As of September 16, 2026, the veterinary professional associate (VPA) — the mid-level role Colorado voters created in 2024 — exists in exactly one state, with 0 known VPAs registered anywhere.
For a practice owner, the enacted framework reads as a staffing option with the brakes on: a master's-level clinician who works only inside a written supervisory agreement, three per supervising veterinarian at most, on the same premises, and whose supervision no employer can force a veterinarian to provide.
What Colorado's framework lets a VPA do in your practice
Colorado's Proposition 129 passed on November 5, 2024 with 52.76% of the vote, writing the role directly into state statute; HB25-1285, signed May 30, 2025 and effective January 1, 2026, supplied the operating mechanics.
As of September 16, 2026, that combined framework is the only enacted VPA law in the country.
For the role's definition and the full dated tracker behind it, see what a veterinary professional associate is.
The scope language is unusual.
A VPA may practice veterinary medicine that is within the VPA's advanced education and experience, performing only duties delegated by the supervising veterinarian, for which the VPA has the necessary training and experience as determined by the supervising veterinarian (C.R.S. 12-315-105(1)(r); 12-315-209.7).
A VPA's boundary is set case by case, by each supervising veterinarian's judgment of that individual's training — not a fixed statutory list like a technician's — so in practice, your written supervisory agreement is where the real scope line gets drawn.
See scope compared: credentialed technician vs mid-level vs DVM for the statutory text behind all three roles.
Several hard edges do exist in statute.
The veterinarian-client-patient relationship must be established by the licensed veterinarian before anything is delegated — a VPA cannot originate one (C.R.S. 12-315-105.5(2), effective January 1, 2026); the VCPR rules are their own subject.
Colorado's electronic-prescribing statute, whose "prescriber" definition governs electronic prescriptions for opioids and benzodiazepines, includes the licensed veterinarian and does not list the VPA (C.R.S. 12-30-109(4)) — the clearest statutory signal that VPAs hold no independent prescribing authority.
AVMA's position goes further, asserting federal law bars a VPA from prescribing absent an act of Congress.
From January 1, 2026, only a registered individual may use the titles "veterinary professional associate" or "registered veterinary professional associate" or the initials VPA/RVPA, and practicing unregistered is a class 2 misdemeanor (C.R.S. 12-315-204(2); 12-315-210).
A VPA must identify themselves to the client both visually and verbally, and the employer must disclose that a VPA — not a veterinarian — is providing the care.
One more practical limit: the only education pathway in the country, Colorado State's master's program, is small-animal — dogs and cats, with no large-animal component (CSU program materials, 2026).
The rules are still being written
The supervision rules that decide your staffing math
The defaults are tight.
A VPA practices under immediate or direct supervision, and earns indirect supervision only by meeting clinical benchmarks the board sets — including a specified number of hours under direct or immediate supervision first.
As of September 16, 2026 the board had not set that hour threshold; it is pending rulemaking (C.R.S. 12-315-105.5(5)(a)(III)-(IV), (9)).
The vocabulary is the same immediate/direct/indirect system used for technicians — how supervision levels are defined — but Colorado's VPA statute writes the tiers into the role itself.
Three structural rules follow.
Supervising veterinarian and VPA must be at the same premises while the VPA practices, unless indirect supervision has been earned (12-315-105.5(3.5)(c)).
Telesupervision is not permitted — the bill's own summary states flatly that it is not allowed.
And one veterinarian may supervise no more than three VPAs practicing veterinary medicine at any one time (12-315-105.5(3.5)(d)) — a hard ceiling on how much of your DVM time any VPA program consumes.
Every arrangement runs on a written supervisory agreement, filed and kept on file at both parties' places of business, stating the training and experience verified, the three-VPA cap, the species the VPA is trained for, and the supervision start date — with termination dates recorded (12-315-203.7(6)).
The delegation rule will look familiar.
A VPA performs only what the supervising veterinarian delegates, within training that veterinarian has determined — and delegating beyond that training puts the veterinarian in violation, exposed to liability for the VPA's negligence and to professional discipline (C.R.S. 12-315-209.7; 12-315-112(1)(ee)).
That is the same per-person, per-task competency duty the delegation framework already imposes — the difference is that a VPA's wider lawful scope makes the competency finding higher-stakes.
