Page 10 - BusinessWest April 15, 2024

EDITORIAL >>
A Critical Time for the State
AIM President and CEO Brook Thomson calls it an inflection point, a critical time for the state and its business community. And while this might sound like hyperbole — something that could be said every decade or so — it isn’t.
This is really an important juncture for Massachusetts, a time when a number of powerful forces are colliding to make the state more expensive, less competitive with other states and other regions, and less able to cope with all the trauma in the business world today.
These forces include changes in where and how people work, a deep housing crisis, a persistent workforce crisis, changing demographics, fall- ing tax revenues, declining commercial property values, climate change, soaring energy costs ... the list goes on.
Many of these forces, as Thomson noted in her interview with Busi- nessWest (see story on page 4), are interconnected, as evidenced, in a very forceful way, by Boston Mayor Michelle Wu’s recent decision to file legislation to raise commercial property tax rates amid a sharp decline in values post-COVID.
Values are declining, in the case of the Hub’s office towers, because more people are working remotely or on hybrid schedules, which put fewer
OPINION >>
people in those towers. Wu wants to raise the commercial rate because the only alternative when it comes to raising vital property-tax revenue would be to pass the burden on to residents. And she can’t do that because those same residents are already being burdened by rising valuations and soaring costs across the board.
That’s why many of them are leaving — for North Carolina, Texas, Tennessee, and other states where there are not only good jobs, but homes that people can actually afford.
The exodus is becoming acute, and if it keeps up, Massachusetts simply won’t have the talent it needs to fuel its economy. And talent has always been this state’s greatest asset.
Thomson’s message, and it bears repeating, is that, if these trends con- tinue, the Bay State is in danger of losing its place as a national and global leader in many different sectors, from healthcare to biotech to precision manufacturing.
The clock is ticking, and various constituencies — local, state, and fed- eral officials; the business community; and residents themselves — need to address these collective forces and try to ‘turn the ship,’ as Thomson put it.
Ships don’t turn quickly or easily, so the time to effect a course change is now. BW
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Don’t Devalue Professional Credentials
BY PAM SHLEMON
In an instance of good intentions gone awry, an effort to hire people because of the skills they possess rather than their college degrees has turned into a concern that certified rehabilitation counsel-
ors may not be able to divulge their credentials to clients. That’s not helpful to anyone, especially the clients they serve: people with disabilities.
In January, Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey signed an executive order requiring the state government to use skill-based hiring prac- tices. That means the state would not ask its job applicants whether they held a college degree, or other advanced certifications, unless
it was absolutely necessary for the job, potentially enabling people with relevant experience but not a degree to be hired.
As the leader of a national organization that advocates for people with disabilities, I see the value of skills-based hiring, which would open doors for qualified, motivated workers who may lack a particu- lar degree.
The problem came soon after, with how the Massachusetts Reha- bilitation Commission interpreted that order. Commissioner Toni Wolf suggested limitations on how the state’s certified rehabilitation counselors, or CRCs, use and disclose their certification to their clients.
That is a problem. Reducing the emphasis on credentials while hiring is one thing, but trying to erase their importance while per- forming the job is misguided. CRCs get their credentials from the organization I lead, the Commission on Rehabilitation Counselor Certification. The certification is the national gold standard in the field of rehabilitation counseling for people with disabilities, and it leads to proven better outcomes. Indeed, the Massachusetts Divi- sion of Professional Licensure asks for proof of the certification to become a licensed rehabilitation counselor.
Certification for CRCs serves as a quality guarantee, an assur- ance for a person with a disability that their counselor has the skills, knowledge, and ethical standards to help clients live as fully and independently as possible. A CRC is required by their certification to focus on what the client can and wants to do in their life, and is trained to work toward those goals. The nationally accredited certi- fication is the result of rigorous training, comes with a 50-page code of ethics, and is not lightly granted.
In this field, as in many professions, credentials are important. You trust a certified public accountant, not a bookkeeper, with
accounting skills. You bare your soul to a licensed mental-health pro- fessional, not someone familiar with some aspects of mental health. When you need surgery, you rely on board-certified surgeons and anesthesiologists, not someone knowledgeable in human anatomy but unlicensed to practice. This is true as well with rehabilitation counseling.
Favoring just skills at the expense of credentials is risky in the field of rehabilitation counseling. The training, the degree, and, most importantly, the certification verify that they know what they are doing. A person hiring a rehabilitation counselor would want to be sure they could do the work, avoid unintentional harm, give accurate information, and not take shortcuts, like referring clients to medio- cre employment opportunities misaligned to their skillset or failing to account for their functional limitations. The certification held by a CRC provides that assurance.
A CRC, for example, is committed to helping a person with dis- abilities find and keep a high-quality job that suits them and bolsters their independence, not just any job. We work with a vulnerable pop- ulation. The certification is acknowledgement of that and serves as a promise that CRCs never forget their obligations to this population. Being barred from divulging their credentials hurts the CRCs, too. It’s demoralizing and frustrating to be unable to speak about their qualifications. It’s an erasure of their professional identities.
I have no quarrel with Gov. Healey’s move toward skills-based hir- ing, which is beneficial to many people in many fields. We at CRCC favor legislation that increases access to certification, including the Tomorrow’s Workforce Coalition, which advocates for workforce- development policies that open up funding for certifications, includ- ing the CRC.
Commissioner Wolf’s track record is long and admirable. This is certainly a case of a move made with good intentions and unintend- ed consequences. I hope the commissioner sees that and steps back from this move. BW
Pam Shlemon is executive director of the Commission on Rehabilitation Counselor Certification (CRCC), the national organization that sets the national standard for certification and advocates both for the profession and individuals with disabilities.
10 APRIL 15, 2024
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