Membership UPdate

Dear CMA membership. 
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Thank you to all of our members who are reaching out with questions and concerns!! We are a better organization with an involved and aware membership. We are so excited to see our community engaging in positive communication in regards to the legislation! The DORA Sunset Report published in October last year really highlighted the quality and success of DEMs across the state. We are so proud that DEMs continue to be part of improving Colorado’s maternal and infant health outcomes, and serving more families all across the state.

What does this all mean? The legislative process has many pieces and can be quite confusing, yet fascinating! Particularly if you have yet to be involved on the back end. That being said, we will try and explain the steps moving forward, and hope you all stay engaged, ask more questions, and band together for the midwives of Colorado! 

On March 10th, the direct entry midwifery law successfully passed out of the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services. The changes that impact us include the following: 

• Adding birth centers to places where a CPM, RM can work
• Adding the authority of carrying GBS antibiotic prophylaxis
• Removing the yearly fees for our various authorities
• Removing the data reporting requirement for annual registration renewal
• Adding a data point to birth certificates to capture labor transfers by RMs from out-of-hospital to hospital.

The next steps are as follows: 

• Our bill will now go to the Senate Committee on Appropriations
• Next, it goes to the Senate floor for a vote
• Then our bill will go to the House

Watch for emails on how to encourage the midwife supporters in your life - friends, colleagues and clients - to contact legislators in support of our bill. In addition, we will be updating you all on upcoming hearing and legislative meeting dates as best as we can on our social media platforms. That being said, we often do not get very much notice in advance. So please keep checking back so you can be as involved as you would like!  We’re working hard to create better transparency and improve communication with our members. Although this legislative year has been, as fellow stakeholders have expressed to us, quite “unusual and weird,” we are all learning to navigate it quite nicely as a team!

Recently, there have been many midwives who are vocalizing their wish to change our registration process to a licensure process.  During this legislative session we’ve worked with and shared positive communication with The Elephant Circle. They may be bringing forth a proposed amendment that would require DORA to alter the title of the midwives of Colorado from "Registered Midwives" to "Licensed Midwives." This proposed amendment was not added to the bill in this Senate hearing, and at this point, it is unclear if it will become part of our bill this year. This is a pressing issue, and possibly the next big issue to be faced by Colorado midwives. We are wanting to hear the voices of all midwives in Colorado about this topic.  Therefore, please watch for a poll from the CMA to share how you feel about this issue. We would like for every midwife's voice to be heard! 

As midwives, politics was not our calling. Our calling was birth, babies, and the families we serve. But in order to continue serving and providing access to those families and sharing beautiful moments, we are also called into legislative work. All of the current board members chose to get more involved at a difficult time for the CMA after 2017, and though growth has been challenging at times, we thank you all for your support and understanding as we continue to learn and grow as a board. We are hoping to engage positively and make a point of hearing all of the voices impacted by midwifery in Colorado; including members, non-members, the BIPOC community, voices of equality, consumers, colleagues and other stakeholders.

Please watch for the poll and our ongoing legislative updates. Do you follow us on facebook?  Instagram? Are you on the legislative update email group? If not, connect with us at coloradomidwivesassociation@gmail.com and we will connect you with our email groups and social media accounts. 

And please put our statewide membership zoom meeting on April 17th on your calendar, time to be announced.

-The CMA board