Ask Alex Hansen from the Rocky Mountain Veterans Advocacy Project the best way to connect with a veteran in need, and she talks about food.
“People relax when you give them a cup of coffee and one of the potato donuts that they have down the street,” she said.
At a Washington conference on pro bono legal support for veterans (“Serving Those Who Serve”), Hansen talked about the network of clinics nationwide helping train a generation of lawyers to care for America’s warfighters.
There are 15.8 million military veterans in the United States, representing 6.1 percent of the civilian population age 18 and over. Like every other group of Americans, some veterans struggle with homelessness, poverty, health issues and other needs. Because veterans fall under laws and federal programs unique to them, many lawyers don’t have the training to serve them effectively.
J.B. Simko, Kristine Huskey, Brad Cummings and Judy Clausen participate in the “Serving Those Who Serve” conference in Washington, DC
Among these, Hansen said, is an 82-year-old Navajo Nation member who spent a year in Vietnam during the war. Despite more than 10 claims for post-traumatic stress disorder over 40 years, a frustrated Hansen said the vet was consistently denied benefits by the Department of Veterans Affairs.
“We have seen a very upsetting trend in that regard,” she said.
Another challenge: Rural veterans comprise 25 percent of the veteran population, and 39 percent of tribal veterans live in rural areas. Most of those live in states like Alaska, Arizona and Colorado, which provide veterans with smaller populations and tighter-knit communities.
This is where clinics like the Rocky Mountain Veterans Advocacy Project and other legal aid groups come in.
From family law to criminal defense to veterans court appeals to discharge petitions, the nonprofits represent Native American and rural veterans for free. Even if it means traveling hours to remote areas to reach them.
According to Kristine Huskey, those smaller communities may not have the legal options that veterans need. She is the director of the Veterans Advocacy Law Clinic at the University of Arizona.
Huskey said some Arizona veterans have to travel more than 200 miles to meet with legal counsel. It can be even farther for Native American veterans living on reservations.
Despite technological advances, internet access isn’t always an option because reservations do not have reliable connections. Huskey has met people who never filed a claim with the VA because they didn’t know much about it.
“It hits you in the face how scarce resources can be,” she said.
Some challenges come from the community itself. The Navajo Nation has rules for lawyers; there are sometimes language barriers and a cultural distrust of outsiders.
Veterans Advocacy Law Clinic has held legal clinics or community events on reservations and in rural counties. It created county-specific legal referral guides. It is working with the American Legion to get guides placed in public libraries.
The Rocky Mountain Veterans Advocacy Project teamed up with the Native American Law Students Association to provide a better understanding of Navajo cultural traditions and connect with veterans.
This attention to detail helped spread the word about the project’s work. Hansen said they helped nine people during their first trip to the reservation. Now, they are representing more than 60 Navajo veterans.
It’s not just the reservation or the community center where the law clinics do the work. They’ll also provide legal representation if a veteran runs afoul of the law, particularly if it’s related to an untreated mental health issue.
“We see them recover, and we stay with them, sometimes with repeated remands,” said University of Florida professor Judy Clausen, the supervising attorney at the Veterans and Servicemembers Legal Clinic.
J.B. Simko with PMI talks about free legal services for veterans at the “Serving Those Who Serve” conference in Washington, DC.
More important, they give veterans access to medical experts. Clausen said those experts write court statements explaining a veteran’s mental health challenges and how they are related to the alleged criminal behavior.
It’s important work that requires legal expertise and funding. J.B. Simko with Philip Morris International says his company is proud to help.
After a series of listening sessions with PMI employees about public service causes important to them, Simko said the company decided to become a veterans’ services advocate.
“We learned that these law clinics are providing exactly the type of service we could support. They need help … and so we thought we would give it a shot,” Simko said. “As you can see, it’s really having an amazing impact.”
The funding helped underwrite clinic operations and hire additional lawyers and staff. More important, it offers veterans with mental illness a lifeline — a chance to access treatment and rebuild their lives.
“It’s about helping somebody who needs your help, establishing trust and meeting them where they are,” Huskey said.
