This report provides background and data from an investigation of New York City's summer youth employment program. It concludes that the program was poorly planned and poorly administered by both the Department of Labor and the city. Although some of the worksites visited were providing useful work experience to enrolled youths, over half of the worksites had serious problems, such as insufficient work or absent enrollees recorded as present. In these instances, program objectives may have been defeated by fostering bad work habits and paying salaries for little or no work. The following factors contributed to the problems found: (1) inadequate planning resulted in an insufficient number of productive jobs and a lack of control over program operations and over the use of Federal funds; (2) project sponsors from previous years were generally refunded with little consideration of their past performance and major sponsors were automatically refunded; (3) the methods used to register youths gave rise to questions about the income eligibility of some of the enrollees and reportedly resulted in all-night lines and rowdyism; (4) monitors were inadequately trained, many worksites were not visited, and problems noted were frequently not followed up on to insure corrective action. (Author/EB)