

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I truly felt that my work positively impacted the community. Great learning environment. Thankful for their Pre-Supervisory Academy... Awesome.

Lead Code Enforcement Officer (Former Employee) - Santa Monica, CA - December 2, 2019

Their slogan of 'We do the right thing right' has stayed with me throughout my public service career. It is not without its' challenges, but they stay the course and keep the objective clear... at least for me.

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