Badass Therapists Building Practices That Thrive
Welcome to Badass Therapists Building Practices That Thrive, the ultimate resource for mental health professionals ready to step into their power, grow their practices, and create a career they love. I'm Dr. Kate Walker, a Texas LPC/LMFT Supervisor, author, and business strategist who's here to show you the path to success.
Formerly Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses, we’ve rebranded because, well, we’re way too big for Texas now! This community of badass therapists is growing nationwide, and we’re here to help you create a career and practice you love, no matter where you are.
Every week, you'll get practical advice, proven strategies, and motivation to help you build a thriving practice—one that gives you the freedom to live your life on your terms. From mastering marketing to designing scalable systems and becoming a clinical supervisor, this podcast is your roadmap to leveling up without burnout.
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Badass Therapists Building Practices That Thrive
Behind the Therapy License Board: What You Need to Know
Get your step by step guide to private practice. Because you are too important to lose to not knowing the rules, going broke, burning out, and giving up. #counselorsdontquit.
There are people in Texas that need mental health treatment that aren't getting served. We are looking for ways the staff is looking for ways to get people licensed, so if they don't meet all the requirements they will make a recommendation. They might say something like hey, you don't meet all of our requirements, but if you do this thing or if you take this training, we will count that and then that'll fill the gap. They are looking for ways to include, not exclude. Welcome to Badass Therapists building practices that thrive where it's all about working smarter, not harder.
Speaker 2:Now here's your host, Dr Kate Walker, who is really starting to like vacationing in the desert. You're going to love this conversation with Nicole Richardson, an LMFT board member, who pulls back the curtain on how licensing boards actually work and what you need to know if you're a supervisor or business owner. This is exactly the kind of clarity we'll be creating inside the Smart Practice Sprint a four-day experience to help you get your business in order and your messaging on point. The first day is free and I will drop more info during the mid-roll. Let's get to work. Let's get to work.
Speaker 3:She's been in private practice since 2012. Before that, she worked in agencies that served people in recovery, people recently released from incarceration and parents involved with CPS, so she had all the easy clients. She is certified in EMDR Gottman 3. She is certified in EMDR Gottman 3. She's a dual supervisor, so she holds LPC and LMFT credentials and loves a perfectionist in recovery. While she's fully telehealth, she's based in Austin, where she has lived since 2007. So, nicole, I'm going to hand it over to you. Welcome.
Speaker 1:Thank you, hi. So this is kind of I'm nerve-sided, as one of my clients likes to say. I'm nervous and excited at the same time. One of the reasons that I bothered Kate about doing this is because, since the Texas legislature only meets every other year and this is a legislative session season, I wanted to tell as many people as I could about the legislation that we are supporting, and we would love for you to support it with us and why. And since Kate gave me so much time, I also thought it might be a good time, since a lot of us who are supervisors got into the game, so to speak, before BHEC was a thing and before the Sunset Commission and all that jazz. And because in my interview to join the board, they asked me why I wanted to do it and I was like I have always wanted to meet the wizard of Oz. What are you talking about? Peel back the curtain, show me everything. I figured I couldn't be the only person that was like oh, you do it like that. Oh, I had no idea. So I thought if I kind of shared some of it with you guys Some stuff I'm assuming you guys will already know and some of it might be new information in addition to the legislation. And then maybe, if you guys have questions, I may or may not know the answer, but I'll try to answer them, okay. So thank you so much, leanne, for introducing me. I won't just repeat everything she just said. So I'm hoping at the end of my presentation everybody will be able to confidently answer like who is the board, what is the board, what do they do, what are the limits? I'm also hoping that you guys will be able to easily find out for yourselves what the board is up to. Recently, on one of the listservs that I'm on, somebody posted like how in the heck are we supposed to keep up with all this stuff? And I feel like a televangelist. I'm like we can go here and we can go here and you can email this or you can read this, and so I'm hoping that by the end of my presentation you guys will feel a little bit more comfortable being able to access the information for yourselves and then for whatever listservs and groups that you're in as well.
Speaker 1:Okay, so first, what is the board? I'm gonna assume I'm gonna go on a wild leap here and assume that most, if not all, of us have a driver's license. Well, in order for anybody to have a driver's license, the state that you have that driver's license in there has to be a law that makes that license possible. And that's true for our professional licenses as well. There is a law for MFTs, there's a law for LPCs, there's a law for LCSWs that make that a thing. And so when those laws were written and we usually, in the jargon of the board, call it the statute and that's definitely what our attorneys like to call it, and so that's never confusing when you're new the statute or the law kind of sets up some of the parameters of what we can and cannot do. But it also means that there's a staff, there's money, there's a budget and then who's going to lead it? So the board right. All of that stuff is possible because there's a law, as I kind of briefly mentioned earlier and I like to call them.
