Legislative Information

Dear Colorado Psychological Association Members: 

As the chairperson of CPA’s Legislative Committee and a Board Member At-Large, I wanted to provide membership an update on the conclusion of an important piece of legislative that affects all psychologists. 

Over the last year and a half, CPA representatives have been working diligently with the Department of Regulatory Agencies (DORA), state legislators, members of the community, and leaders from other mental health professional groups on the Mental Health Practice Act, the law that governs and regulates all mental health professionals in the state.  The Mental Health Practice Act, commonly referred to as "Sunset Legislation", is so called on account of the practice act expiring, or "sunsetting", every 7 years, opening it up for review, scrutiny, and suggestions.  The act does everything from defining mental health professionals' scopes of practice to determining how the various mental health boards operate and are composed.  CPA was integrally involved in the last sunset review and bill passage seven years ago, and again has fought hard on behalf of CPA members and all psychologists in the state to ensure that the Mental Health Practice Act promotes the field, psychologists, and mental health consumers' well being. 

I am pleased to report that a day prior the legislative session ending, SB-187, the Colorado State Senate bill number assigned to the Mental Health Practice Act passed the state legislature and was signed into law by Governor Hickenlooper on Thursday, June 2nd. 

The passage of this bill marked the end of a time-intensive, dramatic, and hard fought process.  CPA representatives, leadership, and The Capstone Group, CPA’s lobbying firm, spent thousands of hours navigating the complicated political process of passing this enormous bill during a time of state financial crisis.  In so doing, CPA secured the following major successes for its members and the psychologists of this state: 

1) A threat of all the mental health boards (e.g. The Board of Psychologist Examiners, the Social Work Board, the Licensed Professional Counselor Board) being dissolved and meshed into one “omnibus board” regulating all mental health professionals was successfully thwarted, and the individual nature, characteristics, and expertise of each mental health board was maintained.  Without CPA and other mental health professional groups’ efforts, an omnibus board would have almost certainly been recommended by DORA and accepted by legislators in order to control budgetary costs. 
2) Psychologists’ scope of practice was altered, expanding it by way of inserting the American Psychological Association’s model scope of practice language into the practice act.  This effort enables psychologists to have a clear, consistent, and distinct identity in the state and ensures that the activities psychologists engage in to make a living is protected. 
3) The composition of the Board of Psychologist Examiners was changed from having a majority of public members to a majority of professional members.  Colorado was the only state in the country to have a majority of public members on the board that regulates psychologists, including overseeing licensure and reviewing grievances.  On account of CPA’s efforts, the board will now be composed of 4 psychologists and 3 members of the public instead of the reverse.   
4) Rigorous mandatory disclosure language was required for unlicensed psychotherapists, both verbally and in written form, to ensure that consumers clearly understand such practitioners are not licensed and do not need to meet any formal requirements in order to practice. 
5) A review of appropriate peer assistance programs for all mental health practitioners will be undertaken in order to design and implement appropriate services and review processes for mental health professionals, including psychologists, who may be impaired and at risk for losing their licenses.  Such peer assistance programs, in place for many other health care professional groups, allow psychologists to more easily seek the treatment they need for personal problems without concern of professional retribution. 
6) Similarly, CPA fought for, and won, the ability of the psychology board to enter into informal resolutions with psychologists who have been aggrieved on account of a physical or emotional difficulty, allowing a psychologist’s privacy, as well as the wellbeing of his or her patients, to be protected.   
7) Finally, while this was a battle that was technically lost, CPA led the opposition to “unlicensed psychotherapists” having their name changed to “registered psychotherapists”, speaking up at countless occasions and making our opposition and the reason for it unequivocal in written, verbal, formal, and informal communication with legislators, other mental health professionals, community members, DORA, and mental health advocacy groups.  As such, CPA was the most outspoken organization on this matter in the state, even when it needed to stand alone during testimony at senate and house committee hearings.  This stance solidified our reputation as being one of the region’s preeminent watch guards for mental health consumer safety and the integrity of the advertisement and provision of quality psychological services.

This was a complicated piece of legislation, the design and passage of which was replete with pitfalls as well as successes.  Not all of our suggestions were accepted by DORA and the state legislature, and the law is not perfect.  CPA welcomes its members’ questions, concerns, and thoughts regarding the newly passed mental health practice act.  Our strength is in your involvement, and our bandwith greatly expands when CPA’s talented members alert us to their needs, desires, and opinions.

Special thanks go to CPA’s presidents during the last two years when the organization was working on this effort, Drs. Cindy Wang and John Mahalik.  CPA’s sunset legislation committee, comprised of Jim Oraker, Len Tamura, Chad Morris, Bill Betts, and CPA Executive Director Karen Wojdyla, volunteered countless hours to ensure that the mental health practice act well served the state’s psychologists and mental health consumers and deserve great thanks.  Representatives from the National Association of Social Workers – Colorado, the Licensed Professional Counselors, the Certified Addiction Counselors, the Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists, and the unlicensed psychotherapists worked with us on many issues as part of the mental health coalition. 

Finally, it is imperative for us to recognize the great contributions of the Capstone Group, CPA’s lobbying firm, and Moira Cullen, our lead lobbyist.  She, along with Capstone employee Leanne Arrant, were our eyes and ears at the Capitol and beyond during this long process.  It should be noted that every professional mental health group as part of the coalition has a lobbyist, but we feel ours is the best.  Doing any legislative work on behalf of this organization and the state’s psychologists would be nearly impossible without Moira and Capstone’s sage counsel and ardent representation. 

Please know that your membership to CPA makes all of this possible.  Without your continued membership and that of other psychologists in the state, the organization’s ability to represent the interests of psychologists and those they serve would be severely diminished.  If you have renewed your membership, thank you for your continued trust and support, if you have not, please do so.  As CPA’s numbers grow, so do our ability and resources to serve you.  We humbly ask you to do all you can to promote the organization and the benefits of membership amongst all psychologists and psychology graduate students in the state.  Please follow this link http://www.coloradopsych.org/membership/ for membership information including renewal and first-time membership application procedures.

If you would like to further support CPA’s legislative efforts, please donate to our Political Action Committee, a fund that allows the organization to support legislators who are interested in protecting the interests of psychologists and the many people who are lucky enough to be served by them.  Funds from the CPA-PAC are distributed periodically and a full list of legislators to whom the CPA-PAC has made donations to is available upon request.  Contribute to the Colorado Psychological Association Political Action Committee by making a personal check out to “CPA-PAC” and sending it to CPA’s administrative offices at:  Colorado Psychological Association, 7995 E. Prentice Ave., Suite 100, 
Greenwood Village, CO 80111.  Contributions to the PAC are not tax-deductible and must come from a personal, not a business, checking account.  Any contribution, no matter the size, helps our efforts. 

Finally, and most importantly, contact us or visit our website at http://www.coloradopsych.org to learn how to be involved so that the Colorado Psychological Association can continue to be the state’s voice of psychology.  

Sincerely,

Rick Ginsberg, Ph.D. 
Colorado Psychological Association Board Member At-Large
Chair - Colorado Psychological Association Legislative Committee 

1521 South Pearl Street
Denver, CO 80210 
303-589-6111
rginsberg@ecentral.com