VA Advisory Committee on the U.S. Outlying Areas and Freely Associated States

Floor Speech

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Mr. SABLAN. Madam Speaker, military veterans living in the U.S. Outlying Areas and Freely Associated States do not have the same access to services as veterans elsewhere in our Nation. They face numerous obstacles accessing the benefits to which they are due. They cannot reach all the services that should be available to them. We must fix this inequality.

As a first step, today I am introducing legislation to create the Veterans Affairs Advisory Committee on the U.S. Outlying Areas and Freely Associated States. The new advisory committee would be composed of veterans from the U.S. Outlying Areas--the Northern Mariana Islands, which I represent, American Samoa, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico--and from the Freely Associated States of the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau. The committee, a part of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, will be responsible for assessing benefit availability and service accessibility in these U.S. Outlying areas and Freely associated States and for advising the Secretary on how any deficits can be addressed.

As an example of these inequities, the Northern Marianas, my district, is the only U.S. jurisdiction without a VA Community-Based Outpatient Clinic (CBOC). The nearest full-service VA medical facility is in Hawaii, which can be over a 15-hour journey by plane. The Northern Marianas is also the only U.S. area without a Vet Center. Guam Vet Center staff travel to the island of Saipan in the Marianas to provide services, but visits are infrequent and limited to a few hours. Veterans on the islands of Tinian and Rota must travel to Saipan or Guam to receive in-person services. The Marianas is also the only U.S. jurisdiction without a Veteran Benefits office. Guam VA Benefits Office staff travel to Saipan to meet with Marianas veterans and their families, but again those visits are infrequent and limited to a few hours.

The advisory committee my legislation sets up will detail issues, like these that Marianas veterans face, and concerns raised by veterans resident in the other U.S. outlying areas and freely associated states. And the committee will recommend to the Secretary how these issues should be addressed.

It is also my intention that the committee's existence within the Department will encourage VA leadership and staff to consider island area veterans from the outset, when developing new programs or initiatives, to put an end to this pattern of inequity.

Providing equitable support to veterans in the outlying areas and freely associated states is an obligation long overdue. These veterans have fought in the same conflicts and suffered the same physical, mental, and spiritual wounds of service as veterans residing everywhere else in America.

The legislation I am introducing today will give these veterans a voice within the Department to advocate for equal treatment. I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

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