Career Opportunity

Program Specialist - Dept of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (2913 TEX)

Recruitment: RTF0160840-01137839

Published: October 17, 2025

Apply using SmartRecruiters, the City and County of San Francisco's application portal.

About:

Appointment Type

This is a Temporary Exempt (TEX) position is  excluded by the Charter from the competitive civil service examination process and shall serve at the discretion of the Appointing Officer. The duration of the appointment shall not exceed 24 months.

Application Opening: October 17, 2025

Application Deadline: : May close at anytime but not before November 3, 2025

Compensation Range:  $101,998 - $123,968 annually

Recruitment ID: RTF0160840-01137839

Who We Are

Through the provision of coordinated, compassionate, and high‐quality services, the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH) strives to make homelessness in San Francisco rare, brief, and one-time. The Department provides assistance and support to homeless and at‐risk youth, adults and families to prevent imminent episodes of homelessness and end homelessness for people in San Francisco. Services including outreach, homelessness prevention, emergency shelter, drop‐in centers, transitional housing, supportive housing, short‐term rental subsidies, and support services to help people exit homelessness. For more information on the department, please visit our https://hsh.sfgov.org.

What we Do

San Francisco is a pioneer in homeless services and a leader in providing supportive housing as a permanent exit from homelessness. The Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH), founded in 2016, is a national leader in the movement to end homelessness by developing a coordinated, equity-driven, client-focused system of compassionate services while piloting innovative models, and implementing best practice solutions with measurable results.

HSH’s Homelessness Response System (HRS) funds, oversees and implements a system of care that shelters, houses, and serves approximately 15,000 people daily. Major programs include: street outreach and service connection through the Homeless Outreach Team (SFHOT); 3,600 +bed shelter system for transitional age youth, adults and families including shelters for members of the LGBTQ community; rapid rehousing rental subsidies for families, adults, older adults, and transitional aged youth; the Problem Solving and flexible financial assistance programs; and robust supportive housing programs with over 14,500 units which provide housing and services to formerly homeless transitional age youth, individuals, and families.

Role description

The Shelter Program Specialist works as part of a collaborative team to manage the continued development and oversight of San Francisco’s Shelter System, which provides temporary places for people experiencing homelessness to stay while accessing other services and seeking housing solutions. The Shelter System is comprised of non-profit operated programs for adults, families, and transitional age youth (TAY) across a range of congregate and non-congregate shelters, navigation centers, cabins, and resource centers.

Under general supervision, the Program Specialist performs a variety of specialized technical duties that may include investigating, reviewing, evaluating, training, screening, and coordinating the activities of various programs of the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing. Positions in this job code are responsible for carrying out specialized functions for an assigned program and performing specialized duties which require a comprehensive knowledge of Federal, State, Local and Departmental policies, procedures, rules, and regulations.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

• Serve as the shelter team’s subject matter expert on the Shelter Grievance Ordinance.
• Serve as the Shelter Grievance Arbitration Secretary, managing scheduling of shelter grievance arbitrations, logistics, and documentation, and overseeing recruitment, training, and support of arbitration panel members
• Support in design and deliver provider-facing training on shelter grievance processes, ADA compliance, and related topics; provide ongoing technical assistance to providers.
• Maintains various tracking systems including shelter matrix with critical information about shelter programs including site contacts and shelter rules as well as other PowerBI dashboards used by the shelter team.
• Support cross-team initiatives, maintain accurate documentation, and contribute to continuous improvement of shelter system operations.
• Supports in the development of shelter program policies and procedures.
• Provide technical assistance to management personnel and community advisory boards, councils or agencies to coordinate and implement program development.
• Helps support innovative initiatives and temporary shelter models aimed at preventing and ending the homelessness of the youth, family, and individuals.
• Supports compliance, quality assurance and continuous quality improvement processes of the Shelter System team.
• Other duties as assigned

How to qualify

Minimum Qualifications

• Education: None
• Experience: (3) Three years of experience in the Social Services field performing duties in the areas of eligibility determination, case management, data management, employment services or training.

License and Certification:

• Some positions require possession of, or ability to obtain, a valid California drivers license.