Speaker 1:In the dark days when I was getting licensed, long before the Sunset Commission, I often heard a lot of chatter about clinicians feeling like the board was out to get them. And the Sunset Commission came about not really to support us as clinicians but really to figure out why there were some gaps in what kinds of services were available to people and the kinds of experiences that clients were having. And in that they also found that a lot of clinicians didn't feel like they were being treated well. They also found that a lot of clinicians didn't feel like they were being treated well. They also found that the board was being run really inefficient all of the boards. And so that's where the Texas Behavioral Health Executive Council came from, affectionately known, which I will be referring to affectionately as BHEC from now on. That's how BHEC came to be. They consolidated all of the mental health boards. So psychologists, lcsws, lpcs, mfts were all kind of under the umbrella now of BHEC.
Speaker 1:So a little bit about BHEC. Because they were able to consolidate, it meant that they were able to streamline a lot of things. So now all of the administrative staff is all in one place instead of on different campuses and different offices. It also means that they can share staff so they don't need four separate people to answer the phone, for example. Or well, I'm sure there's actually more than four people that answer the phone, but in four separate places running four different. It's all kind of filtered through one office and there are specialists. So there's a team of people that do everything.
Speaker 1:There's a team of investigators and within the investigators there are investigators that kind of specialize. Usually it's in two boards and they just know those rules backwards and forwards With the applications to either get a provisional license or to upgrade your license. There's a team of people and again, they usually specialize in one or two, and that is what they do all day. We have a team of attorneys and they do a host of things, including attending all of our meetings and telling us when we're not allowed to do that because that's not allowed in statute. Also, like helping us refine our language, because sometimes I just kind of say, well, that's dumb, and the attorneys will remind me you can't put that in a rule. That's dumb, is not a good rule, because we're all under one umbrella.
Speaker 1:It also meant that we could more easily streamline the rules. I don't know if anybody else in here is duly licensed, but having so many different, competing and conflicting rules is exhausting, and so being able to streamline them make them, frankly, just more user friendly, right, it also means that we can kind of better understand what the other boards are up to. We talk to each other, so I'm going to talk about this more a little bit later, but basically there's sort of a tier system right within the boards themselves. There's a board for LPCs, mfts, etc. And there's two members from each of those board that all sit on the BHEC executive board, and so we all really do have to work together to be good partners with one another. That does mean, too, that there's a lot more communication than there used to be before BHEC.
Speaker 1:Okay, so the staff versus the board. So the staff is everybody that works in the office, from the you know receptionist to the executive director and, like I mentioned before, they do a variety of different things they answer phones, they answer emails, they process applications, they investigate claims of misconduct and naughtiness. That is the paid staff. And then the board is actually the nine people that are a mix of clinicians and community members, and a lot of times I get asked why there are non-clinicians on any of the boards, and I think that's a totally fair question. But I think the shortest and simplest answers is probably a variety of reasons. Is we want people from the community to be the everyday person, the layman's voice on the board. So if we propose a rule, right as a clinician, if I propose a rule that on Thursdays we wear pink and we have to do that right.
Speaker 1:Ideally, our community members are kind of in the meeting going. Well, how does that help me, as a human right, get better counseling or how does that increase my access or anything like that? The idea is, having non-clinician voices on all of these boards helps us think more globally. We typically meet quarterly and I'm going to talk a little bit about how to find. They set these dates like 18 to 24 months out. So it's already posted on the website for many, many moons to come and as it gets closer they will post things like how to attend the meeting. You can attend almost all of them in person. Now that COVID's over and we've opened things back up, we are almost exclusively meeting in person. Now you can also attend via Zoom and if neither one of those work because a lot of times it's on a Friday we also record all of them and we have a YouTube channel that they get posted to so you can watch it kind of at your leisure and also you can fast forward to the boring or parts or only watch the ports that you're interested in.
Speaker 1:Ok, so I mentioned earlier sort of the difference between statutes and rules, so again, I'm just going to keep using this because it feels like an easy, silly rule. But the board could. In theory we wouldn't, but in theory we could make a rule that says all clinicians, to keep their license, must wear purple pants on Thursdays. If you're going to see a client, you must be doing it in purple pants. We can only make that rule if the statute allows us to make that rule. So there might be a clause in that law or that statute that says that the board may not make rules that have anything to do with clothing. It doesn't say anything like that because that's just a silly thing, but they sometimes we are pigeonholed by the statute and a really easy example of this for me a lot of people and I can't see everybody, but a lot of people are annoyed by the fact that NFT associates have to have 200 hours of supervision in order to get their license.
