Contra Costa Health Services (CCHS) is requesting to add one Public Health Program Specialist II position within the Public Health Division. CCHS operates the State mandated Vital Registration Office (VR). The main function of VR office is to register all births and deaths that occur within Contra Costa County. The office receives most of their revenue from birth and death certificates, generating about $1.8M/year with a program cost of $600,000, leaving an annual net income of about $1.2M. The office is operated by County staff and is self-funded. Adding the Public Health Program Specialist II position would be at no cost to the General Fund. This position will responsible for hiring, training, directing, and supervising subordinate staff.  
  

CCHS receives funding to provide refugee health screenings and to establish care for all qualified refugees, asylees, parolees, and victims of trafficking who settle in the County. Currently, these individuals and families are mostly Dari, Farsi or Pashto speaking Afghan refugees who require medical interpretation for their clinic and hospital visits and other support services provided by CCHS. Recently, the number of refugees has risen from about 50 - 80 per year to more than 100 per month resulting in a greater need for interpretation services for this population. Nationally, the number of refugees has also increased with a growing need for these languages on the Health Care Interpreter Network (HCIN) and their contracted language provider, Language Line Services (LLS). The Public Health Division is requesting to add one Medical Interpreter that will provide interpretation services to Afghan refugees.   

The California Department of Public Health (CDPH) awarded CCHS $1,910,858 on August 31, 2021, to support the public health workforce development. Funding supports positions to establish, expand, train, and sustain the public health workforce to better respond to Covid-19 and other public health crisis in the future. The Buyer II position will be embedded into the Public Health department to strengthen the infrastructure and to establish a more responsive and scalable department. It will help develop a division wide purchasing structure needed to better respond to future Public Health emergencies. The position will help meet the CCHS prepared budget and work plan that was approved by CDPH in October 2021. In order to meet the deliverables of the funding, the department is requesting to add one Buyer II position.