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Date: 9/15/2021
NORTHAMPTON – After the creation of the Department of Community Care was recommended by the Northampton Policing Review Commission (NPRC) and later approved as part of the fiscal year 2022 budget by the City Council, the city is currently accepting applications for an implementation director to head the creation of the new department.
Northampton Mayor David Narkewicz said the implementation director will essentially use the NPRC report as a blueprint to establish the Department of Community Care.
“One of the key job descriptions is to use the report of the Northampton Policing Review Commission to set up this department, so any sort of organizational experience, there is grant writing. We are looking for a diverse set of skills and somebody that can be the lead project manager in establishing this city department,” he said.
Because the department will work directly on providing civilian responses to mental health crises or substance use calls, Narkewicz said the implementation director should have experience with those models. To put the department together from the ground up, he added the implementation director will work with agencies, stakeholders, and an advisory board.
“One of their roles would be to network and build collaborations not only internally with various city agencies but also externally with local agencies as well as individual stakeholders in the community. The advisory board is the clearest mechanism for the latter. That specifically is one of the tasks that the implementation director will work with the advisory board,” he said.
The implementation director will work directly with Narkewicz’s office to help build the advisory board.
“There is a report with some broad recommendations with goals but in terms of the nuts and bolts of forming a city department – including how many staff members, their roles, their job descriptions and what kind of training they would need – all those things are what this implementation director would be working on,” he said.
To expand the application pool, Narkewicz said the city pushed the initial application date back.
“The original deadline for applications was Sept. 1, as of that deadline we had 13 applicants and we felt like we wanted to allow a little bit more time, especially during the transition from summer to fall, to see whether or not we could expand the total applicant pool, so we extended to Sept. 24,” he said.
Narkewicz said pushing back the deadline is a common occurrence for many of the current vacancies in city positions.
“That is not an uncommon occurrence; we find ourselves doing that a lot lately in recruitments for many types of positions in the city. I think that is a function of the economy we are in right now and because of COVID,” he said.
With the application deadline approaching, Narkewicz said he is already forming a screening committee to narrow down the decision to the top candidates.
“I am already forming a screening committee to assist me in making this selection and I have already put that together and we are just waiting for applications to close so they can begin the process of screening the applications, doing some initial interviews and then making recommendations to me on the most qualified candidates for the position, which is a standard process I use for all senior level staff,” he said.
He added the screening committee will be a mix of elected and appointed city staff along with community members with professional or lived experience.
Narkewicz also said the city applied for a state grant through the state to secure additional funding for the new department while it continues the search for the implementation director.
“We did submit an application to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, which had an opportunity for cities and towns looking at public safety initiatives, which fit squarely in with what we are doing here. We do not know the timeframe for the decision but that could provide additional financial resources,” he said.