Sanders County is Seeking to Hire a Public Health Director

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Published November 16, 2023

Position Details

Position Title: Public Health Director
County: Sanders
Department: Public Health
Salary or Pay Rate: $34.00/hour
Work Week: 40 Hours Per Week (Full Time) with Full Employee Benefits
Closing Date: Open until filled. First review of applications: 12/5/2023

Position Description

Summary

Sanders County is seeking to hire a Public Health Director. The Public Health Director provides comprehensive nursing services in preventive health, home health, and clinic programs through assessment, teaching, counseling, and prevention services to individuals, families, and groups to promote health and wellness to clients. This includes administering public health programs, maintaining patient and program activity records, preparing required reports, and obtaining adequate public health funding.

Duties

• Identify health needs in the community to create and facilitate programs to promote health and welfare. Assess community health strengths, needs, and expectations to adopt a plan to utilize available medical resources and standards of nursing practices to serve families and individuals through health promotion and to serve those who are at risk of illness, injury, disability, or death.
• Provide nursing services to individuals to prevent illness, disability, or premature death. Perform physical assessments, obtaining blood pressure, temperature, measurements, etc. Retrieve information on health histories, diet histories, and family health histories. Read and interpret lab reports, administer tests, and perform a variety of related procedures.
• Investigate and monitor reports of communicable diseases such as measles, hepatitis, sexually transmitted diseases, and tuberculosis. Coordinate efforts with physicians, school personnel, and others regarding the treatment and prevention of diseases.
• Provide health education, health promotion, health assessment, and disease prevention activities in the community to increase community awareness of the value of public health in the County. This includes representing the Department at various community activities.
• Implement strategies to obtain sustainable public health funding for the delivery of quality services and programs that meet the needs of the community members. Identify funding sources; apply for grants; stay current about funding at the local, state, and national level; promote long-term funding planning; and identify opportunities to expand billable services.
• Ensure that any programs administered by the Health Department operate in compliance with state and Federal standards, policies, guidelines, and/or grant provisions. This includes monitoring and tracking demographic data on participants, compiling reports, and administering necessary budgets.
• Ensure that clinical documentation regarding clients is secure, confidential, and maintained in compliance with Health Department policy and state and federal regulation.
• Review the strategic plans of the County on a yearly basis to ensure they meet community health needs and that services are coordinated to maximize the effective use of resources and personnel.
• Provides direct nursing care to Maternal Child Health Makes referrals to local health care providers, agencies and human services organizations; provides immunizations to children and adults using standing orders in the clinical setting.
• Functions as the Competent Professional Authority for the WIC program. Provides nutritional instruction to participants, parents and other care providers in compliance with state WIC program policies. Documents all visits and instruction provided to participants, parents or care providers.  Provides clinical consultation to WIC aide to assure quality of care and improved patient outcomes.
• Completes WIC certification visits, explaining nutritional risk codes, and develops a nutritional goal for WIC participants.
• Coordinates the local Fetal Infant, Child Maternal, Child Mortality Review (FICMR) process, facilitates team meetings, maintains team membership, translates review findings into prevention initiatives at the community level, and completes the state tool for data gathering purposes.
• Provides population-based education on a variety of topics in many settings, including schools.
• Acts as a patient advocate in the community and with other health care providers. Uses motivational counseling techniques to demonstrate positive, supportive and caring behaviors in communications with patients, families, and other health care providers and agency personnel
• Responsible for all facets of public health preparedness planning for the local jurisdiction, including the SNS plan, the Pandemic Influenza Plan, working with the LEPC, OEM and state agency personnel on preparedness issues, developing or participating in exercises.
• Responsible for all aspects of communicable disease follow-up including surveillance, epidemiology, case investigation, and prevention. Reports cases to the Department of Public Health and Human Services Communicable Disease Section in concurrence with Montana state Legal authority described in statutes and rules.
• Oversees all aspects of the delivery of services to the community and ongoing efforts to improve those services, develops specific objectives for continual quality improvement of performance, using information from quality measurement and satisfaction surveys to establish objectives and strategies.
• Interprets administrative policies, programs and standards for staff and the community.
