Forward Observer

Veterans Are Getting Short Rations in the Governor’s Budget

District 8 of the VFW has once again resolved we need a Department of Veterans Affairs not stuck under the National Guard.  Our Chapter 415 of the Vietnam Veterans of America has just passed their own resolution.  We have heard District 30 of the American Legion also recently passed a similar resolution and other districts like Districts 14 and 19 are also interested in the subject.  Perhaps these grassroots districts, will change the American Legion thinking at state level later in the year.  The state VFW and Military Order of the Purple Heart organizations have been an advocates for a separate department for a while.  The time has certainly come to change the Commonwealth’s manner of dealing with veterans affairs.

As an example, while the proposed executive budget for 2012-2013 just submitted by Governor Corbett increased general funding support to the Ft. Indiantown Gap itself, the veterans community has lost appropriated funding once again.  This was after the Department of Veterans and Military Affairs (the National Guard) decided to offer up about $6 million in savings through staffing reductions and other efficiencies  in the State Veterans Home Bureau after a management review — and after about another projected $7 million in state veterans homes savings this fiscal year.

Forward Observer

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Veterans Employment

The Good:  As far as websites go, the new website My Next Move for Veterans, which tries to automatically relate military occupational specialties with civilian careers plus provide advice on the future prospects of those career fields, identify their characteristics,  salaries, educational requirements and apprenticeship programs  — and then even goes further in helping you locate actual job offerings in a state or zip code area –  is a long sought idea come to fruition.