2025 C-Suite Awards
CAREER ACHIEVER: Alisha Bourdeau
CODAC Behavioral Healthcare | Chief financial officer and human resources director
WHILE PREPARING for her young daughter to begin preschool back in 2001, Alisha Bourdeau, then a stay-at-home mom, started exploring opportunities to get into the workforce.
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After fielding several offers from various organizations, Bourdeau landed a part-time role as finance manager at CODAC Behavioral Healthcare in Cranston. It was a job that fit well with her availability at the time.
It also proved to be a match made in heaven. Bourdeau’s start nearly a quarter century ago propelled her to a long career in behavioral health services, including her current role as CODAC’s chief financial officer and human resources director.
Bourdeau says she knew the organization was the place for her when she began working there. The opportunity to work for CODAC perfectly blended her passions for problem solving and helping others, Bourdeau says.
“I fell in love with being able to do work that I was good at, that I enjoyed and work that, in a supportive and peripheral way, is helping people,” Bourdeau said.
CODAC is the oldest, largest and only nonprofit organization providing outpatient treatment for opioid-use disorder in Rhode Island, offering services to more than 4,000 Rhode Islanders annually across the socioeconomic spectrum. With seven community-based locations, the organization positions itself well to deliver services wherever they are needed across the state.
CODAC also provides several services, including outpatient counseling service for substance use disorders and mental health disorders, intensive outpatient treatment, peer recovery support services, infectious-disease treatment and general medical care.
The organization recently purchased and fully renovated the 22,000-square-foot Royal Little facility in Providence. It both serves as CODAC’s headquarters and houses a community-integrated health care center, where patients can receive comprehensive care at one location through collaborations with provider partners, social service agencies and local university researchers.
After CODAC CEO Linda Hurley’s successful efforts to secure federal funding, Bourdeau was pivotal in the project financing and facility renovation aspects. She worked alongside a local bank and applied for grants with the Champlin Foundation and the Rhode Island Health and Educational Building Corp. to help acquire the property.
Bourdeau also helped secure grant funding to purchase and deploy CODAC’s first mobile medical unit in 2022 to address the opioid epidemic. The unit is the first in the nation licensed to deliver medication-assisted treatment under new U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency regulations that went into effect the previous year.
The mobile units, Bourdeau says, have provided a significant boost in the state’s push to crack down on opioid addiction, which can be deadly if gone untreated. She says the units are strategically positioned to deliver services in overdose hot spots and in underserved areas of Rhode Island where barriers to access to treatment exist.
“The mobile medical units hit the road every day and literally meet individuals where they are to deliver the lifesaving treatment that they need,” Bourdeau said.
Katharine Kohm, a partner at Pierce Atwood LLP, which serves as CODAC’s legal counsel, says Bourdeau is truly the glue that keeps CODAC running smoothly. Kohm feels Bourdeau is the go-to person when an issue arises on any aspect of CODAC’s business.
“There is no challenge that Alisha has not addressed and solved at CODAC drawing upon her quiet persistence, strengths as a skilled organizer and communicator,” Kohm said. “That kind of dedication and consistency is what makes Alisha so amazing at her job. She has an unparalleled ability to hit the ground running on any issue that arises.”
While Bourdeau admits being recognized for her many years of hard work is truly an honor, she is quick to add that success in behavioral health care, especially in finance and operations, could never be about just one person.
“I am incredibly fortunate to work with a team that constantly finds ways to innovate, adapt and make a meaningful impact,” Bourdeau said. “This award is not just a personal achievement, but it is a testament to the power of teamwork.”
