Alan Entin asked me why I would give up my council seat at APA for the lowly job of Treasurer of Division 42. I told Alan that I have been working for years to create a C-6 for the Division. Tommy Stigall’s committee last year helped to clarify the possibility of a C-6 designation for the Division of Independent Practice. Let me illustrate some concepts, which may evolve from this premise.

The Division of Independent Practice is not an institution; it is an instrument for preserving and advancing the practicing psychologist. It is basically an organization of advocacy and political action. As such, I offer a modest proposal as to how we might better function in the services of the practicing psychologist.

The Division should logically be a C-6 and be able to devote all of its energies to the well being of practicing psychologists. How might this be done? I believe that the members would gladly pay dues to a C-6 organization and create a cash flow of approximately a quarter of a million dollars. One hundred thousand dollars of this money annually would be devoted to housekeeping, meetings and organizational needs. I wish we could spend less on this. The rest of the one and fifty thousand dollars would be divided into ten $15,000 units which would be used to support lawsuits, political contributions, support of various state efforts to create essential laws to the benefit of practicing psychologists in coordination with APP and the Practice Directorate.

What would we do with the $300,000 that we have been saving for rainy day money considering that practicing psychologists have had a rainy day for the past twenty years and have not found anything worthy of investing this money? Remember I said Division 42 is not an institution; it is an instrument. Frankly, I think this money has become a means in itself since we find great difficulty in being able to pursue the purposes of our Division. If we cannot make meaningful use of this money because we cannot use it to advance or defend our profession, I wonder if it would be wise to donate it to the C-3 branch of the practice directorate so we could free up the C-6 part to do good works for practice.

There have been many numbers of minor efforts to educate and assist therapists and I am quite sure that over the many years we have benefited our members in many ways. But, year after year, we are relegated to a subservient position within our own profession serving the clerks and managers of managed care. The profits of managed care organizations are enormous. The incomes of practicing psychologists have diminished. It is time to try something where we can apply the resources of our members to the correction of circumstances, which offends our dignity and curtails the professional status of all psychologists.

The concept is a fragment of the multitudes of discussions that are taking place. Let us mount a comprehensive assault and take back our profession. It is a good thing to educate ourselves. It would be better to educate our opponents as to the difficulties they may encounter hereafter in inhibiting our right to practice.

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