Café Support Specialist

Recovery Café Description:

Our Mission: Recovery Café is a community of individuals who have been traumatized by

homelessness, addiction and other mental health challenges coming to know they we are loved

with and that we have gifts to share. Recovery Café was founded on the understanding that every human being is precious and beloved regardless of past trauma, mental and emotional anguish, addictive behaviors or mistakes made. We provide a beautiful, safe, warm, drug and alcohol free space and loving community to anchor Members (our most closely-supported participants) in the sustained recovery needed to gain and maintain access to housing, social and health services, healthy relationships, education and employment. The Café Support Specialist has a deep understanding of the Cafés mission and works to nurture and maintain our principles: Connect with Divine Love in ourselves and others, Show respect, Cultivate compassion, Practice Forgiveness, Encourage growth, and Give back.

Job Summary: The Recovery Café is a community in which people traumatized by homelessness, addiction, and mental health challenges can come to know themselves as loved and as instruments of love in the lives of others. The Café Support Specialist has a deep understanding of the Café’s vision and works to nurture and maintain our principles to show respect, give and forgive, live prayerfully, practice compassion, and encourage growth.

The Café Support Specialist will serve as a support to Recovery Café services offered in a milieu of radical hospitality at our South Lake Union and SODO sites. This is an on-call position to provide periodic staffing coverage when necessary.

The Café Support Specialist is responsible for assisting with Café operations and supporting Members and community volunteers during the hours when he/she is on duty.

Days and hours of duty: The South Lake Union Café is currently open Tuesdays through Saturday noon-6:30 p.m. The SODO Café is currently open Monday through Friday from 9:00am to 3:30pmthe schedule of work will vary according to staffing needs. Whenever possible the Café Support Specialist will be given advance notice of their shift assignment, but notice may be as short as 24-hours. This position is not a regularly scheduled role.

Job Responsibilities:

• Ensure daily preparation and set-up of meals and coffee.
• Supervise kitchen operations to include: food and coffee preparation, dish washing, clean-up.
• Ensure the Café remains clean and beautiful: clean-up of the meal service counters and tables, trash/recycling removal, vacuuming, bathroom stocking and maintenance, sweeping front sidewalk.
• Communicating and supporting Café guidelines and boundaries with loving accountability.
• Assist with administrative support when necessary.
• Attend Café staff trainings when requested.
• Attend Café staff meetings when requested.
• Facilitate Recovery Circles when necessary.
• Assist with food or donation pick ups at offsite locations.

Required Qualifications for this position:

• Strong desire to support people in their recovery from substance misuse disorders and/or other mental health challenges.
• Capacity to be loving and provide firm boundaries with Café Members.
• A willingness to work collaboratively with a creative team to develop and implement support services that are grounded in basic Café principles.
• A demonstrated comfort level working with people and situations that can sometimes feel frustrating, unclear, and seemingly hopeless.
• Flexibility, creativity, enthusiasm, organization, and administrative gifts.
• A strong interest in gaining experience working with an ethnically and socio-economically diverse population.
• Ability to lift up to 50lbs as well as to stand/move on your feet for extended periods of time.
• Education: There is not an educational requirement for this role, and we welcome people with diverse work or educational experiences with a preference for human services to apply.
• Prefer someone with personal experience in recovery, but this is not required.
• Prefer someone with a driver's license and an excellent driving record.

Spanish and English speaker preferred.