ALC-Occupational Licensing Review Subcommittee
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- October 2, 2026
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
0:31
right everybody I've got got 130 so we'll go ahead and get started. call the meeting to order so welcome everyone to the first occupational licensing review committeetee subcommittee for 2026. if you would please keep Senator Wallace in your thoughts and prayers. he's a little under the weather so he wasn't able to to join us today but to get down to business here the first thing we need to do
is have a review of the reports from the oh two that we're gonna be doing today we've got the Arkansas state board of nursing and the state board of register if I can read correctly the state board of registration forfessional soillassifier so we'll cut two interesting groups today so we'll go ahead and get started with the Arkansas State Board of nursing if y'all would come
forward. we're scheduled to have Ashley Davis Daviddawson and Matt Gilmore.
right thank you all for being here this afternoon if you would when you get settled please introduce yourselves to the committee and then you're welcome to make any opening statements you
Speaker 9
1:56
might have Matt Gilmore department of healthalth Ashley Davis director
Speaker 10
2:00
Arkansas State Board of nursing. Daviddawson general counsel for the board of nursing
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
2:03
all right and then we get an annual opening comments you'd like to make on the the state of the licensing well thank you for your
Matt Gilmore
Unverified
2:09
time this afternoon you just heard the director and
her general counselor introduced myself. they'll just make a few opening statements and comments about the board and their licensure process and we'll take any questions y'all have thank
Speaker 11
2:26
you. this is just an update on where we are and the board of nursing was created in 1913 with the purpose of oversight for registered nurses in 1948 we added the regulation of Lpns and in 1995 we added an advanced practice registered nurses. Currently the board regulates72,000 nurses. there
are e types of nursing licenses one level of certification that began in 2005 and one level of registration that will begin in 2026. The protection of the public occurs through the licensure of qualified nurses setting standards for nursing education programs setting standards for maintaining competency and disciplining nurses for violations of the nurseractice actct all states in the United States license all levels of nursing RNs andlpns are required
to pass the standard national licensure exam in order to be licensed in advanced practice registered nurses are required to obtain national certification in their area of specialty Thelpns in arkansas receive a certification of graduation their program length is about one year and currently there are 14,000 actively licensed Lpns in the state of Arkansas.registered nurses received associate degrees or bach bachelor's degrees and there are currently49,000 registered nurses actively licensed in
Arkansas. Advanced practice registered nurses receive a master's degree or a doctorate degree and we currently have 8000 actively licensed advanced practice nurses in Arkansas that's made up of certified nurse practitioners which we have6700 of those CRNA's which we have about 1100 clinical nurse specialists which we have about 140 and certified nurse midwives which we have around60 actively licensed in Arkansas.
Medication assistants are required to be ac andA first and then they must complete 115hour course their role is to administer medications and long term care facilities and currently we have 820 maxx in Arkansas we are in the process of launching a registry for dialysis patient care technicians national data suggests that that number may closely mirror that of the maxx as far as how many we may have in Arkansas and they are required to currently be employed as d
ia ly s is techs have completed or be enrolled in a training course and they must obtain national certification within 18 months. The board provides regulatory oversight by receiving and investigating complaints against nurses and maxx and the board receives approximately 2200 complaints a year and that's my update but I'm will I'm happy to take questions. OK we got we got a few. just just to make sure I understand you were saying on thecA and the dialysis
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
5:13
you're saying well you're saying max as in we can only have so many of those or was I
Speaker 24
5:22
misunderstanding that assistant certified so MAC maxx with acok I was just thinking that just seemed kind of
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
5:27
weird that we would have a maximum number ofcAs that we can't have in the state with that in mind I know in the past Arkansas has faced shortages of of nurses in the past. how are we doing right now in the profession as far as having enough to provide for the needs of our citizens that's a very complex question because if you
Speaker 11
5:45
were to look at our number of licensed nurses we do have enough to to fill the
needs however we have shortages in certain areas and we have a lot of actively licensed nurses who are not practicing as nurses right now so I would say we have a vacancy issue more so than a lack of licensed nurses but that's a complex problem that there's lots of people Arkansas Center for nursing which is our workforce center they spend a lot of time looking at that balance so there's there's room
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
6:17
for more it sounds like the next question that I have is it looked like you said
there's about 2000 complaints in the state based upon nurses. Obviously we can't go into any one particular case but could you give us an idea of generally what you're seeing with those complaints what kind of complaints are we seeing? what tends to be the most typical ones that we
Speaker 11
6:41
see I do actually have some numbers from the previous fiscal year and some of our highest complaints that we work or nurses who apply to become nurses but have positive criminal backgrounds we do some investigation into that fraud
