BY DENNIS HOWLAND, CHAIR

Here’s hoping everyone enjoyed the National Convention in New Orleans and are now safely home and in good health.

I’m sure many delegates have ideas about how to improve the way some things are done, have favorite events from the Convention, and are ready to hit the ground running in service to our communities and fellow veterans.

The elections process went well, and we have a new slate of officers to lead us over the next two years. Support for the Officers and Board from our members is anticipated to keep our focus on business and the future direction to be taken by Vietnam Veterans of America.

I particularly enjoyed the Public Affairs Committee session on Wednesday afternoon. Hearing about different events members participated in over the past several months and the exchange of ideas for community service programs and on future planning were valuable and appreciated. It appears that most are focusing on observing the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the war in Vietnam. Thank you.

A new and welcome Convention participant was Wreaths Across America Radio. Jeffrey Pierce and WAA staff conducted interviews with many of you. Every time we tell our story is an important part of our legacy. Talking about your military service is an outstanding means of furthering our legacy and is part of Public Affairs that has an impact on just about every VVA activity.

Our new Memo of Understanding with Wreaths Across America should be a good addition to VVA’s information and marketing tools. We have nearly every state represented by VVA members in the upcoming December WAA program of placing wreaths on the graves of veterans and statehouse ceremonies. A reminder that the VVA JROTC, Eagle Scout, Sea Cadet, and Civil Air Patrol medals can be presented any time throughout the year. All medals are available from the VVA Communications Department. Email mporter@vva.org to make the arrangements.

As I said in past meetings, getting VVA’s symbol and our members visible in our communities places us far above all the rest.

Good luck and God bless.

BY SANDIE WILSON, CHAIR

VVA experts worked with the U.S. Air Force, the VA, and NIH to reach a Memorandum of Agreement early this year on what to do with the Ranch Hand specimens and data. During that process, we learned that the veterans studied were required to present medical records for any child with an illness that might be related to the parent working with the chemicals, and, in doing so, those children would become part of the Ranch Hand data. We now have prioritized three major areas of concern: recognizing other areas in which toxins were present; including other health problems of veterans from all wars related to toxic exposure; and conducting toxic exposure health research for the children of all veterans.

These priorities cannot be achieved without help from families. Step one of any medical research is to identify affected people. So, please register your children if they have health problems. Your child or grandchild can be registered at birthdefects.org. If you cannot find a service officer, call 727-319-5921.

A few weeks before the Convention, outgoing VVA President Jack McManus and former Connecticut Commissioner of Veterans Affairs and VVA National Treasurer Linda Schwartz were appointed to the VA advisory committee to oversee the medical research, specimens, and data related to the Ranch Hand study. The VA assigned Dr. Rudy Johnson, who directs the agency’s Military Exposures Research Program, to head activities related to Ranch Hand. He has promised a report on the committee’s progress by September. You can read more about VVA’s efforts to preserve these vital specimens here.

A VVA member who worked in heavy construction equipment has identified places where he buried toxic chemicals overseas and at Fort Ord, despite the government’s denials of toxic exposure at Fort Ord. If there are other veterans with knowledge about toxic sites there or elsewhere, please contact me or VVA Government Affairs Director James McCormick.

If your chapter would like to present a toxic exposure or Agent Orange seminar in your area, call me at 734-216-4862.

BY KATE O'HARE-PALMER, CHAIR

VVA’s 22nd National Convention is over, and we have several new members of the Board of Directors to lead us into the next two years. The direction of our organization needs to be solidified, and the Resolutions for the 2027 Convention will be critical in accomplishing this task. We congratulate the new BOD and will work together to make our organization cohesive and continue its effectiveness working with other veterans service organizations.

At the committee’s Women Veterans Breakfast on Friday, Dr. Molly McGaughey, a gerontologist, spoke on caregiving for aging veterans. We had a sold-out event, and the information we handed out was well received. Please contact me if you would like a copy for your chapter. Special thanks to our New Mexico brothers who shared a special blessing ceremony at the breakfast.

Our committee resolutions were all passed, and I thank all the committee members for their help. Our breakout session had some time for discussion about what is happening with women veterans around the country. It is clear that more care for senior women veterans is needed in the VA healthcare system.

I was able to pass some of this information on when a few committee chairs met with VA Deputy Secretary Paul Lawrence before his speech to the Convention delegates on Friday.

The Sons and Daughters In Touch presentation Friday afternoon was exceptional. I don’t think there was a dry eye in the Convention hall. We are proud to continue to support this exceptional group.

