[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 112 (Friday, August 3, 2001)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1519-E1520]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                HOMELESS VETERANS ASSISTANCE ACT OF 2001

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH

                             of new jersey

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, August 2, 2001

  Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I am today introducing the 
``Homeless Veterans Assistance Act of 2001.'' I intend to have hearings 
on this measure in September and to ask the House to consider it 
shortly thereafter.
  This is a great Nation, Mr. Speaker, and Fortune smiles on us in this 
country in so many ways. But tragically, a few are left behind, and a 
large number of America's veterans are counted among them. Currently, 
we believe that some 225,000 veterans are homeless on a given night. 
For these veterans, access to VA benefits, specialized services and 
effective outreach are vital components to any hope of individual 
stability and improvement in their prospects.
  It is important to create and maintain programs that give veterans 
the opportunity to become self-sufficient, and to concentrate our 
resources on programs that work. We know this is not an immediate 
process but instead constitutes a long-term challenge and struggle for 
many, both for those who are homeless and those who are trying to help. 
Also, I believe that some of our government's homeless assistance 
programs ought to stress prevention as an integral part of any strategy 
to help homeless veterans. This bill I am introducing, the Homeless 
Veterans Assistance Act, incorporates a number of these goals.

  Mr. Speaker, it is difficult to pinpoint any one cause of 
homelessness among veterans. Many problems and difficulties could be 
traceable to an individual's experience in military service, exposure 
to combat, or return to a seemingly uncaring civilian society. In fact, 
we know that a majority of homeless veterans today suffer from serious 
mental illness, including post-traumatic stress disorder, and illegal 
substance use often complicates their situations. Many have served time 
in jail. These individual conditions have far-reaching effects on 
veterans and their families.
  A veteran with an impaired mental state may lose the ability to 
maintain stable employment. Absent employment, it eventually becomes 
difficult to maintain any type of permanent housing. The vicious cycle 
only accelerates once employment and housing are lost. The absence of 
these two important anchors to society is a precursor for increased 
utilization of medical resources in emergency rooms, VA and other 
public hospitals and, unfortunately, the resources of America's 
courtrooms, jails and prisons.
  A full platter of medical services may be available to veterans 
through VA medical facilities, but without better coordination within 
and across Federal programs relief is only temporary, because veterans 
once released from VA health care frequently are exposed to the same 
challenges that created these conditions in the first place. This is 
why prevention and accountability are two important priorities of my 
bill. We need to find new ways to prevent veterans from spiraling down 
to homelessness, but to be responsible we should also provide for them 
and their caregivers a sense of accountability. And we should not 
expect veterans to complete this arduous journey alone.

  This bill will hold accountable the three federal departments most 
directly involved in homeless assistance for veterans: Veterans' 
Affairs, Labor, and Housing and Urban Development. These agencies need 
to help homeless veterans make a transition to self-reliance; my bill 
urges them, and in some cases requires them, to cooperate more fully to 
address the problem of homelessness among veterans.
  The bill improves and expands VA's homeless grant and per diem 
program. Recipients of these funds are contributing substantially to 
the fulfillment of this bill's objective: to reduce homelessness and 
provide for the specialty needs of homeless veterans. The initiative I 
am introducing authorizes higher funding for the program. It also 
provides a new mechanism for setting the per diem payment so that it 
will be adjusted regularly. Finally, it eliminates some of the 
intricate accounting procedures associated with the receipt of the 
payment.
  It is important that any investment produced at taxpayers' expense to 
help homeless veterans must do the job for which it is intended, or 
those funds should be returned to the government and put to better use. 
The existing law requires grant recipients to submit plans, 
specifications, and specific timetables for implementation of their 
programs. If the grant recipients cannot meet these obligations, the 
United States should be entitled to recover the total of unused amounts 
provided in the grant. My bill would thus bring greater accountability 
to VA's program to help homeless veterans.
  Working is the key to helping homeless veterans rejoin American 
society, but this is a process that begins with quality medical care 
and other supportive services including counseling and transitional 
housing. The Department of Labor's Homeless Veterans Reintegration 
Program was designed to put homeless veterans back into the labor 
force. The Secretary of Labor has the authority to determine 
appropriate job training, counseling, and placement services to aid the 
transition of homeless veterans back into the labor force.
  This bill makes support services available to veterans in need. As 
homeless veterans begin to make a transition back into the labor force 
the respective departments must make available essential services to 
help these veterans. For example, the bill urges the Secretary of 
Veterans' Affairs to increase contracts with

[[Page E1520]]

community agencies for representative payee services to help some of 
these homeless veterans manage their own personal funds and thereby 
avoid poor choices some of them have made that lead to personal 
catastrophe. The entity acting as a representative on the veteran's 
behalf can work with care providers of the Veterans' Health 
Administration and other parties to a veteran's reintegration to ensure 
that government funds are used appropriately to help the veteran be 
reestablished in society.
  As I indicated, prevention of homelessness among veterans is an 
important objective of this bill. This should certainly include 
veterans transitioning from institutional settings who are at risk for 
homelessness. As I indicated and as we well know, many homeless 
veterans have been in jail or in prison. I believe we need to consider 
making provision for the particular services incarcerated veterans 
need, and begin providing them before they are released from these 
institutions into society. The bill includes a demonstration program to 
test the prevention hypothesis within the institutionalized veteran 
population, at 6 demonstration sites, one of which will be a Bureau of 
Prisons facility. The purpose of this program is to provide 
incarcerated veterans with information, referral and counseling with 
respect to job training and placement, housing, health care, and other 
needs determined necessary to assist the veteran in the transition from 
institutional living to civil life.

  Also, Mr. Speaker, some programs with very high success rates have 
been growing on their own, basically without government intervention. 
One such program that comes to mind is the ``Oxford House'' concept. In 
this model, a group of recovering alcoholics determined to stay sober 
band together to rent a residential property. Oxford House, Inc., 
provides earnest money deposits, and the rest is up to the individuals 
to govern their own lives and run their own homes. This program has 
been highly effective, and now there are over 800 Oxford Houses 
nationwide. The bill authorizes a small demonstration project to 
provide housing assistance to veterans in group houses with similar 
goals of self-govemance. This bill authorizes the Secretary of 
Veterans' Affairs to make grants up to $5,000 for the purpose of 
subsidizing housing for veterans who present this need. Elements of the 
Department of Veterans' Affairs recently have helped sponsor 20 such 
houses. My bill will provide for 50 more in fiscal year 2003 and an 
additional 50 houses in fiscal year 2004. This is a model worth 
exploring.
  Mr. Speaker, these are the highlights of my bill, the ``Homeless 
Veterans Assistance Act of 2001.'' I believe the bill will accomplish 
very important goals. It will provide needed assistance to homeless 
veterans, lift them to a sustainable level that will prevent them from 
returning to a state of homelessness, and help them to become self-
sufficient individuals who are accountable for their own actions. This 
bill will also hold all grant and contract recipients accountable for 
performing their promised services in exchange for government 
investments, and promote a greater opportunity to work across 
departments to provide the best possible service for our Nation's 
homeless veterans. It also sponsors innovative approaches at prevention 
of homelessness in high-risk groups within the veteran population.
  These are good purposes on which I believe we can all agree, Mr. 
Speaker, so I am very pleased to offer this bill to the House. On 
behalf of homeless veterans who need these services, I urge my 
colleagues to support this bill.

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