Irvington
Municipality · Essex County
513 people are enrolled in a State pension fund through Irvington, reporting a median pensionable salary of $71,632.
Irvington is a confirmed New Jersey civil service jurisdiction — a municipality in Essex County that has adopted Title 11A of the New Jersey Statutes to govern how it hires, classifies, and promotes employees.
Essex County has 33 confirmed civil service jurisdictions in total, including this one.
About municipalities in New Jersey
New Jersey has 564 municipalities, and each one decides for itself whether to operate under Title 11A. A municipality that adopts civil service hires and promotes employees through competitive exams administered by the state; one that hasn't sets its own local hiring rules instead.
Irvington Police Department — discipline and transparency records via PoliceTransparencyNJ
See all 33 civil service jurisdictions in Essex County, or browse the full employer directory.
Who is on the pension rolls at Irvington
513 people are enrolled in a State-administered pension fund through Irvington. That is a count of active memberships reported by the employer, not a payroll headcount: anyone not enrolled in one of these funds does not appear in this data at all, and no separate headcount for a New Jersey local employer is published anywhere we can check against.
| Fund | Name | Members | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| PFRS | Police and Firemen's Retirement System | 261 | 51% |
| PERS | Public Employees' Retirement System | 252 | 49% |
Within PFRS, the fund records 151 police officers and 110 firefighters. PFRS enrolment is the only occupational detail this dataset carries; it lists no job titles, so nothing here says which civil service titles Irvington actually appoints.
Pensionable salary at Irvington
Half of the pension-enrolled workforce at Irvington reports a pensionable salary above $71,632 and half below, across 513 members with a reported figure.
| Point in the distribution | Pensionable salary |
|---|---|
| 10th percentile | $37,663 |
| 25th percentile | $50,645 |
| Median | $71,632 |
| 75th percentile | $125,453 |
| 90th percentile | $146,012 |
The range runs from the 10th to the 90th percentile because the extremes are not informative: the lowest reported figures belong to part-time and partial-year members, whose credited salary is a fraction of a full-time equivalent.
Among the 18 civil service jurisdictions in the same county with pension data, that median sits at the 28th percentile, below the county's midpoint of $80,912. Against the 194 bodies of the same kind statewide, it sits at the 44th percentile.
These figures are pensionable salary reported to the NJ Division of Pensions and Benefits for the four most recent quarters, not total pay and not take-home pay. Snapshot of March 31, 2026. How we compile this.
How long people stay at Irvington
The median enrolled member at Irvington has 9.8 years of credited service, with the middle half falling between 4.3 and 19.5 years. 23% have passed twenty years, which matters locally because retirement eligibility and the pension formula both turn on service credit.
| Credited service | Members | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Under 5 years | 159 | 31% |
| 5 to 10 years | 102 | 20% |
| 10 to 15 years | 77 | 15% |
| 15 to 20 years | 57 | 11% |
| 20 to 25 years | 71 | 14% |
| 25 years or more | 47 | 9% |
Membership tier records which pension rules a member was hired under, so the mix is a rough picture of how recently a workforce turned over. At Irvington, 35% sit in the most recently hired cohort.
| Membership tier | Members | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Tier 1 (longest-serving cohort) | 162 | 32% |
| Tier 2 | 7 | 1% |
| Tier 3 | 161 | 31% |
| Tier 4 | 2 | 0% |
| Tier 5 (most recently hired cohort) | 181 | 35% |
Other public employers in Irvington Township
The pension system reports these separate public employers in Irvington Township. Each is its own employer for pension purposes, and only some are civil service jurisdictions — school boards, charter schools and parking authorities are ordinary public employers that were never part of Title 11A. Names link only where the body appears in this directory.
| Employer | Enrolled members |
|---|---|
| IRVINGTON BD OF ED | 1,078 |
| IRVINGTON TOWNSHIP (this page) | 513 |
| IRVINGTON HOUSING AUTH | 12 |
What civil service status means for jobs at Irvington
In a municipality that operates under Title 11A, the mayor, administrator or governing body still decides which positions exist and who gets appointed to them. What changes is the route in. Most permanent positions have to be filled from a list of candidates who took and passed an open competitive examination.
