Top 10 Veterans News from Around the Country

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Find out What’s Inside Today’s Local News for Veterans

  1. Shinseki To Attend Senate Budget Hearing Today.
  2. VA Preparing To Re-Examine Gulf War Vets’ Disability Claims.
  3. Institute Of Medicine Panel Investigating Links Between Burn Pits, Illnesses For VA.
  4. Baker To Congress: PMAS Saved VA $54 Million.
  5. For Soldiers, Single Motherhood Becomes Another Battlefield.
  6. Military Spouses Outraged By Suspension Of Education Grant Program.
  7. Waco VA Regional Office Looking To Employ Homeless Vets.
  8. US-Mexico Border Providing Opportunity For Vets To Feed Drug Addictions.
  9. Bill Would Protect Survivors Of Soldiers Killed In Iraq, Afghanistan From Foreclosure.
  10. Vermont Governor Endorses Plan To Open Psychiatric Facility At VA Hospital.

Have You Heard
Shedding Pounds, Improving Health Did you know that 3/4 of our Veterans are either overweight or obese? Watch this segment from The American Veteran to learn how VA is working with Vets to shed pounds and lead healthier lifestyles.

1.      Shinseki To Attend Senate Budget Hearing Today. Near the end of “Today At A Glance”, CQ (2/26) notes that on Friday, at 9:30 a.m. in 418 Russell, the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee is scheduled to hold a “hearing on the fiscal 2011 budget for the Veterans Affairs Department, with Secretary Eric Shinseki.”

2.      VA Preparing To Re-Examine Gulf War Vets’ Disability Claims. In a story appearing in at least 32 news publications, the AP (2/26, Hefling) reports, “The Veterans Affairs Department says it’s preparing to re-examine the disability claims of what could be thousands of Gulf War veterans suffering from ailments they blame on their war service.” VA Secretary Eric Shinseki “tells The Associated Press that the decision is part of a ‘fresh, bold look’ the agency is taking to help veterans who have what’s commonly called Gulf War illness and have long felt the government did little to help them. The VA says it also plans to improve training for medical staff to make sure they do not simply tell Gulf War vets that their symptoms are imaginary – as has happened to many over the years.” An updated version of the AP (2/26, Hefling) story notes that during an interview, Shinseki said he is “hoping” that Gulf War vets will be “enthused by the fact that this…challenges all the assumptions that have been there for 20 years.”
Similar coverage appears as the lone item in “Nation And World Briefs” for the Denver Post (2/26, 282K), the second item in “Briefing” for the St. Paul (MN) Pioneer-Press (2/26), as the second item in “Nation Briefs” for the Sarasota (FL) Herald Tribune (2/26, A3, 100K), and as the third item in “Nation/World Briefs” for the Detroit News (2/26, 168K). WPTV-TV West Palm Beach, FL (2/25, 11:28 p.m. ET), WOOD-TV Grand Rapids, MI (2/25, 11:17 p.m. ET), KCBS-TV Los Angeles, CA (2/25, 11:01 p.m. ET), KOLD-TV Tucson, AZ (2/25, 10:05 p.m. MT), and KCOY-TV Santa Barbara, CA (2/25, 10:02 p.m. PT) also aired reports on this story.

3.      Institute Of Medicine Panel Investigating Links Between Burn Pits, Illnesses For VA. In continuing coverage, the New York Times /Greenwire (2/26, Maron) notes that this week, an Institute of Medicine “panel…began” an 18-month, $1 million “investigation into possible links between illnesses being reported by Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans and contractors and their exposure to burn pits there. Working on behalf of the Veterans Affairs Department,” the panel “plans to scour existing data on burn pits and then recommend whether service members should be provided disability benefits.” Greenwire notes that US Rep. Tim Bishop (D-NY), who, along with “six other lawmakers,” had “written to VA Secretary Eric Shinseki last February to request a VA investigation into ‘the combined effect of sand, burn pits, dioxins, benzene and volatile organic compounds on returning'” Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, “applauded the VA for taking ‘an important step forward.'”

4.      Baker To Congress: PMAS Saved VA $54 Million. In continuing coverage, the Federal News Radio (2/25, Miller) website reported, “The Veterans Affairs Department estimates it has avoided paying $54 million dollars on the 45 major technology projects it stopped in July.” Roger Baker, VA’s “assistant secretary for information and technology and chief information officer, told the House Veterans Affairs Committee Tuesday that Program Management Accountability System (PMAS) tool is part of the changes the agency is making to how it manages and uses its $3.3 billion technology budget.” Committee members, however, “spent little time asking about PMAS,” expressing more interest in “cybersecurity and veterans benefits management programs.”
CIO’s Sense Of Humor Noted. In its “Circuit” blog, Federal Computer Week (2/26, 90K) says Baker “managed to keep his sense of humor throughout” throughout a “busy schedule this week,” one which involved “talking about the 2011 budget request and VA program updates at two breakfast events, in testimony on the Hill and in a conference call with reporters.” By way of example, Federal Compute Week notes that when “Baker hit the phones with the news media on Feb. 24 to publicize the VA’s program management approach to troubleshoot IT programs,” he likened the situation to walking through an alligator-filled swamp.

