I am relatively new to this forum, and I assume CMHC stands for Community Mental Health Clinic. If that is the case then the impression you received is correct. I am a Master's level clinician and I have been working at one for only a year and it is rough. Aside from being overwhelmed with clients, the majority of them are on Medicaid/Medicare with considerable limitations on transportation and when they can meet for sessions, and given that my CMHC also receives some state funding the paper work is even more crippling than at a typical private practice (or so I have been told). Also, given that many providers in my area have backed away from Medicaid/Medicare, many people are limited to our clinic only, putting clinicians in the position that they take on clients with issues that stretch the limits of their ability or have those clients be simply dropped and not seen by anyone.
Additionally I have had to negotiate clients that are coming in to get their children diagnosed simply to attain disability status and receive government assistance. My first day in the waiting room I heard a client say "I'm bored. I wanna go." The parent responded with "Well, if you go you know you don't get your check." The client replied that they didn't care, and they left. I have also had children who, when I meet with them 1:1 without parents, tell me that their parent wanted them to lie about voices in their head/out of control behaviors, or to simply act 'crazy' until they left my office.We have little to no access for assessments, client families can't pay out of pocket, and I am not allowed to be reimbursed by the insurance companies intakes and sessions that last longer than a certain period of time, so I have to take a client's word for it.
I've even had to call insurance companies to justify billing crisis evaluations on clients who were 1013'd by my supervisor. You have to fight just to get paid for your services. I don't know if this is poor lobbying on behalf of mental health in general, or maybe that mental health services aren't seen as useful by insurance at large, or both. It certainly doesn't help having a slew of degree acronyms.
It seems to me like a bidding war where the insurance will reimburse whoever is willing to take the lowest amount, then force all other to bend to that amount or not be paid at all.