We have an outstanding Government Affairs Committee. At their meeting in New Orleans the committee went over 20 bills that VVA supported. That included H.R. 2201, the Improving VA Training for Military Sexual Trauma Claims Act, which the committee has been involved with.

We are still working on the S.2061, the Molly Loomis Research for Descendents of Toxic Exposed Veterans Act 2025, and S.506, Coordinating Care for Senior Veterans and Wounded Warriors Act. A full list of bills was distributed and our state council presidents should be sending them to the chapters. Please contact your members of Congress to thank them for their support.

VVA Government Affairs Director James McCormick reminded us that the members are “public servants and you are the employer.” He also said, “the stakes are too high to lose—people will die.” We must remain committed to working for veterans. Your continued collective voices are extremely important.

I want to give a shout-out to the women veterans who attended the Convention. We had a great get together on Friday. What a great group of knowledgeable women, including some who attended for the first time. Your support for VVA is greatly appreciated. We still have much to contribute and I appreciate you all.

Our committee is going to put together a short video to honor VVA women veterans. We need lots of pictures and bios. Please forward them to: Koharepalmer@vva.org

Until next time, remember to be kind to yourself and others.

BY DOMINICK YEZZO, CHAIR

The 2025 National Convention exposed an interesting dichotomy in Vietnam Veterans of America. Seven hundred-plus delegates all but unanimously voted down resolutions designed to dissolve the VVA Corporation and set up a Legacy Society designed to transition VVA into what we were told was its inevitable ending.

The delegates said no because they were not sure what was being asked of them in the Resolution. VVA members want clarity about what we will become and how we will be remembered.

What follows is a list of the VINJUS Committee’s Legislative Agenda in Congress:

To pay all service-connected Veterans Incarcerated at the VA rate of disability awarded, with no reduction to 10 percent, acknowledging that the rating was granted to honorably discharged servicemen and servicewomen.

To offer Veterans Incarcerated a separate ward to reside in and to give Veterans Incarcerated opportunities to serve the institution and the community the institution is built in.

To ensure Veterans Incarcerated are tested and, if necessary, medically treated and counseled in therapy for Post-traumatic Stress Disorder and Traumatic Brain Injury, acknowledging that PTSD and TBI are silent wounds of war which may be the root cause of a veteran’s incarceration.

Sens. Angus King (I-Maine) and John Fetterman (D-Pa.) have endorsed the VINJUS agenda and agreed to help us create a bill to be presented to both houses of Congress. The demands for the welfare of Veterans Incarcerated are accomplished through continued active collaboration of the VVA Government Affairs Committee and staff and the VINJUS Committee. The communication between both committees is clear and specific.

The VINJUS Committee recognizes that the Government Affairs Committee pushes our agenda and helps us to accomplish our goals. James McCormick, Jim Khun, Pete Peterson, and Elaina Howell power our mission in Congress. I take pride in knowing that VVA has done more for veterans and their families than any other organization in the history of the United States, but my claim to this pride comes from the work of the Government Affairs Committee.

There is integrity and purpose in VVA. The VINJUS Committee is proud to be a part of such dignity. Thank you for your service and your hard work.

By GRANT COATES, CHAIR

As of August 13, the number of Americans missing and unaccounted-for from the Vietnam War was 1,566. The countries are: Vietnam, 1,233; Laos, 278; Cambodia, 48; Peoples Republic of China territorial waters, 7. These numbers fluctuate due to investigations resulting in changed locations of loss.

The Defense Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Accounting Agency recently announced the following unaccounted for Vietnam War service members as identified:

Air Force Tech. Sgt. Donald K. Springsteadah, 35, accounted for June 23, 2025.

Air Force Tech. Sgt. Willis R. Hall, 40, accounted for June 23, 2025.

Air Force Staff Sgt. Henry G. Gish, 25, accounted for June 23, 2025.

Air Force Master Sgt. James H. Calfee, 26, accounted for Aug. 8, 2025.

In 1968, Springsteadah, Hall, Gish, Calfee, and fifteen other men were assigned to Lima Site 85, a tactical air navigation radar site on Phou Pha Thi, a remote, 5,600-foot mountain in Laos. In the early morning of March 11, the site was overrun by Vietnamese commandos, causing the Americans to seek safety on a narrow ledge of the steep mountain.

A few hours later, under the protective cover of A-1 Skyraider aircraft, U.S. helicopters rescued eight of the men. Springsteadah, Hall, Gish, Calfee, and seven others were killed in action but were unable to be recovered.

Air Force Col. Walter A. Renelt, 40, who was killed during the Vietnam War, was accounted for June 23, 2025.

