Returning Veterans Falling Through The Cracks - Again!!!!
By GordonTaylor Posted in War — Comments (20) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
I see an opportunity here for Red Stater's to respond and help our proud Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines returning from the front.
It appears that more bureaucratic boondoggles are still plaguing returning Veterans of the ongoing conflicts though out the world.
Connecticut in particular is trying to reach out to returning Veterans to help them and their families cope with the stress and financial problems often incurred when a family member returns from a war zone. To date, they have been stifled in their attempts to even find out WHO is returning!
Connecticut Veterans Affairs Commissioner Linda Schwartz told a presidential panel Friday that the federal government needs to share more information about wounded soldiers returning home so states can do a better job helping them.
"Our question is, why can't we, the states, be considered partners?" Schwartz said. "There is a need. There really is a need ... We're not asking for money. We're asking for information."
She stated to the panel that they are asking for less information then is available on most mailing lists, yet they are continually denied the information due to the Government citing privacy law concerns.
The panel is headed by former GOP Sen. Bob Dole, R-Kansas, and former U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala.
COME ON you guys, get your behinds in gear and get the information out to these guys and gals home states!
Divorce rates are running rampant within the ranks of returning Vets, health care is being denied, monetary assistance is being withheld all because the US Government WILL NOT verify the information being provided by the soldiers!
The story, CT Veteran Affairs Commissioner Pushes for Soldier Info appears here.
Why can't we unite in this cause, help the Commissioner get the info she needs and help these guys! When I came back from the Nam, we weren't liked very much, but there was plenty of help available for us. What happened?
...however, in this instance, it's the state government trying to reach out to the Vet's before they reach out to the state.
I'll repeat this phrase...
Connecticut Veterans Affairs Commissioner Linda Schwartz told a presidential panel Friday that the federal government needs to share more information about wounded soldiers returning home so states can do a better job helping them.
According to Ms. Schwartz they are not asking for medical information, yet they are being denied access to the information based on medical privacy laws.
Another quote from the article...
Given the refusal by federal officials to provide information, Schwartz has created Operation Outreach, a grass-roots effort to locate the state's wounded soldiers.
Why is a program like Operation Outreach even necessary? I don't see any issues with the DoD sharing an individuals address with a state agency.
I don't want our vets bothered by whatever state decides it wants to say it's out to 'help.'
Remember what Reagan said about government being here to help...
HTML Help Central for Red Staters
Let's nominate the Nash Equilibrium for President.
I can't break out the acronym, but it's a new series of laws designed to protect a patient's privacy.
My wife is a physical therapist. After HPPA passed, her hospital took down the names of patients, which had previously been posted on their hospital room doors. A plus for privacy---but a MINUS for the crash cart team frantically running down the hall, looking for the name of the patient who's coding.
Health care professionals---the pool of people from which health care government officials are often chosen---are paranoid about violating HPPA. They didn't pass the law---Congress did.
Before you start throwing rocks at the people managing veterans patient care at the federal level, you might want to make sure that they can do what you want them to do, WITHOUT running afoul of the law or established procedure.
If the law needs changing, the VA can't do that. Congress must.
"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)
No one is asking for medical anything. Simply a name and address of a returning Vet.
I know there are tons of programs for our Vets, I have used some of them myself.
But, for whatever reason, the problem seems to be real. Vets don't seem to know where to go, so the state if trying to reach out to them.
I say any help we can give them is good. And those of you worried about your privacy, well I am sorry to say you have very little. The might trasistor has seen to that!
You're not sure what the privacy law does and doesn't preclude, and neither are your bosses. But, EVERYONE knows that anyone deemed to have run afoul of the law runs the risk of getting skinned. Hence, your default response when asked for info is to say no. Or, insist on waiting until you get permission to release the info.
You're missing the point here. If "bureaucrats" are unsure if they can legally divulge the info or not, we're asking them to run the risk of breaking the law when we demand they share that info.
