Human Services Administrative Aide
Dept/Div:Human Services/General/Global Human ServicesFLSA Status:Non-Exempt
General Definition of Work
Provide social work support and assist in program development in the Children's Services Unit. Assist the Children's Services Supervisor in various administrative and technical duties within the unit, manages out-of-home placement documentation and process compliance, and ensures quality of work produced by the unit. Completes independent projects with minimal supervision and direction; multitasks, identifies and prioritizes critical, urgent, and important tasks while establishing and maintaining effective working relationships with clients, public, co-workers, and agency administration. Interprets federal and state statutes, guidelines, and bulletins, communicates policy changes to department, identifies and implements department process and policy changes to improve efficiency of workflow for the unit and department.Work is performed under the general supervisor of the Child Service Supervisor.
Qualification Requirements
To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential function satisfactorily.The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill and/or ability required.Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable an individual with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
Essential Functions
Intake

• Serve as intake worker for child protection reports and voluntary service requests; be able to multi-task between other duties and covering intake.
• Available during business hours to respond immediately to initial complaints of clients and reporters; using motivational interviewing of reporters to obtain and verify necessary factual information related to the report or service request.
• Ask open-ended, educated questions to determine clients' needs and refers clients to appropriate resources.
• Use independent judgment to simultaneously identify, differentiate, expedite, and communicate reports alleging imminent danger and refer clients in mental health crisis to the appropriate contacts to ensure an immediate response for client safety.
• Explain and answer questions about social service, income maintenance, and other community programs, services, and application processes to individuals or groups.
• Assist clients in completing program forms, processing applications and making referrals for services within the agency as well as for area providers.
• Conduct thorough research to gather client data to identify necessary information related to client intakes, using a variety of secure, governmental, and confidential software such as court records (MGA), private person records (Lexis Nexis), income maintenance programs {MAXIS, MMIS), and Social Service Information System (SSIS).
• Participate as a member of the Child Protection Screening Team, documenting team decisions and tracking intake demographics and actions.
• Conduct brief services as assigned or needed to connect Le Sueur County residents that may not qualify for other programs, to necessary resources.
• Provide after-hours response for emergency social services as needed.

Case Management Support

• Assist child protection and children's mental health case managers with case documentation, coordination of service needs, and completion of client program referrals.
• Assist licensor with case support, including SSIS data entry and technical support as well as updating of internal and external agency forms and templates to ensure compliance with regulatory foster care and daycare licensing statutes.
• Assist social workers and other agency staff with client requests such as coordinating supervised visits and transportation through local providers or provide supervision and transportation directly, if local providers are not available.
• Assist social workers and other agency staff with completion of client referrals to providers for service needs identified in their case plan, including but not limited to: parental capacity evaluations, chemical dependency assessments, therapy, respite care, residential
• treatment, MNChoices assessments, mental health and diagnostic assessment, healthcare.
• Assist case managers in entering data into SSIS as required, such as case plans, placements, Children's Mental Health (CMH) assessments, Targeted Case Management (TCM) claiming, client information, Title IV-E referrals, court actions, adoption and kinship workflows.
• Prepare and submit required agency communications to clients as well as federal, state, county, and tribal agencies to comply with legal requirements of federal and state statutes, including but not limited to relative searches, Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) notices,
  Minnesota Indian Family Preservation Act (MIFPA) notices, Title IV-E application instructions, Minnesota Youth in Transition Database (MNYTD) surveys, Youth Intervention Program (YIPA) reports, etc.

Legal Document and Court Preparation

• Assist case managers with dictating, filing, and redacting case findings and correspondence and assisting with preparation of documents for court hearings as part of the continuous discovery process to provide required case information and documents to parties involved in Child in need of Protection and/or Services (CHIPS) court cases.
• Work closely with case managers and county attorneys to prepare witness lists, exhibits lists, and exhibits for discovery prior to court trials.
• Track upcoming court hearings, and schedule reminders of hearings and documentation/discovery deadlines for case workers and county attorneys.
• Review case notes and court orders for Title IV-E compliance, provide updates to income maintenance workers and fiscal supervisor through SSIS and MAXIS, and use Title IV-E knowledge to suggest required corrections regarding judicial findings to county attorney's office to maximize county federal reimbursement for foster care payments.

Slight Service Case Management

• Maintain and manage a caseload for Children's Mental Health slight services upon receipt of a completed Children's Mental Health Assessment and under the direction of the prior case worker and supervisor to facilitate access to funding for respite services that would
  otherwise be administered under CMH Case Management with a social worker.
• Verify ongoing client eligibility for programs, communicate with families regarding service needs, complete required documentation, and process claims for funding provided.
• Consult with supervisor and team as needed regarding progress of cases and services.

