A Request for a Convienient V.A. location

Less than a month after Congressman Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) and Congressman John Hall (D-NY) made a direct appeal to Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) today announced that it will open a Vet Center in Middletown, New York next year to provide veterans and military families from in the mid-Hudson Valley with a convenient location for counseling and other services.

Hinchey and Hall sent Nicholson a letter in January to request the establishment of a Vet Center in Orange County since the closest Vet Centers currently available are in White Plains and Albany, which are inconvenient locations for many veterans and their families who live in Dutchess, Orange, Putnam, Rockland, Ulster, and Sullivan counties. The VA has yet to determine an exact site in Middletown for the Vet
Center.

“Opening a Vet Center in Orange County will help make the lives of our local veterans and military families much easier,” Hinchey said. “The brave men and women who admirably serve our country in the armed forces deserve to be treated with our country’s utmost respect and that includes providing reasonable access to full benefits and counseling when they return home. Vet Centers provide valuable counseling and assistance, and now all of those services will be much more convenient for veterans and military families who live in the mid-Hudson Valley. The new Vet Center is an important step in fulfilling the commitments we have made to those who have served and are now serving our country.”

Hall said, “We are very glad the VA recognized the growing need for veterans facilities in Orange County . The new Middletown center will provide crucial services to Hudson Valley veterans returning every day from combat in Iraq and Afghanistan . Our government has an obligation to provide first class care to veterans who risked their lives and this VA center is part of that contract.”
Vet Centers provide readjustment counseling and outreach services to all veterans who served in any combat zone. Services are also available for family members of veterans and active military personnel for military related issues and readjustment counseling. The benefits are provided at no cost to the veteran or family.

Vet Center services include individual counseling, group counseling, marital and family counseling, bereavement counseling, medical referrals, assistance in applying for VA Benefits, employment counseling, guidance and referral, alcohol/drug assessments, information and referral to community resources, military sexual trauma counseling & referral, as well as outreach and community education. The Vet Center Program was established by Congress in 1979 out of the recognition that a significant number of Vietnam era vets were still experiencing readjustment problems. Since then, Congress and the VA have extended the program to serve veterans and military families who were involved in all other conflicts, including those involved with military activity in Afghanistan and Iraq.