Who carries the liability — and why you can't mandate supervision
The statute assigns responsibility upward: a VPA practices under the supervision of a licensed veterinarian who is responsible for the VPA's performance (C.R.S. 12-315-105(1)(r)(II)).
Layer on the negligence exposure for delegating beyond training, and the supervising veterinarian — not the practice's brand, not the owning entity — is the legal center of every VPA arrangement.
AVMA's stated objection adds an insurance question worth putting to your carrier before any supervision begins: in AVMA's framing, the supervising vet bears legal responsibility for a VPA's acts and omissions, and malpractice policies may not cover a supervisor who is not the VPA's employer.
That is AVMA's advocacy position, not a finding of Colorado law — but it names the exact document to check.
Then the provision with no analogue in technician supervision: a corporation, employer, director, or officer shall not require a licensed veterinarian to enter into a supervisory agreement or to supervise a VPA as a condition of continued employment (C.R.S. 12-315-121(3)(b), effective January 1, 2026).
You cannot staff a VPA by mandate.
Each supervising veterinarian has to agree — which in a corporate or multi-site structure makes VPA adoption depend on per-veterinarian consent, not owner policy.
The ownership doctrine that provision sits inside — who may own a practice, and how control reaches clinical decisions — is the practice ownership guide's subject.
What a VPA would cost: the sourced numbers and the gaps
Start with what does not exist: no federal wage series.
BLS has no VPA occupation code, so no national salary figure for the role can be sourced — this page publishes none, and any specific "VPA salary" you encounter is a projection or a self-reported aggregation.
The one salary number in the record is a critique.
CVMA's position statement (updated January 13, 2023) says the projected $80,000 salary for the role "does not fit the current reality," noting that per AVMA's own 2022 report, only 43% of all 2021 veterinary graduates earned $80,000 or more.
Whatever a VPA is eventually paid, the comparison an owner will actually run is against associate compensation — and CVMA's second cost claim is time rather than money: mentoring a new category of clinician consumes veterinarian hours before any efficiency materializes.
CSU has not published tuition for its program — the only announced pathway to the required degree.
See how to become a VPA: the education pathway for admissions, cohort size, and the one tuition estimate in the record.
Registration is fee-funded: the voter guide's fiscal analysis expected state spending and revenue to rise in step, covered by VPA registration fees, with the board's added workload carrying spending "expected to be minimal."
Why there is no salary table on this page
The case for and against, in both sides' own words
Every established veterinary body — AVMA, CVMA, NAVTA, and (with a carve-out) AAVSB — opposes the VPA role, while proponents frame it as an access fix for understaffed and rural practices.
The full debate, in both sides' own words, is the case for and against the mid-level practitioner's subject.
For an owner, the opponent camp's common thread is a staffing thesis: the alternative to a new profession is better utilizing the credentialed technicians you already employ.
Where adoption actually stands (dated tracker)
Status, dated as of September 16, 2026: Colorado only, 0 known VPAs registered anywhere, and the national credentialing exam AAVSB is building with the state board is the bottleneck — Colorado's regulator projects first registrations no earlier than late 2026.
See where the mid-level role is authorized for the full state-by-state tracker and what would move it.
If you don't practice in Colorado
No other state had an enacted VPA framework as of September 16, 2026 — Florida came closest, with a 2026 bill that cleared three Senate committees before dying on the calendar.
See where the mid-level role is authorized for the full state-by-state status.
Colorado State's own materials make the boundary explicit for its graduates: outside Colorado, a VPA's scope would be defined by each state's veterinary practice act, with shelter-hospital exemptions named as the likeliest early opening — and today there is no distinct VPA framework in any other state to register under.
So for the overwhelming majority of practices, the VPA is a watch item, not a hiring plan.
The useful preparation is reading Colorado's mechanics as the template — the ratio cap, the premises rule, the supervisory agreement, and the no-forced-supervision provision are the shape later bills are most likely to borrow.
If the underlying question is access — the rural coverage problem the proponents' argument leans on — the levers that exist today are covered in rural practice and shortage incentives; and if you are hiring veterinarians into that gap now, the employer's hiring guide covers the current market.
This page tracks a contested, fast-moving area of veterinary regulation. It is general information, not legal or veterinary advice — verify current status with the Colorado State Board of Veterinary Medicine or your own state's board, and consult a veterinary-specific attorney before structuring any supervisory arrangement.