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NMI veterans’ clinic study now law
Kilili: For best results, vets need to register
WASHINGTON, D.C.—Marianas veterans who are not registered for health benefits with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs need to do so now.
That was the word yesterday from Delegate Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan (Ind-MP), as President Trump signed the law that mandates a feasibility study for a veterans’ health clinic in the Marianas.
The VA has 180 days to complete the study.
“For the study that I put into the VA MISSION Act to prove there is need for a veterans’ health clinic in the Marianas, we need every veteran to be signed up with the VA,” Sablan said. “The more vets we have, the more likely that the study will justify the cost of a clinic building and full-time VA medical staff to provide service to our veterans.”
Improving service for Marianas veterans is an important goal for Sablan and having a clinic is at the top of those services.
The Marianas is the only Pacific jurisdiction without a VA-staffed clinic.
“Our veterans in the Marianas deserve their own Community-Based Outpatient Clinic,” Sablan said. “Guam has a CBOC. Hawaii veterans have CBOCs on Kauai, Maui, the Big Island. Even American Samoa has its own Community-Based Outpatient Clinic. And that is what I want for our veterans, too: a full-time, VA-staffed clinic with dedicated healthcare providers.”
Sablan has worked on multiple legislative pathways to get the necessary study authorized; and he was successful yesterday.
“When it happened, it happened quickly,” Sablan explained. “I was able to put the study mandate into the VA MISSION Act in the Veterans’ Affairs Committee on May 8. The House passed the bill on May 16. The Senate followed on May 23. And 14 days later the President signed.”
Sablan was also able to include the study mandate in H.R. 4243, the VA Asset and Infrastructure Review Act of 2017, and H.R. 4242, the VA Care in the Community Act. Though introduced by the chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, neither of those bills passed the House.
“Experience has taught me to be persistent and to have a Plan B… and a Plan C,” said Sablan. “That is how to get things done in Congress for the people you work for.”
With a 180-day mandate the Department of Veterans Affairs should finish the feasibility study by the end of this year.
“Once the study is done—and assuming we get the result we want—then having the necessary funding approved for our veterans will be at the top of my list, when the next Congress begins in January 2019,” Sablan said. (PR)
