2023 Laws of Puerto Rico › TITLE TWENTY-ONE - Municipalities (§§ 1-4 — 6756) › Subtitle 6 - Autonomous Municipalities (§§ 4001 — 4990-4990j) › Chapter 223 - Municipal Personnel (§§ 4551 — 4579) › § 4554 - Municipal personnel system—Legal status of employees

Municipal employees shall be classified as confidential, probationary career, regular career, transitory and irregular.
(a) Confidential employees.— Confidential employees shall be freely selected and removed and shall meet the educational and experience requirements, and take and pass the courses of the Compulsory Training and Continuing Education Program, as established by the Office of the Commissioner of Municipal Affairs, for the corresponding position or administrative unit and a unit of any other nature, as provided by this chapter, and which the mayor or the Legislative Chairperson, in their respective branches of the Municipal Government, may deem indispensable for the proper discharge of their duties.
They shall also be freely removable, except for those who may only be removed for the reasons established by law, and those whose appointment is for a term fixed by law.
When the removal of a confidential employee is for a cause that would provide grounds for the removal of a career employee, charges may be filed in writing, in which case, the procedure for the removal of career employees shall be followed. In this case, the employee will be ineligible to hold a position in the public service.
In such cases, the employee who has been removed may request the Director of the Central Office of Personnel Administration to be requalified as established in § 3.4 of Act Oct. 14, 1975, No. 5, known as “Puerto Rico Public Service Personnel Act”.
(1) Every employee who is a regular employee in the career service and enters the confidential service, shall have the absolute right to be reinstated in a position that is equal or similar to the last one he/she held in the career service; Provided, That he/she shall be entitled to all classification and salary benefits extended to the position he/she held, for the term during which he/she served in confidential office.
(2) Every employee who is a regular employee in the career service in a municipality and is elected or designated as substitute to hold a public elective office, shall have the absolute right to be reinstated to a position that is equal or similar to the last one he/she held in the career service, unless he/she was removed from elective office due to misconduct or by an impeachment, or if he/she resigned from office due to illegal or inappropriate conduct which would have lead to his/her removal or impeachment; Provided, That he/she shall be entitled to all classification and salary benefits extended to the position he/she held, for the term during which he/she served in the confidential service.
(3) Every employee who, as of the date of approval of this act, is holding a position in the confidential service or an elective office in the Executive Branch or the Judicial Branch, and has received a lump sum as liquidation of vacation and sick leave provided in § 4570 of this title, shall be entitled to have said regular vacation and sick leave credited on his/her personnel record once he/she has been reinstated to a regular position in the career service, provided he/she returns the sum received on such account to the municipal treasury.
(b) Regular career employees and probational career employees.— Regular career employees are those who have entered the system after undergoing the recruitment procedure established in this subtitle, including the probation period. These employees shall be entiled to permanent status and may only be removed from their positions for just cause and upon filing of charges.
Probational career employees shall be those employees who have been recruited and appointed pursuant to this subtitle, and whose probation period has not been completed. Once their probation period has been approved, these employees shall be entitled to permanent status and may only be romoved from office positions for just cause and upon filing of charges.
Every candidate recruited and appointed to a career position shall acquire his/her permanent position or regular status, after approving the probation period in a satisfactory manner. The duration of this period shall fluctuate from three (3) to twelve (12) months, depending on the nature and the levels of complexity and responsibility of the position. Said period shall include a complete cycle of the pertinent work of the position. It shall be the responsibility of the direct supervisor to direct and duly train said employee during the probation period.
At least an intermediate and a final evaluation should be administered during the probation period by the direct supervisor of the employee. Upon receiving the final evaluation, the nominating authority shall determine whether the employee shall continue as a regular career employee or shall be removed for failing to approve the probation period.
(c) Transitory employees.— Transitory appointments shall not exceed one (1) year, except for persons who are appointed to fixed-term special projects defrayed with federal or Commonwealth funds, whose appointment shall correspond to the standards provided by the law under which they are appointed.
