Congressional delegation wants more Vet Centers

What Wisconsin congressional unanimity looks like

Wisconsin's 469,000 veterans have only two veterans centers offering counseling in a non-medical setting, and both are in the southern part of the state. Approximately 40 percent of Wisconsin veterans do not have a Vet Center close enough for them to go on a regular basis, says Sen. Russ Feingold.

Feingold and all nine other members of Wisconsin's congressional delegation are urging the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) to open two additional Vet Centers, in La Crosse and Brown counties. In a letter to the VA signed by all of them, the delegation expressed its disappointment that none of the 23 new centers the VA plans to open this year would be built in Wisconsin, which ranks seventh worst in the nation for veterans’ access to these centers.

Other states with similar veteran populations have more than double Wisconsin's two centers. Maryland has fewer veterans than Wisconsin, and is one-fifth the size, but has four Vet Centers. Massachusetts is about one-eighth the size of Wisconsin, and has only a slightly larger veteran population, but it has seven Vet Centers.

If Vet Centers were established in La Crosse and Brown, roughly 82 percent of Wisconsin veterans would be within an hour drive of a Vet Center, the delegation wrote:

“We are very concerned that over forty percent of Wisconsin veterans do not currently have reasonable access to a Vet Center. Servicemembers are returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with alarming rates of PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) and other mental health and readjustment issues. Additional Vet centers are urgently needed to ensure that Wisconsin veterans and their families have reasonable access to necessary counseling in the welcoming, non-clinical environment that Vet Centers offer.”