Speaker 1:This is a problem. Well, why haven't we changed that rule? I'm so glad you guys asked. It's because it's in the statute and we can't, and I'm going to talk more about that shortly. But basically, the way the law was written is minimum of 24 months and 200 hours of supervision. So the best we can do is try to come up with ways to creatively allow people to not have to be in supervision two hours a week, over supervision hours from your internship and graduate school. That's one way. Being able to have two supervisors is one way. Trust me, the board staff is aware that it is not awesome and it's not really something you could just do once a week and get it done in 24 hours. They are aware of that.
Speaker 1:So the other thing I think it's really important to know I feel like sometimes I don't know about you guys, but a lot of times when I'm submitting, I definitely felt this way prior to BHEC I would call and leave a message and never hear back, or I'd email somebody and never hear back, and so sometimes it can feel like when you're emailing a website or filling out a contact form, that you're kind of speaking into the void and it stings these crosses If anybody gets back to you. There are times when the staff can answer your question. For example, if you emailed them and said I can't log into my online portal, that is totally something they can help you with, right. There are some things that are gray areas that they're going to be like, I don't know. But if you emailed them and said, for example, hey, the board made a rule last year that you have to wear purple pants on Thursdays, I think this is a stupid rule. The staff is not really allowed to comment on that. They're going to like as a human, that person who sees the email might go I know right, but they didn't make the rule. They have no power over the rule and so all they can really do is pass that information on to us. And when I tell you that every single one gets read, it does.
Speaker 1:And what happens is we get a big document dump two or three weeks before our big quarterly meetings. And when I say it's a big document dump, I'm not kidding. It's a huge document dump and there's usually a spreadsheet in that document dump. There's usually a spreadsheet of hey, this is. You know, we got a call on this day from this person and they voiced concerns about this. We got an email on this day from this person and they recommended that. So also, if there's a, if there's a rule that you want to recommend, maybe you don't look good in purple and so you don't think it should be a rule that says, on Thursdays we wear purple. Maybe you think it should be green. Right, that will get to us. It's not going to get to us right away because we're volunteers.
Speaker 1:I get to do this in my free time, so they don't call me every day. I'm grateful for that. As much as that, like everybody I've met in the office, is super nice, but I don't call me every day. I'm grateful for that as much as, like everybody I've met in the office is super nice, but I don't have time to deal with it every day. So I am grateful that they consolidate it into a spreadsheet that I get once a quarter. I am happy about that. So I do understand the frustration, especially when you're feeling like, hey, this is something that feels urgent, it feels like a big, important thing. I completely understand and I'm sure if it was a concern that I had that I'd be feeling the exact same way.
Speaker 1:That said, again, the staff can't do anything about it. They can't and they're encouraged to comment as little as possible and just kind of forward that information on to us, and we might not get it for a couple of months, depending on when you contact the board. So how do you contact the board? There's a contact form page. You guys got a PDF with all this stuff so hopefully you guys can refer. If you don't have it, you're getting it. You can reference this later. But there is a contact form page. There isn't an email address, but that's just so that it just doesn't go to one person's email. It kind of goes to a queue where multiple staff members can handle it. So if somebody's on maternity leave or on vacation or their computer blew up, there's somebody else that can get to it. So that's one way.
Speaker 1:Also, anytime we do I don't want to say anything, but anytime we do just about anything when we're having meetings, there's a place where you can submit public comment. So maybe we don't have a rule about what we wear on Thursdays yet and you think there should be one. When we're having a meeting and you see that it's up, please submit for public comment. Hey, we should all have to wear green on Thursdays. Great, you can call that's. I don't know, it's 2025. I know people don't love using their phones, but that is totally an option and I've got the phone number in here.
Speaker 1:As far as the meetings go, like I said, as it gets closer there isn't an exact number of days. Well, there is actually, I think it's 30 days. By law, I think we're required to announce and put up our agenda like what our plan is. Obviously, it's a working document that can change over time and it usually does so. Normally, when I get my document done two or three weeks before the meeting, somebody will catch something and then it's either a non-issue or we have to delay it till the next meeting or something like that. That has happened I think every single meeting I've ever attended thus far.
Speaker 1:But yeah, if you see something on there that you're like I absolutely want to make public comment, you can do it in advance. If, for some reason, you can't attend the meeting. Or, again, you can attend in real life. It's a really pretty building, it's very cold, bring a jacket. Or you can attend virtually like this. We've been playing around with when exactly we have public comment, but everybody gets three minutes and what we've been experimenting with is having public comment at the beginning and at the end, just to try to make sure that if for some reason, you didn't log in right when it started, but there's something really pressing that you want to share with us, that we give you time at the end. Or maybe we said something super spicy and you're like I don't look good in purple. I'm not wearing purple pants. We get to hear from you rather at the end. And then I also put our YouTube channel on here Texas Behavioral Health Exec U 505. I don't know why it's that, but that's what it is. It's also very easy to search. I don't know if you guys are all YouTube users, knowing the limits continued.
