As Illinois faces
shortages of health care practitioners and mental health professionals, the
state agency in charge of licensing for those and more than 100 other
industries has struggled to keep up.
The Illinois
Department of Financial and Professional Regulation has failed to meet its
goals to speed up both initial licensing and renewals in key industries as
applications to the agency grew by 15% between 2019 and 2022. IDFPR’s director
called the situation a “crisis” earlier this fall when testifying before
lawmakers at a committee hearing on the issues facing the agency.
Last week, the General Assembly approved a measure to help IDFPR move beyond its antiquated systems and – at least temporarily – assist those awaiting license renewal. The measure cleared the General Assembly unanimously and needs only a signature from the governor to become law.
D-Deerfield, who sponsored the bill in the House, said with legislative approval, IDFPR would be able to batch-renew licenses for those who’ve been waiting “not days, not weeks, but months – up to six to eight months.”
House Bill 2394 also calls for IDFPR to contract
with a technology vendor to build a new computer software system within three
months of Gov. JB Pritzker’s signature on the bill, and to have that system up
and running three months after that. In a September hearing, IDFPR Secretary
Mario Treto Jr. told lawmakers his agency is hamstrung by 1990s-era technology
that doesn’t allow the agency to add new types of licenses to its online
system, even as more types of professional licensure have come under the agency’s
purview.
As a result, IDFPR has
seen “an onslaught of paper applications,” Treto said, contributing to
“historic wait times.” A sizeable number of the 104,000 total applications the
agency received last year were submitted on paper via snail mail.
Earlier this year, the
agency had been in talks with an existing state vendor that’s already under a
“master contract,” which would have sped up the often-slow process of
contracting with a new company. But in the September hearing, Treto revealed
the agency had walked away from those talks once IDFPR leaders realized the
vendor wouldn’t have been able to meet the agency’s specific needs.
“And candidly, we were
quite disappointed with the news,” Treto said.
In that same hearing,
leaders of industry groups aired their frustrations with IDFPR’s licensing
delays.
Daniel Stasi, a
consultant with the Illinois Mental Health Counselors Association, noted he’s
been the point person for licensing-related issues for 24 years.
“Very little has
changed,” Stasi said in September. “The wait is actually longer.”
Illinois State Medical
Society executive senior vice president David Porter told lawmakers that the
most concerning aspect of IDFPR’s current licensing system is the “lack of
transparency” from the agency.
“Applicants tell us
that there’s no real way for them to obtain status updates on their
applications or renewals, and there’s virtually no chance to be able to connect
with someone at the department by phone or email who can provide such updates,”
Porter said. “Most frustrating to new applicants is that they are rarely
notified when their applicants are deemed to be insufficient or incomplete,
which adds days or weeks to when they can expect to obtain a license.”
Treto assured
lawmakers he’s been speaking with his counterparts in other states to get ideas
about how to improve IDFPR’s systems – and said Illinois isn’t alone in facing
licensure issues. But, he said, some states seem to have figured it out.
Oklahoma, for example, has reduced its call volume by 95%.
Dilpreet Raju contributed to this article.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit,
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by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, along
with major contributions from the Illinois Broadcasters Foundation and Southern
Illinois Editorial Association.
