Legal Assistance to the Elderly (LAE) seeks a coordinating attorney who will work with our social service team to provide representation of clients navigating the CARE Court process.
Organization Description
For more than 40 years, LAE has provided free legal advice and representation to seniors and adults with disabilities in San Francisco. Our mission is to protect and advance the right of San Francisco’s seniors and adults with disabilities to be housed, healthy, financially stable, and safe. Our primary practice areas are Housing Preservation/Eviction Defense, Benefits and Healthcare Advocacy, Physical and Financial Elder Abuse Prevention, Consumer Rights and Protection, Foreclosure Prevention and End of Life Planning. LAE is a friendly and collaborative work environment.
What is CARE Court?
Community Assistance, Recovery and Empowerment (CARE) Court is a new framework to get people with mental health and substance use disorders the support and care they need. CARE Court connects a person struggling with untreated mental illness – and often also substance use challenges – with a court-ordered Care Plan for up to 24 months. Each plan is managed by a care team in the community and can include clinically prescribed, individualized interventions with several supportive services, medication, and a housing plan. The client-centered approach also includes a legal representative and supporter to help make self-directed care decisions in addition to their full clinical team.
LAE seeks a dedicated and determined attorney who will coordinate our legal team in providing representation to clients navigating the CARE Court system. This is a new Court system and will require creativity, patience and dedication as we work within a developing Court system and County developed CARE plans. We will have to develop advocacy approaches that will allow our clients to succeed.
Our legal representation will work in an interdisciplinary team that will collaborate in case assessment, strategy and providing services. This position has a strong preference for having experience working with clients who are severely mentally ill, specifically with untreated schizophrenia, and other psychotic disorders and disorders on schizophrenia spectrum, and/or clients in supportive housing. We would like the advocate to have excellent organizational skills and a willingness to work collaboratively across legal and social work disciplines.
- Member State Bar of California
- Strong written, verbal and interviewing skills
- Patient, flexible and kind
- Works well in a team
- Ability to independently manage a caseload
Highly Desirable
- Experience working with clients who are severely mentally ill, specifically with untreated schizophrenia, and other psychotic disorders and disorders on schizophrenia spectrum
- Experience working with clients who have substance use disorders.
- Bilingual in English and Spanish, Cantonese and/or Mandarin
- Experience working with elderly, veterans, adults with disabilities and/or unhoused individuals or those experiencing a crisis
- A commitment to contributing to your community and advancing justice for seniors and adults with disabilities
- Trial or Courtroom experience
- Knowledge of legal issues related to poverty and/or aging
- A familiarity and comfortability with San Francisco neighborhoods, including Tenderloin, South of Market, Bayview/Hunters Point, Mission Bay and the Mission
- Provide full scope representation to clients navigating the CARE Court System this includes in Court appearances
- Work closely with LAE’s Social Services Team to advocate for clients’ interest in the development of Court supervised CARE Plans
- As this is a new Court system and program for LAE, work with LAE leadership to develop systems and internal procedures to best serve our clients
- Conduct intake interviews with new clients, in various settings, such as at home, including Single Room Occupancy Hotels, shelters, court, and other community-based settings.
- Provide in-office “backup” on a rotating basis, responding to client emergencies and agency inquiries
We offer a family friendly environment, and compensation based on competitive public interest salaries along with a generous benefits package. The salary based on Union Scale starting at $83,000 to $95,000 (placement on scale is primarily determined by years of related experience). There is a salary stipend for fluency in a second language that is regularly used in LAE’s legal practice and an additional stipend after two years working at LAE. LAE’s benefits package includes 100% employer covered medical, dental, and life insurance for employees and dependent children and up 75% for spouses; LAE student debt reimbursement program; employer paid CA Bar license and/or social work license fees; 401k retirement plan with annual LAE contribution; and a Staff Wellness Fund. LAE has a generous paid leave policy which includes: sick leave; parental leave; compensation time, 19 holidays each year; and vacation (starting at 15 days and increasing with additional years of employment).
WORKING CONDITIONS
The position requires working with individuals during moments of extreme stress and instability. The position also requires the provision of culturally-sensitive and empathetic services. It also requires traveling to different neighborhoods and meeting clients in various settings, such as at home, Single Room Occupancy Hotels, shelters, court, and other community-based settings. Some evening and weekend work may also be required.
UNION MEMBERSHIP
After successful completion of a probationary period (90 days), membership in the National Organization of Legal Services Workers becomes a condition of employment.
TO APPLY
E-MAIL RESUME AND COVER LETTER TO: [email protected]
Attention Hiring Committee
Subject line: COORDINATING ATTORNEY-CARE Court [YOUR NAME]
If you find that you meet many of the qualifications in the job description, we encourage you to apply and explain in your cover letter why your experience would make you a good fit for the position. We recognize that organizations may miss out on strong applicants who screen themselves out of the process because they do not meet every qualification and that disproportionately impacts people from historically marginalized backgrounds. We know that our greatest strengths come from the people who make up our team and a welcoming, inclusive and culturally diverse staff allows us to best serve our community. We look forward to your application.
LAE seeks to fill all positions with people who share our values, including our organizational commitment to diversity. We encourage all interested individuals to apply—especially people of color; women; people from low-income backgrounds; people with disabilities; people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, gender non-conforming, non-binary; or anyone belonging to any other federal or state protected category. We believe that all persons are entitled to equal employment opportunity, and are committed to not discriminating on any basis prohibited by applicable law.
APPLICATIONS WILL BE CONSIDERED UNTIL THE POSITION IS FILLED. THOSE SELECTED FOR AN INTERVIEW WILL BE NOTIFIED.
