It's not okay, to late for empathy. Change is needed.

The following information is addressing the lack of follow through and true best effort by our leadership and representatives to address the numerous critical, dangerous and life threatening issues provided to the to those on the floor of  Senate and the House during the time the information was delivered.   Our representatives were and not just aware by word of mouth or through an advocate for a Veteran but from the Department of Veteran Affairs who's mission statement is as follows.

To serve veterans and the public by conducting effective oversight of the programs and operations of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) through independent audits, inspections, and investigations.

Link to the PDF file on there site

VAOIG Mission, Visions and Values

What in my opinion and yet to be determined by constitutional law.  That is it in fact criminal to direct veterans to services needed to help to prevent and or protect a life that is being threatened, having received notification that in the there are critical items that need to be addressed that has made the process up to the actual delivery of what is supposed to extend the life of our veterans is leading to factors which support the 20 + veterans committing suicide statistic.

Should any an all government employees working for the Department of Veteran Affairs at least, at a minimum inform a Veteran if a service is degraded or may possibly cause them harm before referring them to it.

In order to not overwhelm anyone reading this blog with I will try to keep things as direct and adequately detailed and provided links to information for you to research further with the understand that Veterans Affairs is a an organizations that has outgrown it's self and that was 30 years ago when I was child.  I've spent the last 3+ years observing, researching and gathering a lot of information and the process itself has been if nothing else painfully sad and disappointing to know, see and feel for myself.

I don't believe there is a single personal affiliated with the VA organization that will not be sure to provide you with information on how to contact the crisis line.  The fact that I could not find a single person who could provide me with the definition as VA defines a crisis.   Think about that.

The following is a report from the VA OIG.

Title: Healthcare Inspection - Evaluation of the Veterans Health Administration Veterans Crisis Line Report Number: 16-03985-181 Title: Healthcare Inspection - Evaluation of the Veterans Health Administration Veterans Crisis Line Report Number: 16-03985-181 Download Report Issue Date: 3/20/2017 Full Report Issue Date: 3/20/2017 SUMMARY OIG conducted a healthcare inspection of the Veterans Crisis Line (VCL) with four primary objectives:  To evaluate an allegation that VCL staff did not respond adequately to a veteran’s urgent needs; To perform a detailed review of VCL’s governance structure, operations, and quality assurance functions; To evaluate whether VHA completed planned actions in response to VA OIG recommendations from a previously published OIG report; and To address complaints received from the U.S. Office of Special Counsel (OSC).  We determined that VCL staff did not respond adequately to a veteran’s urgent needs. We found deficiencies in the VCL’s processes for managing incoming telephone calls and in governance and oversight of VCL operations. We found substantial disagreement about key decisions in operations of the VCL between the VHA Suicide Prevention Office and VHA Member Services. We found that VHA contracting staff and leaders lacked an understanding of the backup center contract terms and did not verify quality control aspects of contractor performance, resulting in deficient oversight. We found some backup call centers used a queuing process that may lead callers to perceive they were on hold, and that VCL leadership had not established expectations or targets for queued call times, or thresholds for taking action on queue times. We discovered deficiencies in the VCL Quality Management program. We found several challenges in VCL QM staff’s ability to collect, analyze, and effectively review relevant QM data. VCL policies were not consistent with existing VHA policies for veteran safety or risk management and did not incorporate techniques for evaluating available data to improve quality, safety, or value for veterans. We found that the VCL had not completed actions to fully implement the seven recommendations from our prior report. We substantiated the OSC complainant’s allegations that SSAs were allowed to coordinate emergency rescue responses independently after the end of a 2-week training period, without supervision and regardless of performance or final evaluation; that a newly trained SSA contacted a caller in crisis by telephone to solicit the veteran's location; and an SSA did not document when closing out a veteran’s case. We made 16 recommendations.  I highlighted a few things but understand this is the summary of the actual report so one should assume the entire summary above should be highlighted. So every Senator every House representative all the way down the chain through the Doctors, social workers, peer specialist, VA community outreach support to the community based non-profit organizations provided funding to give veterans support directly back up the chain through the Veterans Sub-committee and directly redirected by the Director of Case Management and Social work services out of Senator Kaines Richmond Office Marc Cheatheam who completed the loop of lack of or not available services and regardless if am Veteran or 100% disabled I was left behind.   He closed my case requesting assistance with dealing with the agencies contracted to provide me services as a veteran and forwarded my request to a different branch of one of the very organizations that I was having problems with and 3 years later I can trace everything back to the point in which I first contacted the crisis line and  foolishly but my life further at risk  My fellow vets don't give in and don't give up just know that there are going to be many times throughout the process where you will have to save yourself. I am available to help anyone in need in any capacity they may need while I am here and able to feel free to call, text, email, Facebook any way is fine with me. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.