Seasonal Laborer - 9 Week Program

Seasonal Laborer Program

The Seasonal Laborer Program offers 9-week temporary employment through the City of Cambridge's Public Works Department. Participants engage in outdoor labor, primarily garbage collection and clean up/maintenance tasks on City streets, parks, and cemeteries.

This program is open to Cambridge residents who are willing and able to perform heavy labor duties with reasonable accommodation. Upon successful completion of program requirements, participants may be eligible to extend the assignment by up to 7 additional weeks.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

These positions will be filled via a lottery program. The primary responsibility of this position is basic laboring duties. Positions are outdoors, typically on rubbish trucks, in the cemetery or on parks and public properties. Seasonal Laborers perform a combination of a variety of unskilled labor duties of which the following are typical examples:

• Picking up rubbish from sidewalks in front of houses and other establishments as required, loading refuse onto trucks, collecting garbage, yard waste and bulky items;
• Shoveling materials and leveling areas, removing snow and ice using manual or small powered equipment, spreading salt on icy areas, digging holes, trenches, and other excavations, cleaning out sewers and catch basins;
• Loading and unloading supplies, moving furniture, assisting in placing and holding heavy items in place;
• Cleaning litter and debris from sidewalks, streets, gutters, and parking lots;
• Mowing grass using hand or powered equipment;
• Trimming shrubs and lower parts of trees along sidewalks and streets;
• Using standard tools, i.e., shovels, picks, axes, saws, heavy wrenches and small powered equipment;
• Performing other routine duties as assigned such as cleaning, sweeping, waxing, buffing, polishing, washing floors, walls, sinks, toilets, and other fixtures; picking up, collecting, and disposing of trash; seeing to it that supplies such as soap, towels, and paper are available.

Minimum Requirements:

• Must be a Cambridge resident at time of appointment.
• Must have proper clothing and footwear, including work boots, in order to perform work safely.

Physical Demands: Duties range from light physical to heavy laborious tasks. All labor positions, skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled in the Cambridge Department of Public Works require a combination of repetitive: lifting between 25-100 pounds, bending, squatting, stretching, pushing, dragging, reaching, climbing, and pulling. Employee is required to adhere to all safety and dress code policies. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Work Environment: Candidate will be exposed to all weather conditions and will work in a moderate to high noise level environment caused by sound of machinery or powered equipment being used.

Lottery Information:

• An application will be valid for one year after filing.
• Only one application per person in each twelve-month period will be eligible for the lottery. In the case of multiple application, the first complete application received will be eligible for the lottery.
• If your name is selected, we will notify you to come to our location at 689 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139 to fill out a CORI form and bring in a current ID with the Cambridge address you gave us on your application.