A Familiar Face for a New Chapter

Please Join Us in Welcoming our New CEO!

From our earliest meetings with Matt, we knew that his diverse background was just what we needed to help our company grow. There was just one problem… what do we call him?

As a former Officer with the Santa Rosa Police Department, Matt had a profound devotion to community, accountability, and service – values that define Pura Vida’s treatment philosophy & mission.

From his time working with children in community health settings, Matt also carried an energy and humor that could keep morale high through any challenge.

Couple all of that with a Master’s Degree in Forensic Psychology and extensive experience in behavioral health admissions, utilization review, program building, & business development, and you can see why we had trouble coming up with a fitting title!

Ultimately, we settled on “Director of Special Projects” because it was clear his broad array of skills and expertise would be useful in many facets of our growing business.

At that time, Pura Vida was expanding faster than our office space could accommodate. Buoyed by the trust of our local recovery community, we had gone from a small network of structured sober livings to a bustling full-continuum SUD program in just a few short years and desk space was at a premium. For his first year with us, Matt worked from a small table in our admin office hallway, but this modest space quickly became a launchpad for several innovative projects and ideas.

Matt jumped in feet first, focusing his initial efforts into expanding Pura Vida’s Dual Diagnosis capabilities. In conjunction with Program Directors Christina Esver, Brooke Nichols, and Rick Whittington, Matt helped to onboard several talented clinicians including Clare Friedlander, LCSW, Collin Hoctor, LMFT, and Jenny Sederholm, LCSW. Their shared contributions would eventually culminate in Pura Vida's iconic 8-week residential treatment curriculum.

After helping us build upon our strong recovery roots through the integration of robust clinical and social support services, Matt played a key role in developing & launching Pura Vida’s Medi-Cal Outpatient Track, alongside Program Director Linda Job, SUDCC.

Within Pura Vida, Matt’s analytical mind, strong work ethic, and relational leadership style have been tremendous assets in our ongoing efforts to refine the delivery of programs services and develop our staff. Outside of the organization, Matt has worked frenetically to spread the word about Pura Vida's mission through redesigned collateral, provider tours, community partnerships, and other outreach efforts. For all of these contributions and more, Matt was promoted to Chief Strategy Officer in late 2025.



Now, with the recent City Council victory in favor of our Mountain Hawk Expansion Project, the owners and leadership of Pura Vida Recovery Services have appointed Matt Schembari as Chief Executive Officer to oversee this next exciting chapter of our program's evolution.

"What this program - this amazing team of people, really - have accomplished within this community already is beyond inspiring. To be able to call them my colleagues, to call this company my home, and to have the privilege of leading them into the future is the greatest honor of my career."

- Matt Schembari

Please join us in congratulating Matt on this well-deserved promotion! We look forward to seeing what the future will hold for Pura Vida under his skilled leadership.