That flips the usual job hunt around. For a competitive title you announce yourself by filing for the exam when it is posted, not by dropping a resume at the municipal building. Municipal employers also run the widest mix of titles in this directory: police and fire, public works and sanitation, code enforcement and construction inspection, tax collection, clerical support, recreation, and dispatch.
Promotional examinations are closed. They are open to employees already serving in the unit, scored on a combination of the examination and seniority, and they are how most supervisory positions in local government get filled. It is the main reason entry-level appointments matter so much: they are the door to the ladder above them.
Temporary and seasonal appointments sit outside the permanent track entirely. Summer recreation staff, short-term project help and coverage for an absent employee are filled without an examination and end when the need does. The work counts as experience when you later apply for a competitive title, but it confers no status of its own.
Civil service employers in Irvington Township
Irvington Township appears in the Commission's listing in its own right, so the township government is the appointing authority for its own classified staff.
Two other Irvington Township bodies hold civil service status separately from the township government, listed below. Each runs its own examinations and keeps its own eligible lists, so Irvington Township is really three employers rather than one.
- Irvington Housing Authority, housing authority
- Irvington Library, public library
Civil service titles used by New Jersey municipalities
Real classifications that New Jersey municipalities draw on, each linked to its official specification: the definition of the work, the requirements, and any licence the title depends on. A sample of the system rather than a roster or a list of openings.
Civil service coverage across Essex County
Essex County holds 33 confirmed jurisdictions in the Commission's listing: 11 public libraries, 11 municipalities, 5 municipal departments, 2 housing authorities, 1 board of health, 1 county government, 1 fire district, and 1 school district.
11 of the county's 22 municipalities are among them.
Essex County is a jurisdiction too, though a county's decision does not bind the towns, authorities, libraries or districts inside it.
Also in the directory: West Orange Township, Belleville, Belleville Library, Bloomfield, Bloomfield Board of Health, Bloomfield Library, East Orange, East Orange Library. See all 33 in Essex County.
Common questions about Irvington
Is Irvington a civil service employer?
Yes. Irvington appears in the New Jersey Civil Service Commission's listing of local civil service system jurisdictions as of July 2024, which makes it an appointing authority under Title 11A. Permanent appointments to competitive titles there come from eligible lists the Commission certifies, rather than from purely local hiring.
Does civil service status at Irvington cover the rest of Irvington Township?
No. Irvington Township has more than one employer in the listing, and each holds its own status, runs its own examinations and keeps its own eligible lists. Seniority and permanent status earned at one do not transfer automatically to another, even inside the same town.
Do veterans get a preference on these lists?
Yes, and in New Jersey it is unusually strong. On an open competitive list, disabled veterans who pass are ranked ahead of all other candidates, and other veterans who pass are ranked ahead of non-veterans, regardless of score. Preference has to be claimed and verified in advance, and it does not carry over to promotional examinations.
Do you have to live in New Jersey to work here?
Generally yes. The New Jersey First Act requires public employees hired after September 1, 2011 to live in the state, with a grace period for new hires to relocate and a narrow exemption process. Separately, individual examination announcements sometimes carry a local residency preference, which affects the order of the list rather than eligibility.
How many Irvington employees are in a State pension system?
513 active memberships are reported through Irvington, split across 261 in PFRS and 252 in PERS. This counts pension enrolment rather than payroll, so employees who are not in one of these funds are not included.
What is the median pensionable salary at Irvington?
$71,632, with the middle half of members between $50,645 and $125,453. These figures are pensionable salary reported to the NJ Division of Pensions and Benefits for the four most recent quarters, not total pay and not take-home pay. It excludes overtime and most supplemental pay, and it is before tax, before the member's own pension contribution and before health premiums.
How does pay at Irvington compare with the rest of Essex County?
Its median pensionable salary of $71,632 sits at the 28th percentile among the 18 civil service jurisdictions in Essex County with pension data, where the midpoint jurisdiction reports $80,912. Local pay is set by ordinance rather than a State schedule, so spreads inside one county are wide.
How long do people stay at Irvington?
The median enrolled member has 9.8 years of credited service, and 23% have passed twenty years. Credited service drives both retirement eligibility and the pension formula, so a long-tenured workforce usually means fewer open competitive appointments in the near term.