I am writing my last blog post as President. This weekend at our Board meeting I officially handed the gavel over to Chuck Hollister who is taking the reigns as President. I've worked closely with Chuck in his role as President-elect and I know that he will continue the work we have done this past year. He will be a great successor.
In this past year we have accomplished many goals including completely redesigning our website to make it more up-to-date, easily accessible, with greater functionality; defending our scope of practice from LPCs who sought to gain the right to make psychiatric diagnoses with no formal training to do so; advancing our legislative agenda by working closely on the bill that would mandate insurance coverage for eating disorders; meeting with members of Mo Health Net to advocate for the reimbursement of Health and Behavior Codes under Medicaid; and sending representatives (including myself) to the annual APA State Leadership Conference in Washington DC. We also held a very successful Conference in St. Louis that was well attended by our membership with great presenters and a symposium with a member of the state House of Representatives (Rep. Todd Richardson).
These are just some of the goals we have accomplished this past year and they couldn't have been achieved without the hard work and dedication of our Board members and Committee Chairpersons all of whom volunteer their time and skills for the greater good of psychology. I am also very grateful to each and every one of our members, without whom our organization would cease to exist.
In the coming year we will build upon these goals and address new ones, including re-examining our Committee structure to allow for more active committees that include more members involvement. In the past year I have tried to increase communication with members via the listserv and blog so that you can all see the many MOPA activities that happen "behind the scenes" as a means of demonstrating the value of your dues and how hard MOPA fights to protect and advance our scope of practice in the state. I hope that you will continue to support MOPA by renewing your yearly membership with us so that we can support you in our advocacy efforts.
Thank you all for a wonderful year.
Signed your new "Immediate Past-president",
Rich Martielli

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