Your anger is best directed at the Congressional committees who wrote these laws, and will publicly pillory anyone deemed (suspected?) to have run afoul of them. Recommend that you press the appropriate executive branch officials to press Congress for clarification of the law as needed. Let's remove the gray areas in law interpretation that hinders front-line workers from getting their jobs done and doing the right thing.
But, until that happens, it's pretty big of us to ask lower-level government workers to go out on a limb, if there's every reason to expect that Congress, MSM and blogosphere headhunters will saw that limb off at a moment's notice, once the cries of "infringements on privacy" get started .
You want to stop this sort of thing? Get the government to stop being hypersensitive to privacy concerns. Then, the worker bees will have the freedom of action with which to do the right/common sense thing.
"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)
If not HIPPA, then some other one. They're all equally vague, and have equally intimidated the federal workforce.
"Who will stand/On either hand/And guard this bridge with me?" (Macaulay)
Okay, another government agency decides it's not going to release personal information (no matter how unintrusive we think it might be), and suddenly states are incapable of contacting returning veterans who need and deserve our help.
Well, I've given this five minutes of thought, and I don't understand how any state, who has a program(s) available to assist returning veterans with financial, medical, or other social assistance, is not able to, on it's own, communicate that availability within it's borders. I mean, how difficult is this? If a state has agencies available, you have numerous communication outlets via newspapers, print media, television, internet, etc. to communicate this to the members returning as well as their families. There's no reason why any service man or woman, shouldn't know within 24 hours of his return, who and where to call, in his locale, to get assistance. Not to mention, most of them are members of a local guard unit, or a local military installation, where this kind of information is easily disseminated.
Why do we alway have to allow ourselves to be stymied by the federal bureaucracy and turn every problem into a damn government failure. If the problem is simply a state's inability to communicate the availability of their services, then use your local assets and go around the government. You don't need the soldier's names, you just need to tell all of them that you're there and help is available.
GT
Dumb approach to the problem in my view.
The veterans affairs folks went about this the wrong way I think.
Go through the Governor's office to the State Adjutant General. He/She can go to through the chain of command to the Sec Defense or his action group to work a solution.
Simple stuff, like have the state provide an information package through channels that can be given to each incoming patient as part of in processing. The wounded warrior's privacy is preserved as required by HIPPA and the information of where to get help gets to the wounded warrior. Heck, if it comes down from Sec Defense to every State Adjutant as something that needs to get done, you'll see 50 sets of individual states information packages appear toots sweet. Just have to understand the beast called DoD to get it to do what needs to be done without a bunch of Chicken Excrement.
My take, DoD as a whole and the Secretary of Defense care deeply about our wounded warriors, but sometimes they just don't know how to help without getting tangled up in rules like HIPPA and the other rules in respect to privacy.
______________________________________
Proud member of the Barry Goldwater wing of the party !
I am simply the messenger. They made a big deal out of this on NYC radio today, with the Commissioner asking for help. She has spoken directly to the panel, I don't know what the problem is. She says Connecticut simply wants to be notified when a Vet is returning home from service, and she can't get them to do it.
Beats me what the problem is, other then the DoD keeps sighting HIPPA rules, which don't seem to a apply here.
Maybe the states can take care of their NG wounded, but why should they even need to take responsibility for Regulars? Why isn't anyone saying the obvious: Bush is not doing what it takes to make sure our returning Vets are getting all they need.
Personally, he always has seemed like a short-sighted bumbling fool to me, but he's well connected and serves those who serve him well. I voted for McCain in 2000 as a write-in because of Junior's lackluster track record and his unapologetic Rovian Smear of McCain. GWB seems to have completely misunderstood what it meant to invade Iraq, and has never figured out how to salvage the situation.
And here we have thousands of wounded Vets returning to a care system that, even after four solid years, still has not been funded properly to build it up. Am I paying enough taxes for my son to get the care he needs? (Fortunately he does not; not at this time.) If I am, then why are wounded vets still in need? If not, then why doesn't our Federal Government ask for all citizens to carry the load? Why does anyone think individuals or State government should fork over more cash?