Financial/ Accounts Payable/Receivable

• Assist the Human Services Director, Children's Services Supervisor and Fiscal Supervisor in the preparation, processing, review, and correction of financial, invoice, budgetary, and reimbursement information.
• Assist case workers in processing purchase of service contracts.
• Review, code, and process agency payment vouchers, bills, requisitions and receipts.
• Compute and correct contract of service rates, units, and amounts, and communicate changes to workers and providers.
• Identify system errors or missing data entries that impact payment and communicate with case workers, licensor, and fiscal supervisor regarding needed updates to ensure correct payments.
• Serve as a liaison between workers and providers to ensure greater accuracy and promptness in the transference of reimbursement and payment information.
• Monitor and report portions of the budget to keep unit staff and supervisor apprised of fiscal year budget spending and compiles various statistical and financial reports for review by supervisor, director, and county commissioners.
• Assist in writing state and federal grant applications for agency funding, Review, audit, and report case entries for Child Welfare and Mental Health Targeted Case Management (TCM) and Federal Title IV-E foster care claiming to ensure all eligible claims are reimbursed to the agency, also collects and enters missing or incorrect client information in SSIS to improve and maximize reimbursement.

SSIS Coordinator

• Serve as a subject matter expert regarding Minnesota Department of Human Services (MN DHS) policies and SSIS functions for the agency, answering and researching worker questions and issues.
• Identify need to elevate issues and questions to appropriate MN DHS contacts.
• Attend MN DHS meetings and review bulletins and other communication regarding system and policy changes to identify potential impact
• or modifications necessary for agency policies and procedures.
• Implement agency policy changes to comply with updates to statutes as needed.
• Develop and facilitate training for supervisors and staff about new MN DHS program requirements and resulting software changes.
• Monitor and coordinate agency staff training enrollment through MN DHS site (TrainLink).
• Provide introductory training for new staff and program area specific training to new and ongoing staff for use of SSIS.

Policy and Process Improvement

• Be familiar with and interpret applicable statues and guidelines and use this knowledge to create and maintain agency policies, procedures, and forms.
• Prepare initial reports to communicate current practices, communicate findings, and develop written agency policies, as appropriate.
• Recommend, plan, implement, and evaluate a broad range of best practices, quality improvement and assurance projects.
• Provide training and support to workers on new and updated agency policies and procedures to ensure agency compliance with federal and state statutes.
• Continue to develop a working understanding of the human services area standards and activities on a state and national level through research and training opportunities as available.
• Prepare written, data, and analytical reports to depict trends and, as appropriate; effectively facilitate meetings with management and staff on the analysis of performance including identification of challenges, achievement of or compliance with established guidelines or
  standards, development of improvement strategies and results achieved from implementation of performance improvement strategies.
• Assist supervisor in the communication of internal deadlines and monitor staff compliance for completion of required documentation by identified due date.
• Interpret state and federal policies and regulations to ensure unit compliance with these guidelines, specifically Title IV-E, MN Statute 256B.0625: Subd. 20. and Subd. 33.
• Provide other employees with information, assistance and services. Issues are often complicated and varied. Final answers often require considerable research.

Quality Assurance and Audit Site Leader

• Facilitate federal, state and internal compliance reviews, monitor federal and state performance measures for the agency, and communicate areas of improvement identified.
• Provide quality assurance review data to program managers, supervisors, and social workers to analyze performance, recommend planned targets and monitor progress in accomplishing goals.
• Review client records to assess and ensure compliance with internal policies, procedures and standards of care or service.
• Review case records and SSIS for completion of required agency forms and data input and identifies missing data and Minnesota's Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) errors in cases through review of file and consultation with assigned case workers to maximize state reimbursement of federal funding for foster care.

Salvation Army Committee Member

• Connect with community resources and serve as a representative for the agency on community resource committees. Attend regular meetings and disseminate information to department staff as needed.
• Collaborate on and coordinate referrals from agency and outside providers, organize and coordinate event planning details, and determine eligibility of applicants for various events such as summer camp, food baskets, school supplies, coat drive, law enforcement community event, and other projects.

