Bills Would Add Services, Improve Mental Health Care

Spurred by the scandal at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and what some call other federal failures to provide care to returning soldiers, several Maryland lawmakers and Gov. Martin O'Malley's administration have introduced legislation to create new benefits and enhance services for veterans.

The General Assembly is considering more than 20 bills dealing with veterans this legislative session. Chief among them is an O'Malley proposal to establish a state program to eliminate gaps in mental and behavioral health services for veterans. Through the $3.5 million pilot program, the state would help veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan by providing crisis management and referring them to treatment.

Other administration bills include giving preference to veterans in awarding state contracts, providing unemployment insurance to spouses of military employees and giving veterans seniority if there are state employee layoffs.

O'Malley (D) said the Bush administration has waged a "war on the cheap" and said veterans, particularly those in the National Guard, are returning to their Maryland homes without the services they need.

"Too often when veterans come home, they fall through the gaps in services and outreach," O'Malley said in a recent interview. "We're hopeful that these efforts we're taking on the state level will help us fill those gaps. . . . It's an obligation we have for citizens."

This is one issue on which Democrats and Republicans appear to have found agreement. The top two Republicans in the House of Delegates have signed on as co-sponsors of the O'Malley administration's bill.

"I don't see that support for our veterans is necessarily a partisan issue," said House Minority Leader Anthony J. O'Donnell (R-Calvert).

Still, O'Donnell criticized O'Malley for having what he considers a relatively modest veterans agenda.

"That's all great. I support all that," O'Donnell said of the bills. "But that doesn't mean they're doing earth-shattering things for veterans. They could be doing a lot more."

Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown (D), an Army reservist who has fought in Iraq, considers the veterans bills his top priority this session. Brown said the mental and behavioral health program is just "scratching the surface" of what the state can do for veterans.

The program would help service members make the transition "from the battlefield back into the community," Brown said. He said it is particularly difficult for veterans in rural areas to find necessary health care, so a basic mission of the program is to help transport veterans to service locations, many of which are in the Baltimore-Washington corridor.

"We're going to use this as an opportunity to find where are there gaps in services and how can we bridge those gaps," Brown said in a recent interview. "We're proud of this investment, and we're hoping over time we'll make greater investments."