Speaker 1:The board can't make rules that override state law, like I said, and I mentioned the rule that I find particularly irksome. But it also means that, for example, lpcs are allowed to get fully licensed within 18 months and MFTs it's 24 months, and I never understood before I was on the board why it was that way, and it was explained to me once I joined the board when I asked annoying questions oh, that's just the way the law was written, that's the way it is, and the board can't really do anything about that. It is frustrating that the legislator in Texas really only meets every other year and so when there are sort of things that we want to fix, repair, add, if we can't do it for some reason because the statute doesn't allow us to, then we are relegated really to the odd number year, the first half, and we have to have a legislator that kind of wants to write the bill, take it up, fight for it. And I don't know if anybody in here is interested in the counseling compact that was actually put up for vote, or well, I shouldn't say that it wasn't put up for vote. There was some legislation written for it in 2023, but other things took precedent. So it's back up again and I'm going to share that here, coming up soon and legislation that we're interested in.
Speaker 1:But we're fighting for attention, like all of our bills are fighting for attention, just like, you know, a bill about education or a bill about I don't know water rights, and sometimes you know, we just aren't always the sexiest topic for a lot of legislators. And also I learned this during my training I'm not really allowed like I can go to as a human. I can go to my representatives and say, hey, this bill or that bill is really important to me, but I'm not allowed to campaign for it Because I'm on the board. It's considered a conflict of interest. So what I am allowed to do is talk to you nice folks and tell you guys, hey, help me out here, spread the word. These are the bills that would make everybody's life and day better. Okay, so, speaking of current legislation, senate Bill 51 would bring the number of required supervision hours down to 100, which is far more possible in 24 months, meaning somebody about once a week for supervision. House Bill 1537, which would allow Texas to join the counseling compact, senate Bill 2587 and House Bill 1597 would both correct the statutory problems that staff has encountered when accessing federal criminal history databases for LPC associates. So I'm betting that everybody in here at this point has had to go through the fingerprint process at this point. The staff has had some issues. They can definitely look at what's going on in the state, but they've run into some issue just for the LPC board about looking outside of the state, and so this would kind of help plug that hole again that I mentioned earlier. Right, the current law is just written in such a way that it's fun. So I know I brought this up earlier. These are the bills that we're pretty on one about, if you will.
Speaker 1:I don't know where anybody lives in Texas. I'm assuming you guys are in Texas, but maybe you're not. If you are in Texas, there are websites where you can just go in, plug in your address and find out who your Texas representatives are, and you can do what I did. If you want to, you don't have to. If you have relationships with them, by all means text your buddy. If you don't, they usually have contact forms on their pages as well and say hey, these are the bills that I'm interested in. This is why I'm interested in them. You're my representative, and so I'm asking you to be interested, invested as well. Okay, if you guys want to stay in touch with me, I do have a newsletter, so you can go to my website, nicolemrichardsoncom and sign up for my newsletter there. Also, I created an e-course for parents that don't know where to start when it comes to talking to their kids about sex, sexuality and all that jazz, so I built an e-course for it.
Speaker 3:Nicole, there's a question here that says I understand the staff cannot comment on the rules, but who has the ability to explain the statutes and rules?
Speaker 1:So I would probably leave the explanation of a statute I would probably leave to the attorney because I have a big mouth the rules, we can explain them. They also have been doing a lot of leadership, like lunch and learns. They've been trying to do them, I think, once a quarter. They love for you to bring questions about rules and statutes because actually our executive director is there and he is an attorney and he knows those rules backwards and forwards, upside and down. But if you have a question about how does something apply for example, my dumb example, we wear green on Wednesdays, or whatever If you don't understand what that means like is it a certain shade?
Speaker 1:What if it's aqua? That is a great place to ask. You can also submit any questions that you have into any of those areas that I mentioned earlier. You can call. They may not give you an answer. They might tell you hey, we're going to kick this up to the board and have them answer. But you could totally call, you can totally submit an email and we will answer it as best we can. Sometimes it is in the open meeting so, again, attending, if you can, is a great way to do that, or watching the recording back can be another great way to do that.
Speaker 4:Hey, I have a question for you, nicole Hit me. So I sat in on a lunch and learn, probably around this time last year, and they were talking about the sunset review and going through and they were talking about how they're going. They have to like grandfather and redo the rollover of clinical hours from grad programs for LMFTs not supervision, but the clinical hours. Can you explain Because I'm sure somebody in here is going to have an associate at some point that goes why can't I bring my clinical hours over from grad school?
Speaker 1:The short answer is the statute. The longer answer is there are some they can roll over. And what I have been told repeatedly and this sounds like a non-answer, but I promise you this is what I have been told repeatedly the staff does their best. They, when they're give them everything right, say like okay, in my practicum I had this many direct, this many marriage and family or, if you're an LPC, this many direct, this many supervision. Give them all the data you have and they will do their best to find a way to give you as much credit as they can.
