Displacement Prevention Navigator; Independent Contractor; Non

Displacement Prevention Navigator

For over 35 years, El Buen Samaritano (El Buen) has been a trusted community resource for families in Central Texas. Serving more than 30,000 individuals annually through culturally relevant food access, health literacy, education, and economic mobility programming, El Buen is a welcoming space where families grow into their own power and unleash their potential.

Austin Housing (City of Austin) creates and preserves housing opportunities to stabilize communities. Austin Housing has partnered with El Buen Samaritano to implement the Displacement Prevention Navigator Program and manage recruitment, training, and support of Navigators helping residents in neighborhoods at-risk of displacement.

El Buen seeks a community-based independent contractor to serve as a Displacement Prevention Navigator. The Navigator provides frontline housing stabilization support to households at risk of displacement through proactive engagement, culturally responsive intake and assessment, navigation to resources, documentation, timely triage and escalation of urgent housing risk, and structured follow-up.

This is a flexible, community-facing contract ideal for individuals with strong neighborhood ties, lived experience, or established trust in communities experiencing high displacement risk. We strongly encourage applicants who have lived in, worked in, organized in, or provided informal support within priority neighborhoods, even if their experience has not been in a formal housing or nonprofit role.

The Displacement Prevention Navigator functions as a housing-focused community health worker (CHW) within El Buen's Community Health Worker model and provides culturally and linguistically appropriate navigation, outreach, assessment, referral, and follow-up grounded in trauma-informed, person-centered practice.

This role is especially well-suited for trusted community members, peer leaders, parent leaders, promotoras, church leaders, grassroots volunteers, and others with strong relationship-based experience supporting families through housing instability, benefits access, school systems, healthcare access, or other community-based systems.

The Navigator provides housing stabilization navigation and referrals while connecting participants to El Buen and partner resources (health, food access, education, and economic supports). The Navigator works collaboratively with staff and community partners to strengthen participant outcomes and contributes to data collection and reporting aligned with program requirements.

• Conduct culturally responsive housing stability assessments and displacement risk screening
• Provide trauma-informed, person-centered navigation that recognizes the impact of trauma and supports participant choice, dignity, and self-determination
• Provide cultural mediation and language access support, including interpretation/translation as needed, to reduce barriers and support successful system navigation
• Connect households to rental assistance, utilities assistance, home repair programs, legal aid, benefits, food access, health services, education, and workforce resources
• Provide warm referrals and structured follow-up until the case is resolved, the participant declines further contact, or the household becomes unreachable after documented attempts
• Track workflow status of applications and referrals and support households through completion whenever possible
• Document client encounters and outcomes in designated data systems

• Follow same-day escalation protocols to the Contract Manager (or designee) for urgent housing risks, including eviction notice or filing, imminent lockout, utility disconnect notice with imminent shutoff, unsafe housing conditions posing immediate health or safety risk, domestic violence or safety concerns impacting housing stability, and heightened vulnerability requiring immediate stabilization
• Support workflow processes and escalate urgent or complex cases consistent with program protocols and supervisor guidance
• Within 24 hours of identifying urgent risk, document the risk…