Community Activity Specialist- Parks, Recreation, and Neighborhood Services

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About the Department

The City of San José’s Department of Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Services is proud to be “Building Community Through Fun” through innovative, creative, and excellent programs and services. Our mission is to build healthy communities through people, parks, and programs.

The Department is a steady force in our community, advancing education, health, and social connections. We meet the diverse needs of our community across the lifespan by connecting people to places and people to people. The principles of equity, access, diversity, inclusion, sustainability, and flexibility guide us. The Department creates and activates thriving places where people live, work, play, and learn, which include 48 community centers, 210 parks, Happy Hollow Park & Zoo, nearly 61 miles of trails, and programs and services that touch the lives of individuals and families in our community. We take a fun approach to public service, and value the public’s trust.

The BeautifySJ Program is a blight reduction, community and neighborhood beautification, and encampment management program within the Community Services Division of the Parks, Recreation, and Neighborhood Services Department. BeautifySJ Programs include, the Graffiti Removal Program, Illegal Dumping Program, Neighborhood Dumpster Day Program, Neighborhood Litter Program, Recreational Vehicle Pollution Prevention Program, Encampment Trash removal Program, Clean Gateways and Cash for Trash Program.

Position Duties

The Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Services Department is currently seeking to fill two temporary (Limit dated) full-time Community Activity Specialists vacancies in the BeautifySJ Program. The position is currently funded through June 30, 2026.

Applicants can also expect at times to work on activities and events and may include evening and weekend work. Those selected for the positions can expect to work in-person, 40 hours per week with a typical in-person schedule of Monday-Friday or Tuesday-Saturday.The duties of these positions will consist of:

• Posting encampment abatement notices at encampments
• Engaging with those who reside in homeless encampments to educate them on the “no return zone” and other encampment setbacks
• Working in and near homeless encampment locations
• Pilot and document best practices for a no-encampment zones
• Coordinate with city officials, other City Departments, law enforcement, and service providers to ensure a unified approach to clearing and managing encampments
• Coordinating resources and scheduling workload for efforts including but not limited to Secondary Employment Unit (SEU) requests and scheduling through SJPD outreach service requests to the Housing Department, etc.
• Process reports and data tracking through the Survey123 system
• Coordinating resources and scheduling workload for efforts including but not limited to Secondary Employment Unit (SEU), Parking Traffic Control Officers (PTCOs), Vehicle Blight requests and scheduling through SJPD outreach service requests to the Housing Department, Police Department, Parking Compliance, etc.
• Create a tracking and pilot a process to track referrals to other City Departments or partners;
• Process reports and data tracking through the AppOrder and Salesforce systems
• Coordinate with city officials, other City Departments, law enforcement, and stakeholders to ensure a unified approach to addressing the incidences of illegal dumping and graffiti;
  • Performing public contact and liaison work in explaining and interpreting program;
  • Preparing monthly reports and correspondence;

Other duties as assignedThese two (2) Community Activity Specialist will support one of the below programs with BeautifySJ.

Encampment Management
The Encampment Abatement teams with weekly abatement activities including noticing encampments, referrals to partner departments for outreach, providing education on encampment setback areas. The position daily engagement with those residing in homeless encampments.
Illegal Dumping/ Neighborhood Blight
Provides services and support for litter clean up, graffiti removal, illegal dumping removal, city-wide beautification, outreach and education, and neighborhood association engagement and support.

Community Activity Specialist (CAS) position will monitor illegal dumping and graffiti
activities throughout the City. CAS will review footage captured from the cameras to determine the correct next level of response (either the Police Department for graffiti or Planning, Building, Code Enforcement Department for illegal dumping or an inter jurisdictional partner such as Caltrans where applicable).

Vehicle Blight/RVP3
The intent of the Recreational Vehicle Pollution Prevention Program (RVP3) program is to improve the quality of life for our housed and unhoused residents in San Jose by removing bio-waste and other liquid discharge from recreational and other lived-in-vehicles. Metrics include pounds of bio-waste removed, number of vehicles serviced, safety/operational procedures, and highlights the team’s successful engagement strategies to sign-up new participants and to continually service ongoing participants. The RVP3 Pilot Program is staffed with two City staff (a Community Coordinator & Maintenance Worker II) and two HCI Environmental & Engineering Service vendor staff to service 42 different routes, communicate and perform bio-waste removal services. RVP3 completes three service days/week and performs two assessment days per week. RVP3 will be expanding to include additional routes as well as the coordination of removal of vehicles contributing to blight and safety issues.

