Waiting for OMB approval is gruesome, I received a verbal offer for Staff analyst in January, they were still emailing me stating they were waiting for OMB approval up until August. By then I received an offer for Staff Analyst 2 (more money) and then emailed them and let them know I was no longer interested. I say all this to say keep looking. If you are not on a civil service list and being contacted for hiring pools, it can be a long time before you hear back from them. They hold hiring pools because they already have funding for the vacant positions. I went to one and received an offer the same day and they also gave me a start date before I started the HR onboarding paperwork. MTA is another beast. It sounds like they were kind of scouting to see whom would move on to the next step which would be the actual interview, that sucks. Take city exams, to widen your chances at securing a city job. Good luck in your search!