COVID-19 considerations:

**Bonita House Inc. requires all employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19, and applicants are required to submit proof of vaccination prior to beginning employment. In accordance with the law, Bonita House Inc. will consider exemptions for employees or applicants who cannot be administered the COVID-19 vaccine for medical or religious reasons. Applicants should contact our HR department if they have questions about this requirement or wish to request an exemption.**

In response to COVID-19, we have instituted many safeguards to protect our employees by requiring that all staff and clients be required to wear masks prior to entering our facility, are COVID symptom screened and contact traced, we are taking temperature checks daily, and have installed a clear protective barrier at our front desk.

Please note: You may be required to take a COVID-19 test prior to entering the facility.

Bonita House, Inc. (BHI) is a well-respected nonprofit mental health agency with multiple sites in Alameda County and an operating budget of $7.5 million. It was founded in 1971. BHI is also a social rehabilitation agency providing a full range of Medi-Cal services to adults with co-occurring serious mental health and substance use disorders.

CASA UBUNTU is funded through Alameda County’s Mental Health Services Act (Proposition 63) funding and is designed to actively outreach, engage, and provide a full range of services 100 adults in northern Alameda County who have mental health and substance abuse challenges. Services are predominately office-based, and provide integrated substance abuse, mental health and physical health treatment. Key features are, the partnership with clients and families, service intensity, 24/7 coverage, the foundation of wellness and recovery principles and practices, and the commitment to do “whatever it takes,” utilizing the creativity of a multi-disciplinary, full team approach.

Agency Values:

Compassion: Committed to caring, dignity, and kindness

Respect: Honor each individual and provide highly ethical services

Progress: Leading the way in creating opportunities to change for the better

Resilience: Channeling hope, building strengths to successfully recover, adapt and grow

Embracing Differences: Honor and celebrate our diverse communities and individual uniqueness

Bonita House fully supports the Board of Behavioral Sciences' commitment to protect the consumers of California through effective enforcement, ensure credibility and high professional standards through examinations and licensing requirements, and provide excellent customer service to all its constituents.

Position Summary

The Participant Support Specialist (PSS) functions as a fully integrated Casa Ubuntu team member providing leadership in outreach and engagement efforts, and expertise about the process of recovery. The PSS will promote a team culture that recognizes, understands, and respects each client’s point of view, experiences, and preferences. The PSS assists the team to maximize client choice, self-determination and decision-making in the planning, delivery, and evaluation of integrated dual diagnosis treatment, rehabilitation and support services. He or she provides peer counseling and consultation to individual clients, families, and team staff; carries out rehabilitation and support functions and crisis intervention.

Qualifications

Required:

• Bilingual Spanish/English
• HS Diploma/GED
• The Participant Support Specialist must be willing to share personal recovery journey with consumers.
• 1-2 years of paid or volunteer work experience with adults with severe and persistent mental illnesses, serious substance use disorders, or histories of homelessness.

• Knowledge of and provides assistance with community and concrete resources
• Provide therapeutic milieu including greeting members, ensuring they sign in/out, engages with members, coordinates daily room use schedule, and maintaining a safe and welcoming environment.

• Demonstrated ability to effectively and sensitively provide care to people from different cultural groups.
• Have basic typing skills and knowledge of medical documentation requirements or other forms of clinical documentation.
• Must have a valid California Driver’s License, proof of insurance and use of the personal
• Must be able to meet the Immigration Reform Act of 1986 requirements

Preferred:

• Lived personal experience with mental illness, homelessness, and/or co-occurring disorders required
• College degree in a human services field, or in another area; have completed BEST NOW! Peer recovery support training program; or a comparable peer training program.

Essential Functions/Skills:

• MAA Billing:
  • Informing Medi-Cal recipients/potential eligible about Medi-Cal services, including SD/MC services

  • Assisting at-risk Medi-Cal recipients or potential eligible to understand the need for MH services

  • Actively encouraging reluctant and difficult Medi-Cal recipients/potential eligible to accept needed MH and healthcare services.

  • Non-SPMP gathering information about an individual’s health and MH needs.
• Act as an interpreter to help non-consumer team members better understand and empathize with each client’s unique and subjective experience and perceptions.
• Provide expertise and consultation from a consumer perspective to the entire team concerning clients’ experiences on symptoms of mental illness, the effects and side-effects of medications, clients’ responses to and opinions of treatment, and clients’ experiences of recovery.
• Document client progress to maintain a permanent record of client activity according to established methods and procedures.
• Help clients (and family members) identify, understand, and combat stigma and discrimination associated with mental illness and develop strategies to reduce self-stigma.
• Collaborate with the team to ensure the protection of clients’ rights in order to help clients to improve their knowledge of client rights and grievance or complaint procedures; support clients with filing, mediating, and resolving complaints.
• Increase awareness of and support client and family participation in consumer self-help programs and consumer advocacy organizations that promote recovery.
• Assist in the provision of WRAP groups and other peer-based or family support groups.
• Provide ongoing assessment, problem-solving, side-by-side services, skill teaching, support (prompts, assignments, encouragement), and environmental adaptations to assist clients with challenges in the areas of employment, housing, and activities of daily living.
• Help organize and lead individual and group social and recreational activities to help clients structure their time, increase social experience, and provide opportunities to practice social skills.
• All other duties as assigned by the Program Director.

Physical Demands:

The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions. Physical demands. Must be able to lift 50 pounds.

EOE AA M/F/V/Disability:

Nonprofit is committed to providing equal opportunity to all qualified persons regardless of race, color, citizenship status, national origin, ancestry, gender, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, genetic information, age, religion, creed, physical or mental disability, marital status, veteran status or any other characteristic protected by law (“Protected Status”).