Note: PRNS intends to use the candidate pool developed from this recruitment to fill current vacancies, as well as future vacancies that may occur in the coming months throughout the entire department.

Minimum Qualifications

Education: Graduation from high school or equivalent (General Education Development (GED) Test or California Proficiency Certificate)

Experience: Three (3) years of full-time equivalent work experience (6,240 hours) with diverse neighborhoods, residents experiencing homelessness, blight reduction programs, underserved communities, or neighborhood engagement and mobilization.

Acceptable Substitutions: Up to two (2) years of undergraduate course work from an accredited college or university (equivalent to at least 60 semester units or 90 quarter units) may be substituted for the required experience on a year-for-year basis.

Certifications: Must possess a valid California Driver’s License.

Other Qualifications

The ideal candidate will possess the following competencies, as demonstrated in past and current employment history.

Job Expertise: Demonstrates knowledge of and experience with applicable professional/technical principles and practices, Citywide and departmental procedures/policies and federal and state rules and regulations.
Communication Skills: Effectively conveys information and expresses thoughts and facts clearly, orally and in writing; demonstrates effective use of listening skills; displays openness to other people’s ideas and thoughts.
Computer Skills: Experienced with common business computer applications including but not limited to: MS Outlook, MS Word, MS PowerPoint, MS Access, and MS Excel.
Teamwork & Interpersonal Skills: Develops effective relationships with co-workers and supervisors by helping others accomplish tasks and using collaboration and conflict resolution skills.
Flexibility: Makes effective decisions and achieves desired results in the midst of major changes in responsibilities, work processes, timeframes, performance expectations, organizational culture, or work environment.
Problem Solving: Approaches a situation or problem by defining the problem or issue; determines the significance of problem; collects information; uses logic and intuition to arrive at decisions or solutions to problems that achieve the desired outcome.
Social Awareness: Demonstrates the ability to read or sense other people’s emotions and how they influence the situation of interest or concern; demonstrates empathy and organizational awareness.

Knowledge of:

• Techniques and strategies in working with vulnerable populations.
• Trauma informed principles.
• Local government principles.
• The basic principles and techniques of first aid, including cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).

Ability to:

• Identify and establish positive relationships with residents, organizations, and interjurisdictional partners.
• Coordinate programs and community events, attend neighborhood and community stakeholder group meetings, and effectively respond to resident and program participant inquiries and concerns.
• Ability to work and interact effectively with any of these populations: neighborhood group/associations, non-profit organizations, interjurisdictional partners such as City and County, people experiencing unsheltered homelessness and people with diverse backgrounds.

Selection Process:

The selection process will consist of an evaluation of the applicant's training and experience based on the application and responses to all the job specific questions. You must answer all questions to be considered or your application may be deemed incomplete and withheld from further consideration. Only those candidates whose backgrounds best match the position will be invited to proceed in the selection process.

Note: Submitting a resume along with your application is desirable for this position.

If you have questions about the duties of these positions, the selection or hiring processes, please contact Taylor Pawlik at Taylor.Pawlik@sanjoseca.gov.

Additional Information:

Employment Eligibility: Federal law requires all employees to provide verification of their eligibility to work in this country. Please be informed that the City of San Jose will NOT sponsor, represent or sign any documents related to visa applications/transfers for H1-B or any other type of visa which requires an employer application.

Please note that applications are currently not accepted through CalOpps or any other third party job board application system.

This recruitment may be used to fill multiple positions in this, or other divisions or departments. If you are interested in employment in this classification, you should apply to ensure you are considered for additional opportunities that may utilize the applicants from this recruitment.

Please allow adequate time to complete the application and submit before the deadline or the system may not save your application. If your online application was successfully submitted, you will receive an automatic confirmation email to the email address you provided. IF YOU DO NOT RECEIVE THE CONFIRMATION, please email CityCareers@sanjoseca.gov and we will research the status of your application.

The City of San Jose offers a wide range of core health benefits including Medical, Dental, Vision, Employee Assistance Program, Life Insurance, Disability, and Savings Plans. Please visit the City's benefits pagefor detailed information on coverage, cost, and dependent coverage.

For information on the City’s Retirement Plan(pension for full-time employees), please visit the Office of Retirement Services website. You will be able to view information based on different Sworn/Federated job classification.

In additional to the benefits above, there is an additional perks siteto explore further benefits of working for the City of San Jose like paid leave, educational reimbursements, and holiday pay are specific to the job classification and union membership.

Closing Date/Time: 10/15/2024 11:59 PM Pacific

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• City of San Jose

• 408-535-1285

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