Legislation Updates
First, we would like to thank and congratulate all of our incredible LPCA Members for your hard work and advocacy. We received the following response from Gabriel Sterling, the COO at the Secretary of State's office, to our recent Call to Action concerning the Secretary of State and the delay in implementing the Counseling Compact.
We here at LPCA would like to share this response (in BLACK) and our thoughts (in GREEN).
"Dear Senator/Representative,
We are aware that the LPCA (Licensed Professional Counselors Association) has sent a letter to all their members requesting them to reach out to their Senator and Representative to express frustration with the implementation timeline of the Counseling Compact. As background, Georgia passed legislation in 2021 to enter an interstate compact known as the “Professional Counselors Licensure Compact” that reports to the national administrative body “Counseling Compact Commission”. There was no additional funding provided for this venture. Before we could move forward, The “Counseling Compact Commission” had to appoint members, make rules and prepare a system to work with all states.
There are many issues with their statement, and this is where we are in the process.
1. The Counseling Compact group is currently beta testing in two states projected to be ready to go live at the end of September. Only one of those states has an application developed but has not been approved by their boards for use at this time.
Our Thoughts:
The subcontractor informed the LPCA Executive Director that she was to convey the message that Pennsylvania and Florida are currently beta testing the system. According to both the Counseling Compact public meeting and the official website, the first two states to beta test will be the first two states to "open" the Counseling Compact.
2. The Counseling Compact group has not finalized their policies and rules regarding data sharing and the procedure in case of accidental Personal Identifying Information (PII) being released. It is our understanding they will be adopting these rules and procedures at their September meeting and anticipate it will be ready by the end of September. At that point our CIO and IT security team will evaluate them to make sure they will protect the PII of those who have entrusted our office with its care. https://counselingcompact.gov/compact-commission/rulemaking/
Our Thoughts:
The process and rules are well-documented, and other states are already engaged in beta testing and preparing to open...
3. When implementing a new compact, license, or initiative that involves other partners, our policy is to let others go first and work out all the issues that may arise so that we can move forward with a smooth transition. This protects our licensees and applicants from unnecessary frustrations. This has always proved a prudent action.
Our Thoughts:
And here lies the issue: “When implementing a new compact, license, or initiative that involves other partners, our policy is to let others go first…”
Attendees at this year’s LPCA Convention had already participated in a successful beta test of the system. Afterwards, during an ACA meeting, the software company used the data from our convention for another round of beta testing and once again confirmed that the software was functioning smoothly.
4. The Counseling Compact group has stated that all states should be onboarded no later than January 2026. We anticipate moving forward this Fall once we are confident that these policies and processes work securely and efficiently.
Additionally, the $4 Million in funding was redirected by the legislature, with the savings from coming in under budget on earlier projects, to upgrade the entire licensing software system that supports 43 Boards and 220 individual license types.
Our Thoughts:
They used all that funding just to upgrade the existing software—not to implement a new system? Follow the money…
The Secretary, the Board and the Agency are firmly committed to implementing this. We are scheduled to be onboarding sometime in the Fall. We are actively working to get it established safely and securely for the citizens of Georgia."
Our Thoughts:
We would like to note that LPCA has not had to issue a Call to Action to our members in quite some time thanks to the consistent support of Georgia lawmakers over the years.
We also want to thank Amanda Allen, Executive Director of the Georgia Composite Board of Professional Counselors, Social Workers, and Marriage and Family Therapists, for her dedication and hard work despite the ongoing challenges within leadership at the Secretary of State’s office.
We hope others will follow Amanda’s example of dedication, focused effort, and commitment to progress.