Legal Secretary I - Bilingual (English/Spanish) - Extra-Help

Legal Secretary I

Do you have experience working in a legal office, fluent bilingual (English/Spanish) abilities, and administrative skills? The County of Sonoma Law Office of the Public Defender is offering an excellent opportunity to begin your career in the legal secretarial field. Starting salary up to $36.12/hour, plus an additional $1.50/hour fluent bilingual pay. As a Legal Secretary I, you will utilize your bilingual skills and provide legal secretarial support to the Law Office of the Public Defender. You will be responsible for preparing, redacting, and finalizing legal documents, transcribing various recordings into proper style and form, and providing legal secretarial services to law office staff. Additional duties may include:

• Filing documents and calendaring in support of the Sonoma County Superior Courts
• Organizing and scanning all incoming mail and client discovery to the case management system
• Maintaining client files in the case management system
• Researching client information in various justice system programs
• Composing routine letters for assigned attorneys in both English and Spanish, and notifying clients of court dates
• Transcribing recordings from Spanish to English
• Translating for attorney client office interviews

The ideal candidate for this position will have experience in a criminal or governmental law office, including working with a legal case management system, and possess many of the following:

• The ability to establish and maintain effective working relationships with other Public Defender staff, departmental representatives, court officials, and the public
• Strong communication skills with the ability to work towards the collective benefit of Public Defender clients, both independently and with the team
• The ability to multi-task, while shifting priorities, in a fast-paced environment
• Experience working with Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint)

Fluent (reading, writing, conversational) Spanish is required for this position. Applicants who wish to be considered for a bilingual position must indicate their level of skill in the required supplemental questionnaire. An examination will be conducted prior to employment in a bilingual position to confirm the level of skill in this area.

Extra-help employees relieve or augment permanent staff. Temporary, extra-help employees are not in the classified civil service and do not have property rights to permanently allocated positions. In addition, they do not receive most employee benefits such as long-term disability insurance coverage, accrual of vacation, participation in the County retirement program, or eligibility to take promotional examinations. Temporary, extra-help employees are limited in their employment to a maximum of one calendar year. These employees must be off of work for three months before they can be re-employed on an extra help basis. Extra-help employees who meet the eligibility requirements may qualify for a County contribution toward medical coverage.

This recruitment is being conducted to fill a fluent bilingual (English/Spanish) temporary, extra-help Legal Secretary I position in the Public Defender's Office. The employment list established from this recruitment may also fill future extra-help (temporary) positions as they occur during the active status of the employment list. The Civil Service title for this position is Legal Secretary I.

Application submissions require the Supplemental Questionnaire to be completed.