Teresa Morris, Director, Advocacy & Government Relations

Greetings NOVA Members –

September has arrived. We are in the final weeks of the 116th Congress and about 50 days ahead of the November election.

As we inch closer to the 2020 Election, NOVA will be putting together an informational Get Out the Vote campaign so tune in and watch all of our social media sites in the coming weeks. 

Prior to the publishing of this newsletter, NOVA submitted our priorities and views on mental health legislation being considered in the House before the Veterans Affairs Committee (HVAC). As has been reported, suicide prevention and mental health has been the number one issue that the VA, Committees and the VSO community have been advocating for in this Congress. We stated in our letter to HVAC Chairman Mark Takano, and Ranking Member Phil Roe that any package must include military cultural competency and other training for community care providers – training equal to the vigorous model VA has in place for their employees. We also noted the importance of funding for any new and enhanced programs, to include monies for hiring of mental health providers, suicide prevention coordinators, and counselors. No program or service works without clinical staff to provide the care to our Veterans. The recorded hearing can be found on the HVAC website at: https://veterans.house.gov/events/hearings

Our statement is on the NOVA website front page – Under Latest News

I hope many of you had the chance to engage with your members of Congress while on August recess.  I cannot stress how important it is for all of us to continue advocating for VA to enable them to have the tools you need to take care of all Veterans.

NOVA continues to remind Congress the importance of passing a robust budget for the VA to ensure the delivery of timely, quality healthcare and other services for Veterans. We continue to support and stand by the recommendations of the Independent Budget (IB). http://www.independentbudget.org/116-congress/

The House passed their Military Construction/VA Appropriations bill in May with funding totaling $104.8 billion, of which $90 billion goes to Medical Care accounts. The Senate held its hearing on the budget in July - considerable late this year- with Secretary Robert Wilkie testifying as to what he needs to run the entire VA system (VHS, VBA, NCA). 

As it stands now, it is looking like that we are headed for a continuous resolution (CR) before the election to keep the government running into 2021. Although VA has fared better than most federal agencies in budget proposals and appropriations, the real measure should be how well the funding matches the demand for Veterans’ benefits and services. Funding must consider community care, emergency care and internal VA needs. NOVA believes that VA continues to be the premier integrated health care system that understands and puts Veterans first.  A robust budget will assure that it can continue that work.

Thank you again for all you do and for your heroism every day! 

Stay Tuned!