Speaker 1:I again, I talked about this a little bit earlier but the board kind of before and after BHEC, the board I felt like the staff before was kind of I don't want to say anything too spicy, maybe a little less friendly, and now it definitely feels like they're looking for ways to help us out. They're looking for ways. There's been a big initiative to especially because of the findings after this really terrible event when we found out that, like how access to mental health treatment is such a problem, there really is a big push to get as many clinicians as we can, and so they aren't looking for a gotcha moment, they aren't looking for ways to exclude. It's the opposite. They're looking for ways to get you in. They're looking for ways to give you an opportunity. So just submit everything is my I hate to use the word advice, but that would be my recommendation Submit it all. Give them all the data, which means you've got to keep all the data.
Speaker 3:Have all the data. I can speak to that from the LPC board standpoint that it used to be that you could carry over 400 hours, standpoint that it used to be that you could carry over 400 hours. And they took that away. And I sat in on the meeting where the discussion was about that and they were saying that people were doing just kind of ridiculous things to get hours in and that they weren't quality hours. They were getting quality supervision with it. And we argued that if you're in a cake rep accredited program, your program requires you to have 700 hours and so that's 400 above what you need and within those 700 hours you have an hour of individual supervision and an hour and a half of group every week. So you have two and a half hours or two and a half times the required supervision. And they basically just said we can't make exceptions for accredited programs.
Speaker 2:Hey badass listeners, quick pause. If you're tired of spinning your wheels and ready to grow a private practice that actually pays the bills, you need to check out my Smart Practice Sprint. This live four-day virtual experience is designed to help you simplify your marketing, structure a HIPAA-compliant business and book more clients fast. And the best part, day one is totally free. It starts June 2nd, so go to katewalkertrainingcom slash bonus to grab your spot now. That's katewalkertrainingcom slash bonus, because it's time to stop guessing and start growing. All right back to the show and start growing.
Speaker 3:All right back to the show. I have a question for you about when BHEC first was started and everything was just getting off the ground, One of the things that they said that they were going to do was look for parity in the professions. So, like you, guys have to have 100 hours of supervision, or it's 200 hours of supervision, no less than 24 hours. Lpcs have to have four hours a month until you hit your hours in no less than 18 months, and so if you just do the math on that, lpc could be licensed with 72 hours of supervision and an LMFT currently requires 200. But they can carry over some from grad school, lpcs can't. So do you have any information on where they might be in that and looking at where is it appropriate to have parity and where is it not?
Speaker 1:Oh, we are looking, but again it kind of goes back to statute and the way the law was written doesn't allow us to change the supervision requirements as much as we'd love to, which is why we're trying to find ways to make it easier.
Speaker 1:We're supporting legislation that creates that parity. Also, where we can and this is usually part of our document dump, at least once a quarter, we're looking at ways in which we are not just with the other BHEC boards in line, but we're also looking at how we're in line or not with other states. So whether that's renewal fees, continuing at the number of continuing and you have to have per year, or you know, because in some states you renew annually and some states you renew I think there was one state you renew every 10 years or something wild like that. So kind of looking at like where, not just where we fit with the other boards our sister boards, if you will but also where we fit with other boards and other states. So we are looking to I don't want to say parity necessarily, but we're looking to see where we fit.
Speaker 1:Are we exhausting people with too many continuing ed? Do we have not enough continuing ed? We look at that regularly as well. It's very interesting. We look at that regularly as well. It's very interesting. In Alaska the NFT renewal rates are something like fourteen hundred dollars.
Speaker 3:Holy moly.
Speaker 1:The next time you get upset about writing that check. Well, I guess it's not a check anymore. Right, it's something you pay online.
Speaker 3:But next, time you get upset about putting in your card information, remember at least I'm not in Alaska. However, if you do live in Alaska, if you've lived there for two years, every resident gets a check from the state every year for oil and gas money.
Speaker 1:I lived there for three years. That's a true statement. Yes, it varies, but it helps offset the cost of living. Oh wow, yeah, you don't get that in hawaii, just putting that out there. Hawaii is also expensive to live in.
Speaker 1:They don't give you oil money you know they have regular sunrise and sunset hours, not a winter, a dark winter and the summer when the sun is down for four hours yep, well, look, I mean the summer is weird and winter is weird, but you, you know if you like winter sports, which I don't, but if you do, then it's a great place. It's a good option. Very cold. I know how to build and properly use an igloo, if anybody's interested. Skills you never thought you'd acquire that I do not use here at all. And, fun fact, the outdoor survival is part of the public school curriculum there. It's because it's necessary. If any of you read Hatchet as a kid, yeah, that's real life in Alaska.