5.      For Soldiers, Single Motherhood Becomes Another Battlefield.In a Washington Post (2/26, 684K) op-ed, Mary Eberstadt, a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, says that while official US military “policy is…to keep women,” some of whom have children, away from combat, “sophistical maneuvering around these rules has become commonplace.” Eberstadt concludes, “Sending fathers into military zones has been a tragedy for as long as war has been around. Sending mothers along with them — many of them the only parent a child has — is simply wrong.”

6.      Military Spouses Outraged By Suspension Of Education Grant Program. The AP (2/26, Bynum) says the response from US military spouses “was so heavy” when the “government started offering them grants last year of up to $6,000 for college or career training,” it “nearly busted the fledgling program’s budget, prompting the Defense Department to suspend it abruptly last week.” After noting that the suspension “has triggered outrage” from military spouses, the AP reports DOD “has suggested military spouses consider alternatives to paying for college – such as the new GI Bill, a benefit service members can now transfer to their spouses and children. However, spouses said they don’t like that option,” in part because they do not want to take the benefit away from their husbands or wives, or because they want to save it for their children.

7.      Waco VA Regional Office Looking To Employ Homeless Vets. According to the Waco (TX) Tribune-Herald (2/25, Dennis, 35K), the “Waco Veterans Affairs Regional Office is seeking homeless veterans to fill some job openings to help them maintain stable housing.” After noting that Carl Lowe, the office’s director, “said the agency began the Homeless Veterans Hiring Initiative in response to Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric K. Shinseki’s charge to end homelessness for all veterans within five years,” the Tribune Herald pointed out that 26-year-old Jeffrey Anderson, one of the veterans hired through the initiative, “was twice deployed to Iraq.”
VA Commits Housing Vouchers To Vets Found Dur ing Homeless Survey. The Charlotte (NC) Observer (2/25, Price, 199K) noted that one of the “nation’s most ambitious homeless surveys has been launched this week in Charlotte — not just to count them, but to determine who they are, where they came from, and if they’re at risk of dying on the streets.” The “Urban Ministry Center and the Charlotte Housing Authority are coordinating the…survey, which is patterned after similar efforts in 21 other major cities,” including Denver, Colorado, where, according to Becky Kanis of Common Ground, a “New York-based organization that crafted the survey guidelines,” VA “committed housing vouchers for every homeless veteran…found” during the survey. The Winston-Salem (NC) Journal (2/25) ran a shortened version of this story.

8.      US-Mexico Border Providing Opportunity For Vets To Feed Drug Addictions. According to the KGTV-TV San Diego, CA (2/25, Reynolds) website, Dr. James Michelsen of the Veterans Affairs hospital in San Diego “said one in 50 combat veterans is screening positive for pain killer addiction, mostly to OxyContin.” The Department of Justice and VA “have a prescription tracking system to monitor potential abuses,” but the “system stops” at the US-Mexico border, “where veterans…can feed their addiction while staying off the grid.”

9.      Bill Would Protect Survivors Of Soldiers Killed In Iraq, Afghanistan From Foreclosure. The Air Force Times (2/26, Maze) reports, “Surviving spouses of service members killed in Iraq or Afghanistan would be guaranteed one year of protection against the foreclosure or forced sale of their homes under legislation introduced Tuesday” by US Rep. Frank Kratovil Jr. (D-MD). The “bill, HR 4664, was referred” to the House Veterans Affairs Committee, “which oversees the legal and financial protections provided by the Servicemembers’ Civil Relief Act. The committee is working on a package of changes to that law that could be passed later this year.”

10.    Vermont Governor Endorses Plan To Open Psychiatric Facility At VA Hospital. The Dartmouth (2/25, Aylward), a student-run newspaper at Dartmouth College, noted that on February 18th, Vermont Governor Jim Douglas “endorsed a plan…to open a psychiatric facility,” operated by the Dartmouth Medical School, at the White River Junction Veteran Affairs Hospital. The “Vermont State Hospital Futures Master Plan, which was presented to a joint meeting of several state Senate and House committees” on February 19th, “recommends three new facilities that would be opened by 2012 to replace the outdated Vermont State Hospital facilities by 2014.” The Dartmouth added, “The White River Junction facility would be operational by April 2014, coinciding with the closing of the Vermont State Hospital, according to the Futures plan.”

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