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| Posted at: 8/1/2010 |
| Headline: Lobbyist |
| Expire Time: 9/25/2010 |
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Virginia General Assembly 2010 Session: Key Items of Interest to LCSWs
The 2010 session of the General Assembly convened Wednesday, January 13, 2010, and adjourned on Sunday, March 21, 2010, one day later than scheduled. Members of the General Assembly have been consumed with matching declining state revenues with state programs and services.
Scope of Practice:
No legislative action was offered to alter the basic Virginia statutes on social work licensure. Senator Toddy Puller (D-Fairfax) filed two bills at the request of the Virginia Department of Corrections for legislative authority to use licensed clinical social workers (LCSWs) to administer and oversee sex offender treatment programs. The bills are currently before the Governor for his action. The term in the legislation is “licensed mental health professional who is a certified sex offender treatment provider.”
Summary of Legislation:
Prisons: Treatment and Control of Prisoners. Requires a licensed psychiatrist or licensed clinical psychologist who is experienced in the diagnosis, treatment, and risk assessment of sex offenders to oversee sex offender treatment programs in the Virginia Department of Corrections. The program shall be administered by a licensed psychiatrist, licensed clinical psychologist, or a licensed mental health professional who is a certified sex offender treatment provider (SB 528). And as a sex offender treatment provider may perform a screening for an initial determination of whether a prisoner meets the definition of a sexually violent predator when there is no specific scientifically validated instrument to measure the risk assessment of a prisoner (SB 529).
Health Insurance: The state Bureau of Insurance requested that the General Assembly pass legislation to clarify the Virginia Law of Parity as related to the federal statute. Senator Houck filed SB 706, which is before the Governor for his action. The bill removes the benefit limitations applicable to coverage for inpatient, partial hospitalization, and outpatient mental health and substance abuse services under large group health insurance policies. Under this measure, coverage for such services under large group policies will not be more restrictive than for other illness. The existing limitations will continue to apply to individual and small group policies.
Virginia’s parity provisions provide that benefits will be within parity with the medical and surgical benefits contained in the coverage, in accordance with the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008.
Medicaid: The General Assembly took action in The Appropriations Act in several key areas:
• Therapeutic Day Treatment: Therapeutic day treatment will be reduced by 3% in state Fiscal Year 2011 and 4% in state Fiscal Year 2012. If the Federal Government increases Medicaid, Federal Medicaid Assistance Percentages (FMAP) are available, the state Fiscal Year 2011 funding is restored.
• Psychiatric Residential Treatment Facilities: Residential psychiatric facilities will be reduced by 3% in state Fiscal Year 2011 and 4% in state Fiscal Year 2012. If additional Medicaid, Federal Medicaid Assistance Percentages (FMAP) are available, the reduction in state FY 2011 will not occur.
• Intensive In Home Services: The Virginia Department of Medicaid Assistance Services is directed to work with the Virginia Department of Behavioral Health & Disability Services (DBHDS) and the Virginia Association of Community Service Boards (VACSB) to establish rates for intensive in-home service within certain parameters -- “to establish rates for the Intensive In-Home Service based on quality indicators and standards, such as the use of evidence-based practices."
State Mental Health Services for Children: The adopted state budget continues to provide acute inpatient services for seriously emotionally disturbed children and adolescents at the Commonwealth Center for Children and Adolescents in Staunton.
Designating Professional Social Work Month: The General Assembly passed Senate Joint Resolution 23 designating March 2010 as Professional Social Work Month and each succeeding year thereafter.
Christopher J. Spanos
Government and Public Affairs Counselor
E-mail: ChrisSpanos@SpanosConsulting.com
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