Speaker 4:It's a thing, I do have a question. You were talking about that course you created. Is that specifically for parents or is it geared towards therapists who are helping parents?
Speaker 1:It's geared toward caregivers.
Speaker 1:I said parents, but it's geared toward primary caregivers and not for therapists, because I kind of set it up such that when I was working with a lot of CPS clients this is where I got the idea I found that a lot of them had a lot of as I'm sure you guys can imagine a lot of sexual trauma themselves, and nobody had ever really given them the talk, and so a lot of them were just kind of avoiding the conversation with their kids.
Speaker 1:And so when I was looking for resources to give these parents, I found a lot of like condoms, condoms, condoms, the pill and wait until you're married. And those are both interesting conversations, but neither one is complete and neither one is necessarily reflective of every single parent or caregiver. And so in the course, what I have the caregiver do is kind of do a deep dive on what their own values are and what they want their kids to know about their body, about relationships, about sexuality and when for them. And this should be something that every parent gets to decide what they tell their kid as a parent do you want it to be when they marry, or do you want it to be when they're 18, in a relationship where they're respected and valued and treated well. Once you figure out what those values are, then how do you communicate them in an age appropriate way? So it's really not for therapists Although, yeah, if you guys want to take it, I'm totally open to that and getting feedback from it but it really is meant for caregivers.
Speaker 4:Awesome. I imagine it was very interesting working with CPS.
Speaker 1:That is a good word, interesting is a good word. I assume that I'm not the only person in here that did. My experience was that CPS has two kinds of caseworkers. They have really dedicated, loving two kinds of caseworkers. They have really dedicated, loving, caring people that work way too much and they're really overwhelmed and they do their best with not enough. And then there are these people on a power trip who almost find it entertaining to take families and rip them to shreds, and that part always broke my heart. So I don't miss that work. It was important and I learned a lot and I never, ever, want to do it again.
Speaker 4:It's a good experience.
Speaker 1:Just like building an igloo. Yes, not all. Unlike that. I hate being cold and I hated that too. It's faster to build an igloo, though I'll tell you that I believe that. Do all the stupid CPS paperwork.
Speaker 4:So we talk about the counseling compact. I know from like the LPC side. Can you explain, Cause I didn't know the counseling compact would also apply to LMFTs? I didn't either. It doesn't.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's what I thought it doesn't, but just because it doesn't directly impact the MFT, so just as be heck, we're in support of that. There was some talk when I initially joined the board about something akin to the counseling compact that's for marriage and family therapists, and I was like, why aren't we doing this? Like a volunteer's tribute, like yes, let's do that. And the long and the short of it is that it costs millions of dollars. And so when somebody kind of explained it to me step by step why we're not doing it, we don't have that kind of money to set it up, to create a database, to have a group that comes together and says, all right, these are the standards and this is how we're going to decide a state can come in or not, this is how a clinician is or is not in compliance with us.
Speaker 1:Like that's a whole deal and it costs money, not just to set it up. There's a lot of initial costs associated with that, but there's also costs associated with maintaining it. And I think we were told we could join if we had a like two million dollars lying around, which I didn't, so I shut up. That is a good way to get me to be quiet, as if you ask me for a lot of money, I don't have it just sit down.
Speaker 3:So I know that the lpcs are going to an online continuing ad database where we're going to have to upload. Is that for everybody in BHEC?
Speaker 1:It's for everybody in BHEC. It's called CE Broker. So we have gotten a lot of questions about this and I think there's going to be more questions to come. So we've moved to an online system where we kind of do everything now. Right, you renew online, you do everything online now. This obviously wasn't the case back in my day. You had to do everything by paper and you had to have two copies the original that you sent to the board and the copy that you're saving for yourself in case the board said they didn't get something when you were like, I know it was in the packet because I put it in there and I have a copy of it. So we're moving to something called CE Broker.
Speaker 1:Other states have done this, including, but not limited to, florida and, I think, new York, and there's a handful of other states, and so, basically, my understanding and I don't know exactly how it's going to work on the user side of it, but my understanding is so please don't get mad at me if I'm wrong when you log in to Renew, when it asks you if you have completed all of your continuing education, you're going to go into this portal through CE broker. That's just the company that's running it because there's a lot of infrastructure and memory and data and all that stuff costs money and we don't have the unlimited funds for that. So you go in through this broker and you upload. You can just scan. So let's pretend this is the certificate for today's deal, right? You can just scan it into your computer and upload it. Or, if you have it already downloaded, you can upload it into the portal and CE broker and they help you make sure that you're in compliance.
