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2009 Federal & State Advocacy Summary
December, 2009
Dr. Robert Lane, Federal Advocacy Coordinator
Dr. Phil Baker, State Advocacy Coordinator
FEDERAL
ADVOCACY
Here is
a synopsis of the main focus of our federal lobbying efforts
this past year. Lobbying includes our Hill visits set up by
our lobbyist at the end of the State Leadership Conference
in March and follow-up phone calls and emails throughout the
rest of the year, and all those calls for people to send in
emails of course.
Mental Health Parity - We are still relishing the
success - the Domenici-Wellstone Mental Health Parity Act
finally passed in late 2008 and is set to take effect in
January of 2010! We have been lobbying for this every year
since the first bill passed in 1996 and it is nice to be
done with this one for a little while. It’s when the law
goes into effect the we begin to see unintended
consequences, so I am sure APAPO, Government Relations
people will continue to monitor this issue.
Medicare Reimbursement/Cuts - Medicare reimbursement
schedules are generally one of our lobbying issues and they
were again this year. As bad as the reimbursement issues can
be, those may pail compared to the consequences of failing
to stop the implementation of the Sustainable Growth Rate
legislative mandates that would lead to untenable cuts to
the current reimbursement schedule. We appear to have
successfully held the SGR cuts at bay, though a permanent
solution still needs to be worked out. How Health care
legislation will effect Medicare is truly a wildcard as of
this writing. The national strategy seems to be to try and
fix Medicare as part of any comprehensive health care
reform. I’m sure this will be on our lobbying plate for this
next year.
Mentally Ill Offender and Treatment Crime Reduction Act (MIOTCRA)
- this legislation previously passed, has generally failed
to received adequate funding for it’s mandate, so we have
been lobbying for full funding. I was just notified that the
act has received an increase in funding for FY 2010; a $2
million increase from fiscal year 2009. The President is
expected to sign the bill. MIOTCRA supports programs to
improve inmates’ mental health treatment, train law
enforcement personnel to respond to incidents involving
mentally ill individuals, facilitate mental health courts
and provide for reporting of the rate of serious mental
illness among those in custody or on parole. It seems that
MIOTCRA and the mental health courts programs have become
entrenched in public policy over the years since their
inception,; we just need to keep after them about the
funding.
STATE
ADVOCACY
Our
efforts in this last year, and at least through this next
congressional session have largely been focused on HB 110,
which was introduced for us by Representative Bob Herron.
The bill is designed to tighten up the language pertaining
to who can hold themselves out to be a “psychologist.” You
can see the bill at
http://www.legis.state.ak.us/basis/start.asp (Just type
in HB 110). While the legislature is generally receptive,
there have been a number of concerns raised about
unintentionally limiting paraprofessionals and faith-based
counselors from contributing to social solutions in their
way. I believe we have hit upon a compromise that will allow
this bill to pass through the process this session and into
law. But we will spend considerably lobbying energy on this,
especially by our lobbyist in Juneau, John Walsh.
Phil
Baker continues to appear at each licensing board meeting to
represent AKPA’s concerns, if there are any and otherwise
observe board proceedings. Dr. Baker was instrumental in
attempting to add AKPA’s Diversity Committee’s
recommendation that Alaska have a cultural/diversity
requirement as part of continuing education all
psychologists and psychological associates must obtain each
licensing period. While the licensing board was not
receptive in 2009, we are hopeful they will see things
differently in 2010. Dr. Baker continues to provide the
liaison between AKPA and our State Psychology Licensing
Board to present the work and concerns of our members about
the practice of psychology and convey back the concerns of
the Board about the work of psychologist in our State.
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