DAHP TO CHANGE POLICY ON CONSULTANT LISTS

DAHP wishes to announce that we will no longer be hosting lists of professional consultants on our website.    Recently DAHP has received  complaints from constituents regarding disputes with listed consultants under the presumption that the state had in some way endorsed or certified that consultant. The lists will be removed from our website effective immediately.  We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. The consultants list was posted as a courtesy to the public. Nothing in state or federal law requires that we post the list.  The concern was that the list was misinterpreted by the public as being an endorsement by the agency even though we have always included a disclaimer statement. The reality is that we do not control client/consultant relationships nor the quality of the consultant’s work while its being conducted. Also, this has become a major workload issue for DAHP staff. We have to check every consultant’s credentials to ensure they meet professional standards. We are a small agency with 10,000 reviews a year and we are facing severe budget cuts. We no longer have the time to monitor this list. Between the two issues, we can no longer provide lists as a courtesy workload.