• Initiates relationships, clarifies public health nursing programs and develops relationships with state organizations and agencies.
• Monitors all aspects of the public health programs to ensure compliance with contracts, efficient procedures and appropriate documentation.
• Functions as the WIC Director and liaison for the MCH, Tobacco Prevention, Public Health Preparedness and Immunization contracts. Develops or oversees the development of the annual plan for the programs which outlines project priorities, activities, implementation and evaluating criteria.
• Assesses public health needs and trends, current service delivery models, programs strategies, and implements changes to meet the needs of target populations using local, state and national data sources.
• Collaborates with the program assistant to develop the WIC budget, tobacco prevention specialist to develop the tobacco program budget and develops the budget for the entire department and other contracts.
• Completes the annual plan (including budget) which outlines goals, activities, implementation and evaluation for the Maternal/Child Health, Immunization, and Preparedness grants.
• Completes all public health program budgets, monitors expenditures and completes all monthly, quarterly and annual expenditure reports to be submitted to contractors or grantees.
• Manages, directs and supervises the entire operation of the Public Health Department.
• Instructs staff in proper procedures of their respective jobs and inspects work in progress and makes suggestions or issues directives for improvement.
• Responsible for all aspects of personnel management for the department including advertising open position, interviewing potential candidates, hiring, conducting periodic evaluations of performance and disciplinary actions as appropriate. Assesses training needs of staff, offers training opportunities as appropriate for staff job duties and accountabilities.
• Approves staff vacations and leaves, schedules staff to various job duties as indicated by staff skills and job tasks.
• Interacts frequently with other organizations, agencies and health care providers in the local jurisdiction, State Agencies, Federal agencies, Local Governmental Agencies, Private Businesses and the general public to promote the mission of the Sanders County Health Department.
• Attends community meetings as appropriate for position, to promote the missions of the department and to clarify health department role and responsibilities.
• Prepares and conducts community awareness campaigns using the following strategies:
  • Radio Programs;
  • Newspaper articles;
  • Class instruction;
  • Civic groups;
  • local Chamber of Commerce groups;
  • Support groups;
  • volunteer agencies;
  • Local Emergency Planning Committee;
  • County Commissioners, Mayors, City Councils, Board of Health;
  • Businesses;
  • Local hospital and health care providers;
  • Local state senator and representatives;
  • Attends meetings as needed;
  • Attends all Board of Health meetings as the Public Health Director.
• Coordinates the performance of duties of Health Department staff to ensure compliance with safety and security standards.
• Implements safety program to enhance staff awareness of potential hazards in the Health Department.
• Ensures that the Health Department staff utilizes personal protective equipment while completing tasks that may be hazardous. Must be cognizant of safety hazards pertaining to Health Department Office and work to remedy identified safety hazards.
• Schedules and performs safety training sessions on a regular basis for Health Department staff.
• Participates in informative training sessions for other courthouse and county personnel. Must be a participant in the Sanders County Safety Committee.
• The Public Health Director assures the vision, mission and values of Sanders County Health Department are understood throughout the department and by the residents it serves.
• The Public Health Director acts as the principle organizational leader, through performance of strategic, operational and communications functions and maintains accountability to the Board of Health for these functions.
• Develops a collaborative relationship with the department staff, a strategic plan for the department, which includes a strategic vision and specific annual objectives for achieving goals.
• Through leadership and direction, the Public Health Director establishes an organizational climate of openness and trust and an organization culture of continual improvement, learning and teamwork.

Required Education & Experience

• Associates or Bachelor’s Degree in Nursing required.
• Valid Registered Nurse license to practice in the state of Montana.
• Current CPR Certification recommended.
• Two years of experience in Public Health and one year supervisory experience preferred.

Additional Eligibility Qualifications

Must possess or obtain a Montana driver license within thirty (30) days of employment. You will utilize a county vehicle and may be subject to a motor vehicle driving history review.

Applicant Pool Statement

If another department vacancy occurs in this job title within six months, the same applicant pool may be used for the selection.

Application Instructions

Applications and a complete job description are available at the Human Resources office, 1111 Main Street, Thompson Falls, MT, or by sending an email to Rich Wallace at rwallace@co.sanders.mt.us.

You may submit your application online through Thompson Falls Job Services at montanaworks.gov or by calling (406) 382-3045.