Speaker 1:So I need three hours of this, six hours of that. I know that's all super fun to keep track of. I've got my jurisprudence here. I've got this, I've got that For MFTs, we're supposed to have three hours of basically how to not be naughty on the computer. And there's a we have a better word for it, but that my brain is freezing and so CE Broker will help you categorize all of it to make sure you have not just all your hours but all of the right hours in the right buckets. So if you're a supervisor, obviously you need those hours, and if you don't have them for some reason and this is where CE Broker is able to offer this to us for free If you don't have them CE Broker can go.
Speaker 1:Hey, by the way, we've got some over here and you can just buy it here. You can buy them wherever you want CE Broker. You don't have to get them through CE Broker. You can get all of your continuing in through Kate Walker for the rest of your life. But you can also get them through CE Broker and they're going to be sort of like levels.
Speaker 1:Again, everybody's going to have access to it for free, but they're going to have like a concierge level where you basically just give them a bunch of money and they go. Here are all the courses that you need to take and then you can just sort of not have to make another decision. Not that any of us are tired of making decisions, but yes, everybody in BHEC will have to use CE Broker. We're going to roll it out in September and you'll be able to set up your account in September, so you don't have to wait till the last minute If you're a planner and an organizer, right, and I would honestly recommend getting in there, playing with it and then kind of seeing how it works, so that you can tell your supervisees what to expect. That's probably what I'm gonna do, did.
Speaker 3:I answer your question. Yes, yes, you did Not this last time that I renewed, but the time before that I have a ton. Half of my practice is supervision. I normally have anywhere from 12 to 20 supervisees. Two of my supervisees are here as a part of their supervision. Tonight. We were already scheduled for supervision when Kate asked me to do this and I said can I make my supervisees come for supervision? And so a couple of them are here, but I had gone online.
Speaker 3:I got my little card said renew. I went online, I renewed my license and I renewed at the end of January and it was like the first week of February. I was like I don't remember getting my license. I was like I don't remember getting my license. And so I went into the system and checked and it said that I was delinquent or expired I can't remember which one comes first and I was like what the heck? I don't remember getting my license. What's going on? So I called them and they said you were selected for audit. And I went oh no, I was not. You know how am I supposed to know I was selected for audit? And they said well, it was on the card. And I'm like there's no way. There's no way. That was on there.
Speaker 3:Luckily, I had saved the little thing I got and I went and not only was it at the top of it, it was at the bottom of it as well. But because I knew I was going to renew online, I didn't even look at it, I just went online and renewed. And so then I was like dude, I've got all these supervisees, you have to help me. And so he just said here, get all your stuff together real quickly. But my stuff was all over everywhere.
Speaker 3:Before that, I had some stuff that was electronic. I had some stuff that was in a file, and so I quickly created a spreadsheet and started, and I knew I had some stuff that was electronic. I had some stuff that was in a file, and so I quickly created a spreadsheet and started, and I knew I had enough. I always have way more than what I need, and so I hadn't really paid that much attention to it because I knew I had what I needed. And so the staff member was great. He said just email all this to me and I'll take care of it. And so I had to quickly tell my supervisees my license is expired, but we're taking care of it.
Speaker 1:So I'm excited about this.
Speaker 3:CE broker thing. I think it will be great that you know you'll have everything there organized together.
Speaker 1:I've gotten much, much better after that experience. I am much better about keeping track of them half an hour, scanning, uploading, scanning, uploading. And it got to the point where there was no more memory and I was afraid. I said, you know, I remember it, just like you, I had more than I needed, I had more than the minimum, but I had attested to like, oh, I had, let's just call it, 80 hours. I have 80 hours and so I thought I was going to be in trouble if I didn't prove 80 hours. But it was only letting me submit like 60. And I'm like, well, what happened? So I'm emailing them frantically, I'm like it won't let me. They're like it's fine, we're good, Like well, I'm now, you're done.
Speaker 1:But that's another reason that we're moving to a system like CE broker.
Speaker 1:They can only audit something like five to 10% of our continuing ed, and that was something that not the sunset commission it was a different sort of study found that it was like not cool that we, as the board, we weren't more aware and I don't mean me, the board, I mean the staff board weren't more aware of if people were in compliance with this particular rule and we didn't have a lot of great ways to figure that out, other than an audit where you're having to you know frantically at the last minute to make sure that you don't get in, get a big naughty submit, submit, submit, submit or email it all in. And so CE broker is how we're solving that. This way no one can renew when they're not compliant, at least with this thing. Right, it doesn't prevent you from doing other naughty things, but we're hoping. The idea is that if you're going to trainings and you're doing everything else in earnest, that you're probably not sending nudes to your clients and doing other very silly things.
Speaker 3:I applied for my license in Colorado. I had an associate that moved to Colorado and you can use your Colorado hours to get your Texas license and vice versa. But she had to have a supervisor who either a supervisor in both places or a supervisor who was licensed in both. I agreed to get my Colorado license so that I could keep supervising her. I wouldn't do that for just anybody.
