Relating to supervision requirements for licensed marital and family therapists, mental health counselors, and social workers, and including effective date provisions

This bill relates to supervision requirements for licensed marital and family therapists, mental health counselors, and social workers and provides an effective date. The bill provides that the board of social work and the board of behavioral science shall not require that supervision of an applicant for a license as a social worker, marital or family therapist, or mental health counselor be completed in-person. The bill allows licensed marital and family therapists and mental health counselors eligible to practice without supervision to supervise applicants for an independent social worker license. The bill provides that the board of behavioral science shall not require supervised clinical experience for marital or family therapists or mental health counselors. The bill allows licensed marital and family therapists and mental health counselors eligible to practice without supervision and licensed independent social workers to supervise applicants for a marital and family therapist license or mental health counselor license.4(2)(b). The bill directs the board of social work and the board of behavioral science to amend their administrative rules to remove any requirement for supervised clinical experience and supervised professional practice to be completed in-person as a condition for the licensure of marital and family therapists, mental health counselors, and social workers. The bill requires the board of social work and board of behavioral science to adopt emergency rules. The rules shall be effective immediately upon filing unless a later date is specified in the rules.4, subsection 1. The bill requires the board of social work and the board of behavioral science to jointly develop rules through a collaborative process. The respective boards may establish subcommittees or designate other personnel to facilitate the process. The adopted rules shall consist of substantively identical standards applicable to the professions regulated by the respective boards and shall, to the greatest extent possible, consist of substantially similar language in a substantially similar format. Prior to a vote to adopt the rules by either board, each board shall, by a separate vote, approve the language to be adopted by the other board. Neither board shall vote to adopt such rules until the rules to be adopted by both boards have been so approved. Such rules shall have the same effective date and shall be submitted to the administrative rules coordinator and the administrative code editor for publication in the same issue of the Iowa administrative bulletin. The bill takes effect upon enactment.