The following are the written submission comments we've presented to the BHEC Council for consideration by its members and the members of the four Boards they govern. Find out how you can submit your own comments in time for the meeting in the Summary section at the bottom of this post.

Our Written Submission Comments

Please Distribute For: August 23rd BHEC Council Meeting
To: BHEC Council and All Licensing Boards Governed by BHEC
Subject: The Rules Change Process, Committee-Board Relationships, and Proposed CE Renewal Changes

The catalyst behind my thoughts today is the proposed CE Rules Changes, but I see them as symptomatic of some framework issues I'd like to address first.

Rules Change Process Is Missing the Debate Factor

The Rules Change Process itself is a good one. It has numerous check-and-balance points built into it for Board consideration, for Council consideration, and numerous opportunities along the way for public input. Kudo's to BHEC and Darrel Spinks for implementing a functional system. On paper.

The problem is that it's only functional if all the players work the system properly, and I'm not seeing that. I know what the process is. I acquired a workflow diagram from Tim Speers last year, and I've been watching Committees and Board members propose and pass poorly considered measures to the next level since it was put into place. I attend every meeting virtually and I am literally not seeing active, informed debate from way too many members.

I too often see board members that do not seem to have an understanding of subject matter being discussed or haven't read the packaged materials that were distributed to them. That package includes the written public comments that caring folk take many hours out of their practice days to craft and submit.

One example among many, at the most recent LMFT Board Meeting, licensee L. Hayes submitted a very lengthy, well thought out written submission that must have taken her countless hours to draft. It was distributed to Board members in their pre-meeting materials package, and her piece contained many well-considered points (see 12.b), each of which would have made for an outstanding discussion during the meeting.

There is NO WAY anyone with a degree could read her submission and not come up with A SINGLE POINT they felt was worthy of discussion at the meeting. Yet, all of 5 seconds was devoted to mentioning that "there were two public submissions", as they dashed over it to get to the next item on the agenda. Very disheartening.

This tells me nobody read the d**n thing. Nobody. What's the point of public comment, written or oral, if the Board members are not going to consider it? (How can I urge people to submit comments and participate in the system if you people won't read them and publicly debate the points??)

What I'm seeing is the good ol' boy network in action, passing Little Johnny on to the next grade even though he can't read. I appreciate your willingness to serve, but please bring your willingness to study and do the job correctly or bow out and let someone else do it. Lead by example.

The Standards Committee/Boards Relations Issues

I appreciate the Standards Committee's objective but I'm fairly certain that a one-size-fits-all approach to across the board rule-standardization will not work in all instances. Works for some rules, won't work for others.

Using the recently proposed CE Renewal Rules Change proposal as my body of evidence, it appears to me that the atmosphere in the room at the time of this proposal's development must have been one of, "how can we draft something that checks all these boxes?"

[  ] Keeps all 4 Boards and their members happy
[  ] Keeps our Academia friends happy
[  ] Keeps our Associations happy and their revenue streams flowing (our "key stakeholders", which doesn't include Independent Stakeholders like me)
[  ] Can be easily pushed through the BHEC approval process

"What the licensees want", and "what is best for Joe Citizen", were apparently not on the checklist since there is nothing about a) the proposal, or b) the debate currently happening within the approval process, that offers any proof that they were considered at the proposal's conception (although, at their last gathering, the LPC Board's Steven Hallbauer did seem to sit up in his chair and suggest, with some vigor, that more in-depth discussion was needed).

Convince me I'm wrong 'cause I'm not seeing it.

Keep the Standards Committee because we need them to do this job. But apparently, their governing rules need to be tweaked before they're allowed to create any other proposals. I have concrete thoughts on what those tweaks need to be if anyone on the Council would like to have that live conversation.

Question Everything About Proposed Changes

There needs to be a set of questions in place that any proposal from any board or committee must be subjected to. That might look something like this:

1. What's driving this proposal, this need for change? Is there a quantitative problem we can talk about on this point? Is this a solution looking for a problem?
2. Does this best serve Joe Citizen or does it do him potential harm, even if we can't quantify the potential damage? What is our common sense and gut telling us?
3. Is this a social/political solution desperately looking for a problem to fix? If so, is it really our place, as a licensing board, to legislate yet another layer of public morality "from the bench"?
4. Are we proposing a methodology simply because "that's the way we've always done it"? Is that really the best way to approach this particular problem?
5. Is additional regulation necessary? Does it amount to micro-management?
6. Do we trust our licensees enough on this point to make their own decisions, or not? If not, why not?
7. What do our licensees think about this? (Again, I understand that the Rules Change Process has opportunity for public and licensee input but if it goes unread, unconsidered, and undebated, maybe we have a larger, systemic problem than we want to admit.)

So, if the issue has been that "no one has ever come up with a set of vetting questions for committee or rules change proposals before", well, now you have one.

BTW, that 90% of the Public Members on all 4 Boards don't seem to have ever possessed a copy of the Rulebook for the Board they're representing, much less read it to be able to participate in these conversations, is very sad. I understand their purpose as 'public members' but if they don't have a clue as to the real effect these rule changes are going to have on the licensees and by extension, Joe Citizen, how are they helping the process?

