If you are a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and considering relocating to NYS you may want to seriously re-consider. I wasted an entire year time and money attempting to get my license transferred from California where I have been an LCSW for 10 years. It literally takes them 2-3 months to respond to/answer simple “yes/no” questions. Most of the people I talked to either did not know their own policies and/or stood behind erroneous policies. Because I took the California exam NYS is requiring me to start all over again as if i had just graduated with my masters and spend more money/time to take the ASWB exam that has been proven now to have racial inequities baked into it as evidenced by the National Association of Social Workers recent position of”opposition” of the ASWB exam because it clearly violates the NASW Code of Ethics which requires Social Workers to challenge Social Injustice which the ASWB’s exam which has been found to be rife with. According to their own policy however NYS will review another state’s exam process upon request.I made that request several times and was told erroneously by several workers that they had a strict policy of accepting ASWB exams only. After much ado and many wasted months I got through to the board’s gate keeping receptionist to whom i quoted policy directly in a polite/professional manner and requested that the board review the CA exam. The receptionist admitted that there was such policy however they do not appreciate Social Workers who can research policy (2nd major in grad school was Law and Policy) as evidenced by the receptionist’s becoming quite aggressive and then telling me and i quote “ sir who do you think you are?! Do you know WHERE you are?! This is New York sir and you are coming from California…you don’t tell us what to do here in New York! Now I am sending you back to processing where you belong!” So while the policy does exist in writing it is empty ie they do not ever actually utilize it to an applicant’s benefit in reality. So back to the bottom of the ladder where I finally requested a refund. I requested and was told no less than 3 times that i would be mailed a form to fill out and then would receive a refund for the application process and never did receive one. I am sure that the great state of California is not turning out LCSW’s who do not test at the Masters’s level. In fact California was the last state to accept the ASWB exam precisely because they were concerned about the validity of the exam as well as racial inequalities built into it. And in fact the California exams were arguably the most stringent exams in the country. I passed both exams (notoriously difficult with. 50% pass rate) with flying colors the first time around , worked multiple highly clinical in patient settings in addition to almost ten years in a primary care medical setting providing direct psychotherapy provided an NPI and reimbursed by all the major medical insurance groups only to be told by NYS that I cant even qualify as an LMSW! What more does a person need?! There are I am sure many good reasons that NYS is leading the country in de-population my situation being a classic example. One would think I moved here from another country much less a state! I went from a 6 figure salary to $17.00 an hour before taxes job; child care costs me $20.00 an hour i will leave you to do the math. I am getting tired of all the news stories about the lack of health/mental health resources in this state. The Gov of NYS may want to take a look at the licensing process and the lack of professionalism I encountered and payed for the “pleasure” of.