deception and misrepresentation is another big one but I would say misappropriation drug abuse issues and criminal investigations are also a very high number and then the last question I have and
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
7:10
then I'll see if any of my colleagues have any. right now it
looks like you're spending about4 million dollars a year have about an $8.5 million fund balance. of course the the laws three years so not quite there but you're kind of
getting into that area. I also noticed it says you don't really do any kind of training program or outreach is there any opportunities to to do that to try to help promote nursing in some of those rural areas that we could use some of that fund balance for y'all look at that or is that out of your purview for how we could utilize that extra money. I think that we have do you want
Speaker 23
7:48
to speak to this OK I think I think that
Speaker 11
7:50
we have a a lot of work with our nursing associations in doing that and so we support them in doing that and and some areas that we
are looking at is with our nurses in our alternative to discipline program we require them to go to support groups and we're looking at ways that we might could help them pay for the the cost of that particularly if it's a nurse led support group. so we are kind of looking at different ways and and I might just add re ctor
Speaker 19
8:17
Davis and her staff do go around the state work with the schools and provide
Matt Gilmore
Unverified
8:23
it to provide some guidance and some that are struggling in in different
categories of their licensure accreditation so they support that as well
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
8:32
so it's multifaceted y'all do anything with concurrent credits
in high schools to try to help with that career path try to promote that any we do
Speaker 11
8:42
not necessarily work with them and one on one but the Arkansas Center for nursing which is our workforce center we do give them a grant to do some of that outreach and try to get our numbers of actively working nurses higher and so they do engage in that. excellent excellent OK
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
9:01
uhpresentative Bentley, you are up thank you chairman thank you all for
Representative Mary Bentley
Unverified
9:05
being here today and I was just a tad bit late getting back here so you may have covered this but with the high volume that we have of complaints and nurses that have to be investigated and from what I understand it's been taken up to two years sometimes you get to those cases completed do we need to relook at that system and maybe add more staff or something to get to where it's quicker than the twoyear turnaround time or am I am I wrong and when I was told it takes up to two years
sometimes to get these cases completed you're not wrong
Speaker 11
9:35
in that there is opportunities for us to be more efficient and that's been one of my number one things that I have done since I have taken the role is to look for those opportunities some of the things that I've identified is more about how we are documenting that so for instance we have nurses who have been charged criminally and so we open a case when that happens but they may not have adjudication of
that criminal charge for 2 years,3 years and so that case is remaining open on our books while we wait for the criminal system to to make an adjudication on that case and so we're looking at ways that we can identify that to where it doesn't count on our open case time necessarily so there's other opportunities like that for better documentation on what exactly is going on with the case so that it doesn't appear as if all cases take that I will say that I did I ran some numbers and our average
length is 191 days. and so and that includes those cases that take years because we're waiting on that criminal adjudication but we are working on processes and we have with the help of the department of healthalth have added some extra help positions to hopefully increase that efficiency but that is one of my number one priorities yes. great thank you for that. So I think that's
Representative Mary Bentley
Unverified
10:53
all the questions I have for now. thank you chairman. all right anybody else?
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
11:03
going once going twice OK right saying done thank you all for for being here without objection. Well that report will stand as reviewed. second on our agenda for today we have the professional soil classifiers so we have our gentlemen from the department of agriculture
And I want you to get settled in if you would please introduce yourselves to
the committee and then you'll be recognized
Speaker 41
11:44
to make any opening comments ri al la z er director of the naturaltural Resources
Speaker 43
11:51
division at the Arkansas Department of Agriculture. matthew Ford chief legal counsel for the
Speaker 41
11:58
Arkansas department of agriculture. right good afternoon members what you have before you is the occupational license for the sole classifiers soil classifiers were established by
the state in 1975 and that has been administered by the Arkansas State Board of registration for profession soil classifiers that board was later abolished in 2023 and moved to the naturalsources commission which is where it's housed right now it's a very small group of individuals very niche, profession in that it has to be focused on being extremely knowledgeable when it comes to soils the requirements to be a soil classifier is that you have to have a four year
degree and that you have to have a certain number of hours in biological sciences earth sciences and so's classes and so those professions across the state typically are going to be folks that design septic systems do wetland determination they can do nutrient management work but obviously very skilled and very knowledgeable when it comes to soils. I think we have 29 right now that are registered in the state of Arkansas.gain very niche if you look at other states the
numbers tend to be relatively low like that because it is a niche profession so with that'd be happy to
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
13:18
take any questions so kind of like the last question is 29 enough to handle the the need
Speaker 48
13:24