The information is out there and readily available. That has been the case since early in WWII. The Veteran's Administration and the various veterans service organizations remain available to assist.
Look in your phonebook or even in your local newspaper. Most local newspapers contain notices of veteran's services provided in the local area. Before discharge, most, if not all military personel, are given a series of classes that include what services are avilable to assist them after discharge. Also, discharged veteran's with disabilities receive, as part of their outpatient counseling, specific information on what services they will need and how to obtain them.
The problem that Gulf II veterans are having with the Veterans Administration is that they are too few in number. The Veterans Administration deals with all veterans not just current dischargees. The system, as any bureaucratic system must, deals in numbers. There are more WW II veterans seeking services than Gulf II veterans. The system deals fairly efficiently with the claims of WW II veterans and the other wars but is still working on proceedures to handle Gulf II claims.
When I was a veterns counselor, I had contacts. People that, because of their position and knowledge, could assist me in processing a veteran's claim or tell me how to obtain certain information quickly. I was tapped into an informal network that included active-duty military, Veterans Administration medical personel and specialists as well as many other sources, including the National Personel Record Center.
I relied on a number of people to locate those veterans with problems and get them to me. These people included medical workers, clergy, politicians and members of the various veteran's groups. The system was not perfect. If a veteran with problems refused help, he or she could not be forced to accept help.
The CT Veterans Affairs Commissioner means well but the problem could, and probably is, being handled. There is no privacy problem with having the military, as part of the discharge process, including a class in which either a nationwide resource pamplet or individual state pamplets are given to the dischargee.
The problem is that many military personel, awaiting discharge, are not interested in learning about their military benefits. They will sleep during the class and circular file the pamplets.
By the way, the problem is not with funding or available resources. The problem is that there are not enough casualties to cause the bureaucratic system to fully kick in with its built in efficiencies of scale. The low rate of casualties means that there are no well made groves or tracks for the VA clerk to follow. Just about every case must be treated as a new learning experience with no "old hand" available to point out the best way to get the job done.
This, of course, means that competent assistance can help. That assistance is available and in your local neighborhood. The bottleneck is that these veteran's groups cannot act on your behalf unless you request their assistance and give them the authority to act on your behalf.
sources for the assertions that you have made in your last paragraph.
I mean sources other than the frequent drive-by attacks by Democratic politicians and the MSM.
Have you ever visited a Veteran's Hospital or Out-Patient Clinic? Have you talked with enough disabled veterans from Gulf II to know what kind of treatment they received and are receiving?
Have you checked with your local Veterans organizations, who monitor the Veteran's hospitals, about the care and treatment Gulf II veterans are receiving?
Or, are you relying on the Democratic Talking Points for you information.
The Veteran's Administration is not perfect. It never was! The clerks could and would make mistakes and veterans could and did suffer because of the mistakes. But the system, with the input from the service organizations, is self-correcting.
the Reply To link under the posting is your friend. When you use it instead of the Post a New Comment section at the bottom, things get threaded and connected more easily.
Second, please don't feed the trolls.
Next,
Thanks for the other posts. You said things that probably ought to be common sense, but sometimes aren't.
Personally, my immediate thought about automatically passing names along to every state agency was, "Great, just what we need! Grandma Pelosi's comrades getting the addresses of returning veterans. No thanks." Which is probably unfair to the Connecticut people trying to do this, but somewhere out there, it would happen. It's the other law of large numbers.
And most importantly, thank-you for your service.
Can't we do a little better by our servicemen than this???
How ya been?
Anyway, this problem is sticky and complicated -- nevertheless somebody in DC needs to carry this on his back and make it happen -- just ramrod it through all the bureaucratic crap and make it happen.
Stare decisis is fo' suckas -- Feddie
I was taught "problem solving techniques" in the Army. The first thing to do was "define the problem." It was an axiom that "a proper definition of a problem would contain the solution."
What is the problem? That some returning servicemen are not aware of the veterans support system?
Will giving their names and addresses to state veteran's agencies cure the problem?
My prior posts on this tread seem to have been misread. Maybe I am not writing well or maybe I am not being explicit or maybe I have been misreading the other posts.
