Your government relations team at the American Counseling Association continues to push the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to begin hiring counselors in its health care system. News reports regularly cite the need to increase veterans’ access to mental health services, but VA clinics and facilities appear uninterested in hiring
Category: Washington Update
Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (the VA) announced that it was adding Mental Health Counselors and Marriage and Family Therapists to its workforce as part of the hiring of an additional 1,900 mental health staff nationwide that VA announced last week. Included in the announcement was this quote
Breaking recent precedent, the House of Representatives, the Senate and President Barack Obama agreed to a legislative package extending payroll tax relief, unemployment benefits and Medicare physician payment rates more than a week before each was set to expire at the end of February. The House approved the final package
February 16, 2012 Public Policy Conference Call (Click the link to listen) ACA’s public policy staff hosted a conference call on Thursday, February 16th, from 2 – 3 p.m. ET regarding policy issues they are working on, including the president’s budget, Medicare coverage and Veterans Administration developments. The next public policy
The Elementary and Secondary School Counseling Program (ESSCP) is one of the most competitive discretionary grant programs operated by the U.S. Department of Education. The program provides grants to local education agencies (LEAs) for the development and support of school counseling services. There has been so much interest in ESSCP
The Department of Defense (DoD) has finally issued regulations allowing licensed professional counselors to practice independently within the TRICARE program, which provides health care coverage to more than 9 million military service members, retirees and their dependents. The agency’s regulations were released in the Federal Register of Dec. 27, 2011,
Members of Congress are expressing frustration with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and its delivery of mental health services. Lawmakers voiced concerns during two recent congressional hearings, one held in the Senate and another held two days later in the House of Representatives. Concerns regarding veterans’ access to care
On Oct. 20, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee approved legislation, with modest bipartisan support, to reauthorize federal elementary and secondary education programs in a 15-to-7 vote. The legislation rewrites the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA, most recently authorized in 2001 as the No Child Left Behind Act)
Partisan differences within Congress on education spending and policy are coming to a head. Appropriations committees in both the House of Representatives and the Senate have drafted competing education spending proposals for federal Fiscal Year 2012, and the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) plans to take
Congressional leaders and President Obama reached a deal to raise the debt ceiling mere hours before the United States would have begun defaulting on its financial obligations for the first time in the nation’s history. The agreement, the Budget Control Act of 2011, was approved by the House of Representatives