Renelt served with the 20th Tactical Air Support Squadron. On November 20, 1969, he was an instructor pilot aboard an O-2A Skymaster aircraft with another crew member on a visual reconnaissance mission over Laos. During the mission, the plane was hit by enemy fire and crashed. Dangerous weather and enemy activity prevented ground rescue attempts, and subsequent searches for both crew members were unsuccessful. The Air Force made a presumptive finding of death on July 12, 1973.

VVA’s Veterans Initiative Program continues the mission. Your help is needed. Objects taken from the battlefields of Vietnam are more than souvenirs or war trophies. They may help name and determine the location of war dead in Vietnam.

Maps, stories, after-action reports, pictures, and military items may have a story of interest to both American and Vietnamese researchers trying to recover remains from the battlefields.

Please contact the Veterans Initiative at:
Veterans Initiative Program
Vietnam Veterans of America
8719 Colesville Rd., Suite 100
Silver Spring, MD 20910
vi@vva.org

By KEN ROSE, NATIONAL REPRESENTATIVE

The legacy of VVA’s VA Voluntary Service program is a work in progress. How we assimilate in the future with other parties such as AVVA is in discussion.

At present, we are seeing the federal government do many things that affect veterans. The VA has cut the unions out from under the VA staff and forced out needed staff. The administration cites “national security” as one of their justifications for these and other cuts. But this has nothing to do with national security; it’s about stripping away the power of government unions and making it easier to fire employees without providing protection under hard-fought-for bargaining agreements.

Along with reductions in force, layoffs, and deferred resignations, VA support staff is being reduced. Registered Nurses and physicians are not affected by the deferred resignations, but 2,000 RNs and 750 doctors have left the VA this year. This has left the VA short-staffed in many areas. Nurses, for example, are doing work that the support staff usually does, taking them away from patient care.

Once again, people who know little or nothing about the VA Health Care system are forcing valuable staff to leave the department in the name of reducing waste and providing better care. All that these directives do is hurt veterans just to show a better bottom line.

Not every veteran in Congress is on our side. Most are watching their backs, not the veterans they are supposed to be working to protect.

With staff leaving and some hiring limited, VVA volunteers will also have less support. These volunteers continue to work hard under these conditions and the stress that comes with it.

Our volunteers do all kinds of functions in the VAMCs. They are Ambassadors, helping veterans navigate the campuses to find their clinics, and they are helping in clinics with sign-ins, and assisting staff with functions in the Community Living Centers.

With fewer staff doing more jobs in their own departments, they will have less time to work with volunteers who help them every day. Believe me, management and staff at the VAMCs know the value and appreciate the work of volunteers.

Every change that comes from above affects both in-patient and out-patient care. The PACT Act brought more veterans who need care into the system, and this is no time to cut back promised care to all veterans.

Feel free to call email or call with any questions or problems: krose@vva.org or 215-527-3494.

By GUMERSINDO GOMEZ, CHAIR

Please allow me to express my joy and appreciation to my fellow VVA members who showed confidence in me by voting during the Convention for me to continue to represent you on the National Board for my fifth term. The committee’s resolution nominating Sgt. 1st Class Jorge Otero-Barreto for the Presidential Medal of Freedom was presented to the Convention delegates and approved in a unanimous vote. Now it will go to the White House.

The committee presented two awards at the Convention. One went to Joey Strickland, a retired Army Colonel who served as the Director of the Arizona Department of Veterans’ Services and later as the Secretary and Executive Director of the Louisiana Department of Veterans Affairs. Strickland, a Native American of Choctaw-Cherokee-Lumbee descent, also served as Director of the Louisiana Governor’s Office of Indian Affairs from 1996-2004.

The Minority Affairs Committee honored the late Gen. George Baker Price with VVA’s highest award, the Commendation Medal. His widow accepted it on his behalf at the Saturday night Awards Banquet. Francisco Ivarra and I served on the VA Advisory Committee for Minority Veterans when Gen. Price was the panel’s Chair.

Now that the Convention is behind us, we have to rethink the future of VVA. Resolutions setting out the organization’s dissolution and its future that were presented to the delegates were voted down, and we have two years to come up with a plan for the organization’s future.

I would like to reorganize the corporation, keep it as a 501c (19) nonprofit, and work to ensure benefits for veterans who served in Iraq, Afghanistan, and in other places. However, it is up to the delegates at the 2027 Convention to decide on a plan for VVA’s future. It has to be one that works for the whole of VVA, not just a few.

If you are a veteran or a dependent of a minority veteran and have questions, do not hesitate to contact me at Sgtgomez@aol.com or call 413-883-4508.

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