Counseling compact official: system ready; Kansas to set modest out‑of‑state privilege fee

The Professional Counselors Advisory Committee of the Kansas Behavioral Sciences Regulatory Board heard an update on the Counseling Compact from Executive Director Greg Searls, who said the compact has 38 member jurisdictions (37 states plus Washington, D.C.) and is aiming to begin issuing multistate privileges in late summer or early fall.

The Counseling Compact creates a privilege to practice across participating jurisdictions without a separate full license in each state. Greg Searls, executive director of the Counseling Compact Commission, told the committee the compact’s system will let a licensee create an account, select which other jurisdictions they want a privilege in, pay an administrative fee to the commission and, where required, complete jurisdictional jurisprudence steps before a privilege issues.

“We are coming up on the end of year 1 of that contract, and are getting close to that minimally viable product so that we'll be able to begin issuing privileges,” Searls said. He said the commission adopted a $30 administrative fee per privilege and that individual states will set their own state privilege fees; Kansas staff proposed setting the Kansas out‑of‑state privilege…