Honoring our Veterans

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Hello,

Veterans Day marks an important opportunity for our nation to honor the lives and service of our veterans. To America’s veterans: thank you for your dedication to this country. This Veterans Day, we commit to honoring our veterans. We honor their service, we honor their dedication to this country, and we honor the promises we made to them when they entered service.

When the men and women who bravely serve our nation in the military come home to the North Coast, we owe them and their families the deepest gratitude and the highest quality programs to support the nearly 40,000 veterans in California's Second District. It must be more than just "thank you for your service." We must honor our commitments and deliver real results for all who've served our country. 

Rep. Huffman discussing how to help Californians with Lt. Colonel Baker of the Army Corps of Engineers at Willits and Lake Mendocino in California's 2nd District.

In that spirit, I'm excited to be introducing new legislation this week to address the VA's chronic inability to recruit and retain physicians and other health care providers to clinics that serve rural communities. This longstanding problem undermines access and quality of care for veterans in my district and in rural communities around the country. My bill would solve the problem by creating a new and specialized rural recruitment office, requiring VA to develop a targeted, nationwide plan for recruiting doctors in rural areas, and providing annual reports on the status of rural VA health care to make sure we are meeting our goals. 

Veterans deserve quality VA care, and should not be left behind because they live in rural areas like the North Coast. Many rural VA clinics are severely understaffed, leading to longer wait times and numerous, inconvenient trips to larger cities. The VA can and must do more to provide high quality medical services in rural California – and across the country – so my legislation will create an office to assess best hiring practices and create a national strategy for rural recruitment. The VA will be required to submit reports on hiring needs and strategy to Congress every year. With the centralized Office of Rural Recruitment, we can help ensure rural clinics have the staff they need to serve our veterans. Stay tuned for more on this new bill. 

I'm also working to provide veterans and active duty service members with the care they deserve. This year alone, the House has voted to pass the Veterans' Access to Child Care Act to provide childcare services for veterans while they are receiving health care, the Whole Veteran Act to make sure all necessary tools are available to veterans for their individual mental health needs, and the Vet HP Act to address vacancies in the Veterans Health Administration. I am also a cosponsor of H.R. 2435, the Accelerating Veterans Recovery Outdoors Act, legislation to expand recreational opportunities to veterans on public lands.

If you have had any difficulty getting VA services please contact my office and we will do our best to help you. We can help you with the following services:

I will continue to fight endlessly to improve access to health care facilities and substantial housing, employment, and educational opportunities that our current and former service members have earned.

With Best Regards,

Jared Huffman
Member of Congress

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