About the DTES SRO Collaborative (SRO-C)
The SRO-C is a non-profit organization that works to improve habitability, affordability, health and sense of belonging for 4,000 tenants living in Vancouver’s privately-owned Single Room Occupancy hotels (SROs). Established in 2015, the SRO-C has grown to operate multiple tenant-based initiatives in fifty hotels around food, harm reduction, maintenance, culture and tenant committees. These initiatives are supported by 15 staff members, over 100 peer workers, plus dozens of funders and community partners. Our goal is to create a large, long-term network of tenants who can grow to support each other, address collective needs, put down roots, and feel part of the wider community. Through this network, tenants can be part of efforts to redevelop their SRO housing into decent, affordable self-contained housing.
About the Tenant Overdose Response Organizer (TORO) Program
The TORO Program is a volunteer/honorarium-based initiative that SRO-C operates in forty to fifty SROs as a complement to the existing overdose prevention services in the city. Its intention is to tap into established networks among tenants to provide peer-based support, Indigenous cultural supports and naloxone training in the places drug users live in order to increase information, safety and comfort for those most directly affected by overdoses. The TORO program hires and trains peers who offer a variety of services in their buildings, including referrals to safe supply, cultural services, treatment, and other resources, tips on safer drug use, naloxone training and kit dispensation, and harm reduction supply distribution.
About the Assistant Director of Harm Reduction Programs (ADHR)
The ADHR is a key management leader of the Downtown Eastside SRO-C and leads TORO in a manner that supports and guides the organization’s mission as defined by the Executive Director and Director of Harm Reduction. This job will include grant writing, financial oversight, facility management, basic human resource management, conflict resolution duties and establishing and maintaining relationships with various organizations, utilizing those relationships to strategically enhance TORO’s mission.
This new manager will supervise four staff who support forty TORO volunteers who receive honorariums for working in their hotels and in our warehouse. This management position will be very challenging and we are looking for the right person to fill this role. There were 165 deaths from overdoses in the month of March 2022 in BC, many of these in the Downtown Eastside hotels. Staff and TOROs try their best to focus on their jobs but they can get very stressed by the:
- Relentless burden that failed drug policy is having on the community and deaths.
- Vast unmet needs for housing, healthcare and various other types of support among the tenants.
- Dynamics of systemic oppression around identity and power imbalances among peers and staff in the SRO-C.
- The many moving parts and coordination required to make this program work.
We are looking for an Assistant Director who can work in this challenging environment, be extremely patient and provide practical, emotional and human resources support to the team. This person will have management experience where they had to use non-violent communication, conflict resolution and coaching skills while effectively and compassionately setting and maintaining expectations and accountability with their team.
Requirements
- Bachelor’s level degree in healthcare, health services administration or a related field.
- Lived or living experience as a person who uses substances, an asset.
- Extensive personal understanding of the experience of people who use or have used drugs (i.e. structuralized violence, stigmatization, discrimination, criminalization, and harms of prohibitionist policy).
- Grant writing experience.
- High level strategic thinking and planning and uniting people around the organization’s mission and mandate.
- Previous success in establishing relationships with individuals and organizations of influence including funders, partner agencies and volunteers.
- Solid organizational abilities, including planning, delegating, program development and task facilitation.
- Strong written and oral communication skills.
- Strong work ethic with a high degree of energy.
- A high degree of understanding of intersectionality and cultural familiarity and sensitivity.
Compensation and Contract details
- 40 hours a week at $31.50/hour
- Extended health benefits
- Internet and cell phone allowance
- 4 weeks paid vacation in the first year of work and 6 weeks paid vacation thereafter
- 3-6 month review period
To Apply
Please send a resume and one-page cover letter outlining why you would be a good fit for this job to [email protected].
Deadline for application: Until position is filled
We thank all prospective applicants for their time; however, only those selected for an interview will be contacted. BIPOC and/or LGBT2SIQ+ applicants are strongly encouraged to apply.
Learn more about the community and work of SRO-C.