Speaker 3:And Alex and Colleen, it's not that I don't love you she was in a group of students that I had promised. I was a professor at SFA and I had promised them that I would not retire until they graduated. And things just got to the point that I had to go, and so I left a year before they graduated, and I mean I would have sold my first child for them because I felt so guilty that I broke a promise. So when she said you get licensed in Colorado, it was like for you, sarah, I will get licensed in Colorado. But when I got it, first of all you only have to have six hours of supervision training to be a supervisor, and so I was like, okay, well, yeah, I've got 40 plus more. So then you just attest that, yeah, I have that training.
Speaker 3:And so yeah, it was pinky promise here. And then I reached out and said, so, will I get a certificate? I mean, what am I gonna get? And they were like, oh, no. The next time I said where do I have to upload, where do I have to prove this? And she said no. The next time you were new, just tell us, you took the training, okay then apply to colorado in texas.
Speaker 3:So this is applying for colorado. Real quick, I'm going to tell you, their jurisprudence test was hard and part of it is because their rules are not like Texas where everything is laid out. The rules are like three or four pages long and it'll say here's the rule about this. Go look at this law over here. Here's the rule about this. So we have to do Texas Family Code, but a lot of that is also spelled out in hours. I mean, you had to do such a deep dive into different codes to find out what the rules were and it's not a no fail test like Texas.
Speaker 4:OK, I do have one more question before you end. So there was a new LMFT rule adopted in March. It's 801.115. So it's talking about applicants who are currently licensed in another jurisdiction. So it's talking about applicants who are currently licensed in another jurisdiction. So it says, like, if they have 3000 hours of work experience and 1500 hours of direct clinical services and the 200 all that, what happens if they don't?
Speaker 1:OK, so I think you're talking about the. Is it the temporary license rule?
Speaker 4:says applicants currently licensed as an LMFT in another jurisdiction.
Speaker 1:And that's all it says. And then there's three little points and then it moves on to something else. So what if you don't? Again, because we are focused on shoring up the fact that we don't have enough. There are people in Texas that need mental health treatment that aren't getting served. We are looking for ways the staff is looking for ways to get people licensed, so if they don't meet all the requirements, they will make a recommendation. They might say something like hey, you don't meet all of our requirements, but if you do this thing or if you take this training, we will count that and then that'll fill the gap. They are looking for ways to include, not exclude.
Speaker 4:Make sense. Yeah, they are looking for ways to include, not exclude. Makes sense. Yes, because that's something that people are going to ask, you know, especially if MFTs can't become part of any sort of counseling compact. Well then, people are going to want to apply to Texas, and I know like Utah requires 4000 hours for LPCs and if you come in from a state that doesn't require 4000 hours, they'll require you to get those additional hours.
Speaker 1:So yeah, there's. It's a good question. There was another rule and I think it's just worth noting. There's another rule that we rolled out about temporary licenses. So let's say you're licensed in Utah and you don't want to be fully licensed in Texas. There is a new rule now where people can be temporarily licensed in Texas and I wanna say it allows someone to practice one calendar year up to 30 sessions and the idea is, say somebody's moving from Utah to Texas and they've been in therapy with you for a very long time and I don't know about you, but I find moving rather stressful and that doesn't mean that I don't need support in that time and it certainly doesn't mean I have the bandwidth to make yet another choice right and find yet another provider or like it's super easy to find a provider. So the idea is that temporary license helps that Utah person not be breaking Texas law by treating that client while they're here. But it is meant to be a bridge, not a permanent solution.
Speaker 1:Perfect, Thank you. This is awesome. Thank you, it was nice meeting everybody. Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate your time Awesome. Thank y'all. Have a good night, Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thanks for listening. If today's episode got you fired up to finally build the private practice you've been dreaming about, don't miss the Smart Practice Sprint. It's happening virtually so you can join from anywhere. Starting June 2nd, we'll spend four days getting your messaging clear, your HIPAA compliance dialed in and your client calendar moving from crickets to booked Head to katewalkertrainingcom. Slash bonus to register, remember, night one is completely free.
Speaker 2:And here's the exciting part I'll be taking this sprint on the road in Texas. Soon I'm going to be coming to DFW, austin, houston, el Paso. So wherever you are, I'll be coming to a city near you. Can't wait to see you inside the Sprint and maybe shake your hand in person real soon. I'm Dr Kate Walker. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you to the lovely Ridgely Walker for the interesting facts about me that we've used in our introduction and do me a favor when you get a second, please like, share and subscribe and write us a review. That's really how we get picked up by other RSS feeds and we get this information out to the mental health badasses who need it. Thanks again, and keep saving the world with excellent therapy. You.