Desired Qualifications:

• Understanding of the San Francisco shelter delivery system; including family, adult, and TAY programs.
• 1+ years of public or non-profit experience involving complex analysis of housing, health, social programs and/or public policy.
• Experience working with a diverse workforce of people with different cultures, backgrounds and perspectives.
• Knowledge of homeless services program policies and operations.
• Excellent organizational skills.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills

Verification:

Applicants may be required to submit verification of qualifying education and experience at any point during the recruitment and selection process. If education verification is required, information on how to verify education requirements, including verifying foreign education credits or degree equivalency, can be found at https://sfdhr.org/how-verify-education-requirements. 

Note: Falsifying one’s education, training, or work experience or attempted deception on the application may result in disqualification for this and future job opportunities with the City and County of San Francisco.

All work experience, education, training and other information substantiating how you meet the minimum qualifications must be included on your application by the filing deadline. Information submitted after the filing deadline will not be considered in determining whether you meet the minimum qualifications.

Resumes will not be accepted in lieu of a completed City and County of San Francisco application.

Applications completed improperly may be cause for ineligibility or disqualification.

Selection Procedures:
The selection process will include evaluation of applications in relation to minimum requirements. Applicants meeting the minimum qualifications are not guaranteed advancement to the interview. Depending on the number of applicants, the Department may establish and implement additional screening mechanisms to comparatively evaluate the qualifications of candidates. If this becomes necessary, only those applicants whose qualifications most closely meet the needs of the Department will be invited to participate in the oral/performance interview
The selection process will include evaluation of applications in relation to minimum requirements. Applicants meeting the minimum qualifications are not guaranteed advancement to the interview. Depending on the number of applicants, the Department may establish and implement additional screening mechanisms to comparatively evaluate the qualifications of candidates. If this becomes necessary, only those applicants whose qualifications most closely meet the needs of the Department will be invited to participate in the oral/performance interview.

Tuberculosis Screening: Prior to appointment, applicants may be required to take a tuberculosis (TB) screening test

What else should I know?

What else should I know?

Additional Information Regarding Employment with the City and County of San Francisco: 

• Information About the Hiring Process
• Conviction History
• Employee Benefits Overview  
• Equal Employment Opportunity 
• Disaster Service Worker
• ADA Accommodation
• Right to Work
• Copies of Application Documents
• Diversity Statement

How To Apply

Applications for City and County of San Francisco jobs are only accepted through an online process. Visit https://careers.sf.gov/ and begin the application process.

• Select the “I’m Interested” button and follow instructions on the screen.

Applicants may be contacted by email about this recruitment and, therefore, it is their responsibility to ensure that their registered email address is accurate and kept up-to-date. Also, applicants must ensure that email from CCSF is not blocked on their computer by a spam filter. To prevent blocking, applicants should set up their email to accept CCSF mail from the following addresses (@sfgov.org, @sfdpw.org, @sfport.com, @flysfo.com, @sfwater.org, @sfdph.org, @asianart.org, @sfmta.com, @sfpl.org, @dcyf.org, @first5sf.org, @famsf.org, @ccsf.edu, @smartalerts.info, and @smartrecruiters.com

Applicants will receive a confirmation email from notification@careers.sf.gov that their online application has been received in response to every announcement for which they file. Applicants should retain this confirmation email for their records. Failure to receive this email means that the online application was not submitted or received.

Analyst Information: If you have any questions regarding this recruitment or application process, please contact the analyst Latasha Collins at latasha.collins@sfgov.org.

The City and County of San Francisco encourage women, minorities and persons with disabilities to apply. Applicants will be considered regardless of their sex, race, age, religion, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition (associated with cancer, a history of cancer, or genetic characteristics), HIV/AIDS status, genetic information, marital status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, military and veteran status, or other protected category under the law.

The City and County of San Francisco encourages women, minorities and persons with disabilities to apply. Applicants will be considered regardless of their sex, race, age, religion, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition (associated with cancer, a history of cancer, or genetic characteristics), HIV/AIDS status, genetic information, marital status, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, military and veteran status, or other protected category under the law.