May 27, 2022
Many thanks to those NYS Council members who weighed in on the draft bill language we shared with everyone this morning regarding the clinical scope of practice issue as it relates to Article 163 practitioners. Based on your feedback, the attached statement was sent to key lawmakers and their staff, central staff and others who have been working on a solution to these problems. Since the language we shared with you has yet to be introduced in the Assembly, and since there are no bill numbers yet, we elected to keep our message short and straightforward. It signals our support for the concepts embedded in the draft language, and (hopefully) provides some early cover to those lawmakers who have already experienced pushback from those who would oppose the changes in the draft bill.
I want to be clear that the NYS Council has intensified our push on the state agencies for the release of formal guidance pertaining to the potential end of the exemption for our workforce (currently scheduled to sunset 6/24) if there are no legislative fixes. I wrote a letter yesterday (11 associations signed on) that I sent to OMH Commissioner Ann Sullivan, imploring the Office to quickly consult with stakeholders and then release guidance that speaks to the many human resource issues associated with the sunset of the exemption without fixes. I also signed the NYS Council on to a letter that was sent to OASAS Commissioner Cunningham yesterday.
Throughout the weekend, I will keep you informed of what’s happening. The Legislative Session is currently set to conclude on June 2. That means a bill that reflects the language of the draft we shared this morning needs to be introduced quickly. Once the bill is introduced, Assemblywoman Deborah Glick would need to convene her Higher Ed Committee to pass the bill out of Committee and move it to the floor for a vote before the end of session AND the Senate would also need to pass a ‘same as’ version. Stay tuned.
Note: Two docs attached:
1) Group message we sent to lawmakers in support of the draft bill language
2) 5/24/2022 draft bill language. This is the same version I sent to everyone this morning