Other duties as assigned by Supervisor

• Administer drug screens (UAs), monitor drug test supplies, ensure collected samples are mailed.
• Attend, participate, and serve as a scribe at meetings, including Child Protection team consultation, Children's Mental Health team consultation, Interdisciplinary care-planning meetings, Out-of-Home Placement Team Meeting, and unit staff meetings.
• Participate in the recruitment, interviewing, and selection of unit staff.
• Participate in training as agreed upon by worker and supervisor.
• Maintain a high level of expertise and professionalism.
• Maintain confidentiality and privacy of clients and their sensitive and protected information.
• Daily oversite of the EDMS storage system and Captiva indexing system.Ensure documents run through the systems, trouble shoot issues, keep up-to-date on changes and attend training.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities
Thorough knowledge of Minnesota Child Maltreatment Screening Guidelines, Le Sueur County Child Services Unit policies, Indian Child Welfare Act, Minnesota Local Collaborative Time Study Operations and Activity Codes, and Title IV-E of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. §§ 671-679b).General knowledge of Minnesota Department of Human Services Bulletins, Minnesota Administrative Rules, CHAPTER 9560, SOCIAL SERVICES FOR CHILDREN.Some knowledge in Interstate Compact for Adoption and Medical Assistance.Comprehensive skills in the Le Sueur County Human Services Intake Policies and Procedures, Minnesota Social Service Information System Updates and Technical Help Texts and Minnesota Department of Human Services Performance Management System Measures, Thresholds, and Reporting Schedule.
Thorough Minnesota Child and Family Services Reviews: On-Site Review Instrument, Minnesota Department of Human Services: Random Moment Time Studies Online Portal System, Federal Title IV-E Foster Care Eligibility Review and Social Service Information System Intake, Person and Case Reports.General knowledge of Minnesota Department of Human Services Child Welfare Data Dashboard.Comprehensive skill in Month End Financial Reports for County Board approval, ICWA/MIFPA case review tool and Invoices/Claims.
Thorough knowledge of Minnesota Child Maltreatment Screening Guidelines, Le Sueur County Child Services Unit policies, Indian Child Welfare Act, Minnesota Local Collaborative Time Study Operations and Activity Codes, and Title IV-E of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. §§ 671-679b).General knowledge of Minnesota Department of Human Services Bulletins, Minnesota Administrative Rules, CHAPTER 9560, SOCIAL SERVICES FOR CHILDREN.Some knowledge in Interstate Compact for Adoption and Medical Assistance.
Comprehensive skill in Standard Office (computer, dual monitors, keyboard with 10-key, and mouse), Printer/Copier/Scanner, Fax machine, Desktop Scanner and Envelope Printer, two-way radio and wireless connected overhead screen projector.Thorough skill with the IP Phone with headset.
Ability to make arithmetic computations using whole numbers, fractions and decimals. Ability to compute rates, ratios and percentages. Ability to use and create formulas to calculate spreadsheets. Ability to create and use graphs, charts, and pivot tables to consolidate and present data in a spreadsheet. Expresses information to individuals or groups effectively, considering the audience and nature of the information. Listens to others and responds appropriately. Ability to accurately and rapidly process detailed information and facts, and to remain objective when making decisions. Excels in creative thinking and problem solving. Advanced proficiency in using computer skills and programs to plan, develop, analyze and evaluate data to provide consultation, develop initiatives and prepare reports. Demonstrates responsible behavior and attention to details.Ability to communicate effectively, both orally and in writing.Respects confidential information including worker performance. Knowledge of interviewing techniques and skills in conducting interviews. Ability to establish and maintain accurate and systematic records.
Education and Experience
Associate degree and moderate experience in administrative/clerical or accounting, at least two years of experience working with children in the Human Services field required, quality assurance or writing or implementing policy preferred or equivalent combination of education and experience.
Physical Requirements
This work requires the occasional exertion of up to 50 pounds of force, frequent exertion of up to 10 pounds of force; work regularly requires sitting, speaking or hearing, using hands to finger, handle or feel and repetitive motions and occasionally requires standing, walking, climbing or balancing, stooping, kneeling, crouching or crawling, reaching with hands and arms, pushing or pulling and lifting; work has standard vision requirements, close and distance vision, ability to adjust focus, depth perception and peripheral vision; vocal communication is required for expressing or exchanging ideas by means of the spoken word; hearing is required to perceive information at normal spoken word levels; work requires preparing and analyzing written or computer data, visual inspection involving small defects and/or small parts, operating machines, operating motor vehicles or equipment and observing general surroundings and activities; work occasionally requires exposure to outdoor weather conditions; work is generally in a moderately noisy location (e.g. business office, light traffic).
Special Requirements
Valid driver's license in the State of Minnesota.CPR/AED certification for adults and children.Familiar with the Social Service Information System.
Other Requirements
The incumbent may encounter not public data in the course of these duties. Any access to not public data should be strictly limited to accessing the data that are necessary to fulfill the employment responsibility. While data are being accessed, incumbent should take reasonable measures to ensure the not public data are not accessed by individuals without a work reason. Once the work reason to access the data is reasonably finished, incumbent must properly store the not public data according to the provisions Ch. 13. If a new work assignment requires access to not public data, the incumbent is permitted to access not public data for the work assignment purposes only. Any access to not public data must be strictly limited to the data necessary to complete the work assignment and after the assignment is completed, the employee's work assignment no longer requires access.
Minimum Qualifications

1. Associate degree and moderate experience in administrative/clerical or accounting, at least two years of experience working with children in the Human Services field required, quality assurance or writing or implementing policy preferred or equivalent combination of education and experience.
2. Valid Driver's License in the State of MN

Salary/Benefits : Starting wage is $25.52 per hour plus health insurance, life insurance, retirement plan, vacation/sick/holiday pay and many other voluntary benefits.
Contact information:
Sarah Pint
Le Sueur County Human Resources
88 S. Park Avenue, Le Center, MN56057
Telephone: 507-357-8579 -Fax: 507-357-8607
Email: hr@co.le-sueur.mn.us
Deadline: Job open until filled. Reviewing applications June 28, 2024.
Equal Opportunity Employer