Transitory appointments may be made in permanent career positions as determined by regulations.
The following shall be deemed to be transitory appointments:
(1) When the transitory appointment is meant to substitute a career position of an employee on unpaid leave.
(2) When the candidate to be appointed holds a provisional permit required for a job for which there was no candidate in the Eligible Candidate Register who met the requirements.
(3) When the person holding the regular career position has been removed and is appealing such removal before the Board of Appeals.
(4) When the person holding the regular career position has been suspended without pay for a definite period.
(5) When the person holding the regular career position is holding another position on a transitory appointment, and is entitled to return to his/her previous position.
(6) When, due to a need for service, it is indispensable to fill a position reserved for a scholarship holder, in which case the transitory appointment shall last for the duration of the scholarship.
(7) When an emergency arises in the rendering of services which makes it impossible or difficult to certify candidates from an eligible candidate register, in which case the appointment shall not exceed six (6) months. After said period elapses, if the appointing authority deems that the conditions that motivated the original transitory appointment persist, such appointment may be extended an additional six (6)-month term.
(8) When the person holding the regular career position becomes a trust employee.
(9) Whenever the municipality deems it necessary for just cause.
The test for the persons to be recruited through transitory appointments shall consist of an evaluation for the sole purpose of determining whether they meet the minimum requirements for the job class for which they shall be appointed, and the general conditions for entering public service.
Employees with transitory appointments shall not be deemed to be career employees nor shall they be appointed to career positions on a probationary or regular status unless they undergo the recruitment and selection procedures provided in this subtitle for career service.
(d) Irregular employees.— An irregular employee is a person who performs incidental and intermittent functions in the municipality, whose nature and duration make it impractical to create a full or part time position.
The municipality shall adopt regulations for the administration of its personnel, including their selection, classification, changes, remuneration and leaves, pursuant to the provisions of § 4553(d) of this title.
The selection, appointment and removal of irregular service personnel shall be done at the discretion of the nominating authority according to the person’s merits and competence.
Employees in the irregular service shall not be deemed as career employees nor shall they acquire such status merely by the passing of time.
Every irregular employee shall acquire regular status as a career employee when he/she meets the following requirements:
(1) He/she has rendered continuous services to the municipality for a term of three (3) or more years. A year of service shall consist of one thousand eight hundred (1,800) hours or more or services rendered in one fiscal year.
In those cases in which the daily working hours of irregular personnel are reduced by virture of the provisions of a Commonwealth act, or in compliance with federal minimum wage provisions, the Municipal Assembly shall determine with the advice of the Central Personnel Administration Office the number of hours equivalent to one year of service.
The equivalence indicated abover shall be determined considering the hours of service that can be rendered in a fiscal year, based on a full working day resulting from the reduction of working hours;
(2) has the minimum educational and experience requirements established for the type of position to which the functions he/she was performing are assigned, and
(3) the employee’s immediate supervisor certifies to the Mayor that he/she has rendered satisfactory services in accordance with the standards adopted to such effects.
In the case in which an irregular employee deems he/she has been injured by the refusal of the nominating authority to certify the term and minimum requirements of the position, the employee may appeal said determination before the Board of Appeals of the Personnel Administration System.
Irregular employees shall acquire regular employee status in the career service on the first day of July immediately after meeting the requirements indicated above.
Whenever an irregular employee refuses to accept an appointment to a regular position, he shall notify it in writing, by letter, or on a form that is adopted to such purposes.
The positions needed to comply with these purposes shall be created pursuant to the administrative regulations in effect.
History —Aug. 30, 1991, No. 81, § 12.004; Oct. 29, 1992, No. 84, § 47; Apr. 13, 1995, No. 36, § 37; Aug. 4, 1996, No. 97, § 3, Dec. 31, 1998, No. 343, § 3; renumbered as § 11.004 on Jan. 10, 1999, No. 30, § 3; Nov. 22, 2009, No. 151, § 3.