in the state? I mean right now we don't have we don't seem to have a shortage
Speaker 41
13:31
of workers that can do the work. I mean obviously things can change if you have a boom and you know nutrient management for example, things
like that those sorts of needs then yeah I think you would see a need to increase it but right now we're not seeing any major issues with with the number
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
13:51
that we have and then the the only other the question that I have it's not necessarily a red flag but it looks like you 29 individuals you're collecting600 dollars a year it looks like you have $20,000 in reserves and of course the the law threeyear fund balance so600x3 would be 1800 so obviously we're we're 10 xxx that now I understand we're
not talking a whole lot of a lot of money here but I'm just wondering if it looks like you used some of it to pay cybersecurity expenses but I'm just curious what can we do with that $20,000 to make make sure we're in compliance and be productive you know whether it's for educational or I just kind of curious your thoughts on that. Yeah, I mean there's there's
Speaker 41
14:32
some expenses that that could have been charged over there since it was moved to us in 23 we had some savings in some
other areas that we used to to assist with this program if you think about the the program itself it's not super expensive I mean we print certificates so there's ink there's paper there's some staff time we have a very small appropriation and it's an M&O appropriation we're looking to maybe expand that so that we can encompass some of the so some of the expense related to salaries to administer the program but there's also some training opportunities that we can do with the association we've also talked to them about potentially looking at upgrading
the test and some of the curriculum so I think we won't have opportunities there yes sir OK excellent right uhpresentativemcGgrew
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
15:18
you're up, sir. thank you chairman and thank y'all gentlemen for
Representative Richard McGrew
Unverified
15:23
being here and I'm gonna show my ignorance a little bit today but I I've never heard of this classification before is a sole classifier can you give me an indication of what would be involved in the job of that and what the what the demand is for for this yeah so it's gonna be those things where you have to
Speaker 41
15:45
classify the soils and so in in most cases probably the most common is gonna be s for septic tanks and so we have a list of those providers on our webpage and if folks want to go to them or they can go to potentially somebody with the health department but a lot of times they'll go to a soil classifier and they can assist with laying out that septic tank and that design and making sure that it's gonna perk and those sorts of things follow up so you're
Speaker 59
16:13
you're talking about a perp test yes sir that's part of
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
16:16
it yeah thank you our senator English you're
Senator Jane English
Unverified
16:24
next so what kind of obviously somebody's gonna have to have a college degree so what kind of degrees would people get to come into this field mostly going to be in
Speaker 41
16:37
the biology earth science, physical science. so you think about the geology degrees biology degrees and then you have to have I think 15 hours of Suwell's
classes so you have to have30 hours in the biological physical sciences and then 15 hours and college yes before you take the curriculum that the natural resources
Senator Jane English
Unverified
16:56
has thank you p re s ent ative Perrier you're
Speaker 56
17:05
cup sir you sopresentative Mcgrew brought up that
Speaker 64
17:07
where someone asked a question makes you think of a
Representative Chad Puryear
Unverified
17:10
question so I apologize for that but what you mentioned the like the designated representative in the
septic world what can what can the what can these guys do that adR could not do. I mean with these guys superseded DR's decision when they say a place wouldn't perk or just kind of elaborate on the differences of
Speaker 41
17:30
the two. I don't know that I can answer that completely as far as the comparison between the two all I know is that if if you're going to classify soils in the state of Arkansas you need to be a soil classifier and these folks obviously have extensive knowledge of soils and so I don't know what the
difference would be but typically these folks are gonna be can be on construction sites when you're looking at you know complex soils if you're building something or establishing foundations wetland determination but really anything dealing with soils I hope I answered that
Speaker 50
18:02
may not have done a good job I could get in the
Speaker 68
18:07
weeds on that but we'll I appreciate you done asking questions so if if someone was
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
18:14
gonna come build a new you know multi-acre
warehouse complex or Walmart was just finished building their new giant headquarters up there. these folks would probably be employed to make sure that the foundations and so
Speaker 48
18:28
forth was all so if if they had if they needed to classify the soils there then they would get a soil classifier every project may
Speaker 69
18:39
right anything else? any other questions colleagues? all right seeing none gentlemen thank you for your
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
18:45
time this afternoon without objection the report will stand reviewed.
that's the only thing we have on the agenda this afternoon. our next meeting will be on February 191:30 in this same room have a good afternoon everyone.
Agenda
A. Call to Order
B. Comments by the Co-Chairs
C. Review of Reports from Occupational Authorization Entities:
D. Other Business
E. Adjournment
Documents
Speakers
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
Speaker 9
Speaker 10
Matt Gilmore
Unverified
Speaker 11
Speaker 24
Speaker 23
Speaker 19
Representative Mary Bentley
Unverified
Speaker 41
Speaker 43
Speaker 48
Representative Richard McGrew
Unverified
Speaker 59
Senator Jane English
Unverified
Speaker 56
Speaker 64
Representative Chad Puryear
Unverified
Speaker 50
Speaker 68
Speaker 69