By Jim Vines | jim.helpingveterans@gmail.com
The Department of Veterans Affairs deployed 20 additional Mobile Vet Centers on Jan. 4th to increase access to readjustment counseling services for veterans and their families in rural and under-served communities across the country.
Mobile Vet Centers allow the VA to bring the many services vet centers offer veterans to all the communities, wherever needed. The VA launched the 20 new vehicles to their destinations ranging across the continental United States, Hawaii and Puerto Rico.
These customized vehicles, which are equipped with confidential counseling space and a state of the art communication package, travel to communities to extend the VA’s reach to veterans, service members and their families, especially those living in rural or remote communities. The vehicles also serve as part of the VA emergency response program.
The 20 new, American-made vehicles will expand the existing fleet of 50 Mobile Vet Centers already in service. In fiscal year 2011, Mobile Vet Centers participated in more than 3,600 federal, state and locally sponsored veteran related events. The VA contract for the 20 mobile Vet Centers totals $3.1 million.
Also, 230 emergency shuttle vehicles are in the plans over the next five years. The shuttles will provide routine transportation for veteran patients in and around various metro areas during normal operations, but convert to mobile clinics that will facilitate the evacuation of patients and their care teams during disasters and emergencies. The VA contract for the 230 emergency shuttles totals $53.5 million.
The VA has 300 Vet Centers serving communities across the country, offering individual and group counseling for veterans and their families, family counseling for military related issues, bereavement counseling for families who experience an active duty death, military sexual trauma counseling and referral, outreach and education, substance abuse assessment and referral, employment assessment and referral, VA benefits explanation and referral, and screening and referral for medical issues, including traumatic brain injury and depression. To find out more about Vet Center services or find a Vet Center in a particular area, go to www.vetcenter.va.gov.
Protect your papers
When I was discharged from the military in 1968, I was given a packet of discharge papers and told to guard them with my life, as they were the only copies I would ever see and without my DD-214, I would have no access to veteran benefits. When being young, these documents seemed insignificant. Now as age and illness start to take their toll, this information becomes critical to veterans and family members for a variety of reasons.
Safeguard these documents in a home, fire-resistant safe or procure a safe deposit box at a bank. If records are lost, a request (Standard Form 180 ) can be submitted in writing to National Personnel Records Center at 1 Archives Drive, St. Louis, MO 63138-1002. Another alternative because of time consumption through the mail, try the website www.archives.gov/st-louis/military-personnel.
Update
An update on my article dated March 2010 “Hazelwood Act.” New info on “Transferability of Benefits” (Legacy Program) is provided by Robin Greer, Texas Veterans Commission, in Granbury. Effective Fall 2011, with tuition and fee charges, a veteran’s spouse or a child’s guardian, conservator, custodian or other legally designated caretaker may reassign unused hours to an eligible child on behalf of the veteran if the veteran died prior to requesting the transfer of hours. Veterans’ spouses are not eligible to receive a transfer of unused hours. The Hazelwood Act is now available to all Texas veterans – alive, disabled, non-disabled or deceased.
Also, all applicants must complete and submit appropriate application and documentation to their college or university’s financial aid office or veterans education office, no later that one year after the earlier of the date the school provides written notice to the applicant of his or her eligibility or receives written notice from the applicant that acknowledges the applicant’s awareness of his/her eligibility for the exemption. For additional information visit www.collegefortexans.com.
Speak to you again next week.
Jim Vines is commander of AmVets Post 133.
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