Proposed CE Renewal Requirements

I have done as thorough a dissection of the proposed CE Rules Changes and what I think about them as I can, in a series of blog posts on our website, PracticeMentors.us. I will not reproduce those arguments here, but I urge you to take the time to read them before you continue the approval process on this behemoth. I will, however, submit a brief recap of my main points then offer up some additional thoughts.

My Top 6 Objections to The Proposed CE Rules Changes

1. What We Had In Place Was Working

We went from a DSHS-era, confusing and convoluted, set of CE guidelines, to a Sunset-Mandated set of very simple CE Rules. Now I suppose enough time has passed we can ignore the Sunset Commission's directives and return to an unnecessarily complicated schema? Why? Standardization doesn't require or equate to complication.

2. The 50% Rule

This line item would be the Psych Board's 1992-era contribution to this beast we're building. Why is it necessary? We operated just fine for the last 2-3 years but now we can't live without it? Who are we placating here?

3. Independent Stakeholders Ignored

Architects of the ce proposal insist that "everyone is included", that no one is excluded from offering ceu's. It's not that simple. What you've assembled is an "you (Independent Stakeholders) stay on your side of the tracks, we'll (Associations, Academia) go anywhere we want to in this town, and we'll allow you to participate as long as you're ok with the economic limitations that come with it” arrangement.

No, I'm not ok with it.

Either add a new category to the approved Providers List for “Independent Stakeholders” or, better yet, trash the entire proposal and start all over with simplification in mind, like the current LPC guidelines.

4. Required Multi-Cultural Diversity Hours

“Multi-Cultural Diversity” used to be about understanding other native, geo-based cultures. There is an obvious and very public effort underway to hijack and redefine it to include and normalize conditions that have always been categorized as mental illness, and I am not a fan. I cannot possibly know everything about every geo-based sub-culture that exists, and now certain factions are creating new ones based on personal beliefs??

It is up to ME to adopt an attitude based on the golden rule and work from there. If Joe Citizen thinks he is being treated unfairly by one of our licensees, then that's what the complaint process and penalty matrix are for. I do not wish to be brow-beaten every two years for 3 hours with either the latest list of sins I didn't know I had committed, or additional mental health issues being added to the list of things to normalize. It's not helping me in my practice and exists only to advance a social agenda. No thanks.

“Treat others with love and respect.”

There. It really is as simple as that. Lose the Multi-Cultural/Diversity agenda requirement completely.

5. Limited Flexibility-Too Many Required CE Topics

Too large a percentage of my required renewal hours are selected for me. Topic flexibility has been largely removed and I've been told, "well, nothing's keeping you from taking more than 24 hours". Ok, you paying for those for me? You have extra calendar time for me that I don't know about? That's a very shallow, arrogant, and condescending response.

6. You're Mucking About With MY Business Revenue!

Every, single change you make has a ripple effect in our business models. (Wondering out loud if vigorous, well-considered, pre-approval debate with licensees and the public might help avoid those unintended consequences??) The proposed rule changes will severely impact licensee participation in my workshops because of the 50% Rule and my exclusion from the Approved Vendors list. You're negatively impacting my revenue and you just earned my unwavering, inescapable attention.

Again, either add a new category to the Approved Providers List for Independent Stakeholders or, better yet, trash the entire proposal and start all over with simplification in mind.

BTW, Have You Considered the Logistical BHEC Tracking Nightmare?

Who's going to track all of this on the BHEC end of the street? Guessing the pat answer will be, "BHEC won't have to track it, they just audit occasionally, and the counselor will be responsible for tracking it all."

Uh-huh.

I want a 50-yard-line seat for that train-wreck. We teach ce workshops and I can tell you way too many of us have trouble keeping track of paper certificates. Now you're going to require an Excel spreadsheet and a basic knowledge of algebra to track ce's? If you think it's going to be that simple to track then you haven't put any sausage through this grinder yet.

This is going to roll downhill into some BHEC staffer's lap, who's going to end up in Darrel's office. Real fly-on-the-wall stuff!

Compliance and Board Micro-Management

Counselors in 2022 are overwhelmed with regulations and compliance on multiple levels of jurisdiction. It. Is. Overwhelming. In fact, I'm willing to wager that a majority percentage of Board Members aren't doing 100% of their legally required compliance in their practices, yet here we are, looking at yet another layer of unnecessary regulations we must be responsible for from people who are not totally compliant. Get your houses in order before you come to redecorate mine!

We're over-burdened with regulations, codes, and guidelines and I haven't yet heard one good argument for adding more to the problem. “Keep It Simple”, works.

See you in the public, 3-minute comments.

Summary

If you'd like to submit your own written comments about the proposed CE Rules Changes you may either pen your own and submit them, or feel free to copy/paste anything you read in this blog post and modify to better reflect your wishes.

Email your comments to general@bhec.texas.gov but do it today because the cut-off date is looming and the BHEC staff needs time to copy and distribute to all Council members prior to the meeting. You got this. Speak up and be heard or be happy with what we get.

Plan Smart. Be Safe. Serve Others.

Kathleen Mills, LPC-S, CEAP