Frau Budgie wants to know why we "can't do better for our servicemen than this?" I want to know what she means by "this" and how it relates to this thread.
I have tried to explain why releasing personal information about returning servicemen is unnecessary. Veterans Outreach by the state veteran's agencies can be done by existing legal means without the necessity of further legislative action.
I wasn't intending to get into this (thus the very short note, whose primary purpose was to give a 'what-up' to my friend FB).
So, what is the problem? You are close to the source, but there's one layer deeper. I believe the most fundamental problem is this: the logistics of overseas military service during wartime is playing havoc on the families and personal lives of these service men.
The desired solution (IMO) is that these people and their families survive and thrive in this very rough time.
Whatever the 'existing legal means' are, it seems from here that the job ain't getting done. I believe that Frau Budgie's "this" is that: the job ain't getting done.
So 'we' as civilians would like to see better done. Talk is cheap, so it seems that certain state organs have taken it on themselves to help. To that end, their efforts to garner a fairly harmless bit of info [what servicemen who are residents of our state are returning from overseas deployments], they are stymied by the bureaucracy.
I am not AT ALL sure that a state organ is the proper venue, but then what would be? If they desire to help, then so be it. My "it" (as in, make 'it' happen) is simply to remove the barriers to providing this very basic information to state organs who want to offer services to returning veterans.
The fact that there are existing services that are supposed to address the fundamental problem -- that's all well and good, but then it seems the work ain't getting done. States wanto to help. Let them.
Stare decisis is fo' suckas -- Feddie
However, unless you stop relying on the MSM for information on what's happening to returnees, you may make the situation worse.
There are problems, I know that.
I worked for fourteen years assisting servicemen, veterans, their families or survivors with the real problems.
On a scale of 1 to 100, the outreach problem probably rates a 5. The major problems are MEGO problems and the MSM does not do a good job of reporting such problems.
For example, the disability rating system always lags behind medical knowledge concerning the disability. The problem is to reduce the lag time on corrections to the disability tables so that a claimant's needs are fully met without, as has happened several times in the past, compensating for non-existant disabilities due to political pressure.
I was a New York State Veteran's Represenative from 1973 to 1987. During that period, the only information provided the states was information regarding KIA's. We did not get any information at all on returning military, wounded included. Why? Privacy considerations. Only the dead have no privacy rights.
Besides there was no call for that type of information from the states or from the various veteran's organizations.
It was assumed that the various veteran's outreach programs, at federal, state and local levels plus those outreach programs of the veteran's groups would be sufficient so that no veteran would fall through the safety net.
Now, after years of Privacy Laws, we expect that the Federal government, the various branches of the military and the Veteran's Administration will ignore all those rules and regulations emplaced to protect privacy and release information regarding active duty military, reservists and veterans to the state and local governments.
The support network put into place since WWII and improved through the years is still there and is available. Check your local telephone book. You will find listings for state veteran's services and local (city, town and county) veteran's services. You will also find the listings for veteran's organizations including local posts and/or chapters. Each post has people ready, willing and able to assist returning military and veterans. Check them out. The support is there, it has always been there.
Unfortunately, in my fourteen years as a veteran's counselor, as well as the same time as a County Service Officer for the American Legion and as a registered represenative of the Veteran's of Foreign Wars, I did find that some people, for reasons of their own, did not take advantage of this assistance. Like Sinatra, they would do it their way. Only when their situation was truely desperate, would they seek help.
In many cases, they would appeal to the media and, without investigation, the media would publish "horror stories" about mistreated veterans. In most cases that I investigated, the problem was easily solved. Misfiled papers, documents sent to the wrong party and failure on the part of the veteran, his family or survivors to follow through on a claim.
In a few, there were very complex issues that needed the services of a veteran's counselor, a service office or a registered represenative to gather the necessary documentation and present the information to the Veteran's Administration.
Those services were available and are still available to returned military and veterans. But, the returnee must seek them out. These people cannot help you unless you tell them your problem.