VA doesn’t know where their veterans live

Historic City News has received a copy of a letter from Assistant County Administrator Jerry Cameron to Thomas Wisnieski, Director of the North Florida and South Georgia Veterans Health System, concerning the Veterans Administration Community Based Outpatient Clinic (CBOC) location in St. Johns County, that indicates the the VA doesn’t know where their veterans actually live.

Armed with census data and the county’s global information system mapping capabilities, Cameron plotted the location, within a stated margin of error, against the estimated veteran population, by census tract, to arrive at a weighted “mean center” of veteran residences in St Johns County. Pretty impressive stuff. And the results may surprise you.

“We have bent over backwards, tap-danced, pleaded, extended dates with Lowe’s, and generally extended ourselves to the limit of time allotment,” Cameron told Historic City News when we investigated complaints from readers in June. “We offered to make facilities available to them, built to their specifications in our new facility and have, to date received nothing but a run around.”

Since it was announced that the US Veterans Administration was in a hold-over status in the former county Health and Human Services building, now owned by Lowes Home Improvement Centers, all eyes have been focused on where the outpatient clinic would relocate — or, as some have speculated, if it will simply close. If that were to occur, local vets would be forced to travel to the VA Hospital in Gainesville, or elsewhere, which would impose a heavy burden on the patients, especially those with service-connected disabilities.

When it was learned that the VA didn’t appear interested in the wing already designed and being constructed for them in the county’s new “Gauze Mahal”, the nickname given by some objectors to St. Johns County’s new multi-story, $12.5 million Health and Human Services building, Cameron began a campaign to raise awareness in the veteran community about the impending closure.

VA Public Affairs Officer Cindy Snook told local Historic City News reporters in an e-mail that they do not intend to close the vital outpatient clinic, however, they believe that the approximately 5,000 United States veterans in St Johns County, who are potential patients, are situated further north near Nocatee where the Veterans Administration could build their own building for less.

Snook included bullet points regarding the current situation with the St. Augustine Community Based Outpatient Clinic:

1. Under no circumstances will VA services be interrupted to Veterans in the St. Augustine area.
2. Plans are in place to acquire a replacement clinic
3. The plans are presently being overseen by Department of Veterans Affairs Central Office of Construction and Facilities Management, Real Property Services
4. Solicitations for offers have been issued
5. Bids were evaluated in July 2014
6. I want to reiterate that we strive to meet the needs of every Veteran we serve and there will be no interruptions of VA Services to Veterans in the St. Augustine area.

A recent meeting of veterans and veteran organization representatives was held which allowed for a face-to-face exchange of concerns and solutions. The exchange was a bit lopsided in that there were a lot of concerned and few solutions. Possibly more frustrating to the vets who attended was the fact that the entire bidding and construction of this clinic project is shrouded in secrecy. Even the spokesmen who attended were prohibited from discussing certain aspects that, had they been known, could have clearly conciliated the crowd.

At the VA Town Hall Meeting, ordered by Secretary of Veterans Affairs Robert A. McDonald, Director Wisnieski announced, “We are forbidden by a law, issued by congress, from saying anything about the process.” It was like a person on trial repeating “I am invoking my rights under the 5th amendment.”

“I find it abhorrent that you will not, under any circumstances, give us any information about the location of our much needed CBOC,” Bill Dudley, Chairman of the Veterans Council of St. Johns County, said, as he repeatedly voiced his displeasure with the way the VA has been handling the process. “I find the fact that you and those who work for you appear so arrogant that you will not even reply to letters written by our two senators and a member of congress totally unacceptable.”

What Director Wisnieski did say at that meeting was that the US Veterans Administration is proceeding with the acquisition process to construct a permanent CBOC facility location here in St. Johns County.

In his September 10, 2014 letter to Wisnieski, Cameron cautioned the Director that “if you proceed based on your present assumptions, you will make a final selection based on seriously flawed data.” Cameron contends that the search area did not accurately reflect the location of the current veteran population, much less pronounced growth patterns in the county.

To support his findings, Cameron included the GIS map reflecting the results of their analysis.

“It is very clear that St. Johns County is in the best position to meet time lines and provide services most equitably to the overall veteran population,” Cameron concluded. “In fact, St Johns County is perhaps the only entity that can accomplish these critical goals.”