In scoping
Licensing & Self-Regulating Bodies
State bar associations. Medical licensing boards. Real-estate commissions. Engineering boards. Trade licensors. When an industry gets to regulate itself, the public is trusting that the foxes have agreed to audit the henhouse. That trust deserves scrutiny.
Where rules get set and outright ignored here
- Complaint-intake and disciplinary backlogs stretch for years, effectively converting serious misconduct into a long wait.
- Sanctions come in private reprimands nobody can look up. Public records are sanitized to protect members.
- Board composition is dominated by the licensees — the incentive to discipline competitors is minimal, the incentive to discipline peers is worse.
- Continuing-education requirements are satisfied by sponsor-funded conferences that double as industry marketing.
- "Consumer representatives" on licensing boards are often retired insiders.
What TASFGA will track
- Discipline ledger — complaints filed vs. investigated vs. sanctioned vs. publicized
- Backlog age — how long a complaint waits, by jurisdiction and profession
- Board-composition audits — insider/outsider ratio, conflict disclosure, term limits
- CE quality review — content vs. sponsor vs. marketing overlap
- Public-record accessibility — can a consumer actually look up a practitioner's disciplinary history?
Why this matters
Professional licensing is the line between trust and harm. When a licensing body protects its members at the public's expense, the license itself becomes a liability shield for bad actors. TASFGA's role is to apply external audit to the bodies that refuse to audit themselves — and to publish the measurements even when the licensing body finds it inconvenient.