BILL ANALYSIS Ó ----------------------------------------------------------------- |SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | SB 243| |Office of Senate Floor Analyses | | |1020 N Street, Suite 524 | | |(916) 651-1520 Fax: (916) | | |327-4478 | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- THIRD READING Bill No: SB 243 Author: Wyland (R) Amended: 5/7/13 Vote: 21 SENATE BUSINESS, PROFESSIONS & ECON. DEV. COMM. : 9-0, 5/6/13 AYES: Price, Emmerson, Block, Corbett, Galgiani, Hernandez, Hill, Padilla, Wyland NO VOTE RECORDED: Yee SUBJECT : Professional clinical counselors SOURCE : California Association of Licensed Professional Clinical Counselors DIGEST : This bill clarifies that professional clinical counseling does not include the assessment or treatment of couples or families unless the clinical counselor has completed specified training and education, and makes conforming changes. ANALYSIS : Existing law: 1. Establishes the Board of Behavioral Sciences (BBS) under the Department of Consumer Affairs (DCA) to license and regulate professional clinical counselors, clinical social workers, marriage and family therapists and educational psychologists. CONTINUED SB 243 Page 2 2. Defines the following terms: "professional clinical counseling" as the application of counseling interventions and psychotherapeutic techniques to identify and remediate cognitive, mental and emotional issues including personal growth, adjustment to disability, crisis intervention and psychosocial and environmental problems; and "practice of professional clinical counseling" as a person who performs or offers to perform or hold himself/herself out as able to perform this service for remuneration in any form including donations. 3. Specifies that professional clinical counseling does not include the assessment or treatment of couples of families unless the professional clinical counselor has completed additional training and education, beyond the minimum training and education required for licensure. This bill: 1. Specifies that "professional clinical counseling" does not include the assessment or treatment of couples or families unless the professional clinical counselor has completed all of the following training and education: A. One of the following: (1) Six semester units or nine quarter units specifically focused on the theory and application of marriage and family therapy. (2) A named specialization or emphasis area on the qualifying degree in marriage and family therapy; marital and family therapy; marriage, family, and child counseling; or couple and family therapy. B. No less than 500 hours of documented supervised experience working directly with couples, families, or children. C. A minimum of six hours of continuing education specific to marriage and family therapy, completed in each license renewal cycle. 2. Requires applicants, in order to qualify for licensure CONTINUED SB 243 Page 3 examination, to complete clinical mental health experience of not less than 1,750 hours of direct counseling with individuals or groups or couples or families in a specified setting using a variety of psychotherapeutic techniques and recognized counseling interventions within the scope of practice of LPCCs. Background On October 11, 2009, California became the 50th state to license professional counselors making LPCCs the newest of the four licensure groups regulated by the BBS. LPCCs provide a variety of mental health services including individual, group, marriage and family therapy. LPCCs may practice in a variety of settings including, but not limited to, community mental health, private practice and hospital settings. LPCC students are required to complete graduate coursework in a Master's program approved by the BBS. During their graduate program, students also complete clinical internship rotations. In addition, the student must complete a minimum of 3,000 post-degree hours of supervised experience by an LPCC, licensed marriage and family therapist, licensed clinical social worker, licensed psychologist or licensed physician and surgeon, who is certified in psychiatry by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, over a period of not less than two years, including not less than 1,750 hours of direct counseling with individuals or groups in a clinical mental health counseling setting and 150 hours in a hospital or community mental health setting. Under existing law, in order to provide marriage and family therapy upon licensure, the student must complete education and training requirements beyond the minimum education requirements outlined by their educational program. In order to be licensed as an LPCC, applicants must complete their graduate training, clinical internship and post-degree supervised hours and receive a passing score on the National Clinical Mental Health Counselor Examination (NCMHCE) and the California Law and Ethics Exam. The Law and Ethics Exam should be taken in the first year of the applicant's clinical internship and the NCMHCE should be taken at the completion of CONTINUED SB 243 Page 4 the internship upon attainment of all supervised hours. FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: No Local: No SUPPORT : (Verified 5/7/13) California Association of Licensed Professional Clinical Counselors (source) American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT : According to the author's office, this is a clean-up bill regarding the interpretation of previous legislation that established the profession for licensed professional clinical counselors (LPCCs). This bill clarifies the interpretation of required education, training and hour requirements for LPCCs, and specifically deletes language that indicates that training and education requirements must be, "beyond the minimum training and education required for licensure." The bill's sponsor, California Association of Licensed Professional Clinical Counselors, write, "[Current] scope of practice prevents LPCCs from seeing families and couples, unless they have additional education and training in marriage and family therapy beyond the requirements for LPCC licensure. This means that this additional optional education must be above and beyond the degree requirements for the LPCC license, and that the couples and family supervised hours must be above and beyond the 3,000 post-degree hours required for the LPCC license. The reason that we would like to make this amendment as soon as possible is that the universities are already offering the two MFT courses to LPCC students, who want to be able to counsel couples and families. They are concerned that the BBS won't be able to accept these courses if they are taken as part of the required degree program, and students will need to repeat the courses post-degree." The American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists state, "While we pushed for the additional training and experience to be mandated for LPCCs who wish to work with couples and families, and still believe these to be vital requirements for LPCCs wishing to do such work, it was never our CONTINUED SB 243 Page 5 intent (nor, we believe, the intent of the law) to force these units to be done outside the qualifying degree program or the experience to be outside of the 3,000 hours of supervised experience needed for licensure. It is our understanding that a further amendment will be offered to section 4999.46, clarifying that qualifying hours of supervised experience for licensure may be gained with individuals, couples, families, or groups. This is consistent with the change to 4999.20 already in the bill, and with the intent described above." The California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists write, "Although the law says the education and experience must be in addition to, and not part of, what is required for licensure, this was not the intent of the legislation. This legislation will fix this confusing language and allow for the education and experience to be acquired as part of their 3,000 hour requirement, as intended by the original legislation." MW:d 5/7/13 Senate Floor Analyses SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE **** END **** CONTINUED