Transcripts For RT The 20240703

Courtyard, the nazi tattoos on his body. Our journey is that its good versus evil. I pray that and i pray that victory comes soon and i believe it will. The, or in the united states, we have a Cultural Practice of thinking, members of the armed forces for their service. The thanks is almost always genuine. Not everybody decides to either commit themselves to protecting the country or to putting their lives on hold for several years to protect the country. So we think that in many cases that for person has spent 2025, even 30 years in the military. They decide to start 2nd careers in Public Service and often in the service of other members of the military. Im not talking just about the kind of golf course, but also about the department of Veterans Affairs. So many of our active duty Service Members and retired veterans need help and they often go to veterans hospitals for that help. But what happens when you decide to dedicate your life to helping your fellow veterans . And you see evidence of waste, fraud, abuse, or illegality. What happens when you see that the entire system is broken, that its set up not to help people, but simply to check a bureaucratic box. People of wizard. Im john curiosity of welcome to the whistle blowers the. 2 2 weve spoken several times on the show about the Us Department of Veterans Affairs, that large govern mental bureaucracy created to help and to serve the countrys veterans. But for multiple reasons, the department, it has never run the way it was supposed to. Many veterans receive sub standard medical care, many are denied medications necessary to live their lives as normally as possible. And then another terrible development. According to military veteran project dot org, 22 veterans commit suicide every single day. Some even do so in the parking lots of the veterans hospitals where theyve been denied care. Our guest today is ted blick, wadel. He served his country for 27 years in the us marine corps, retiring as a lieutenant colonel. He decided upon retirement to consider serving his fellow veterans and he received counseling training and went to work in the department of Veterans Affairs hospital before then moving on to the vet centers. The centers are Community Based counseling clinics that were established in the wake of the vietnam war, connecting social workers and counselors with military or combat experience to other combat veterans. That way they spoke the same language, had similar experiences and could better understand the pressures of post military life. To begin providing counseling for vets, centers in 2009, but by 2016, he realized that what was originally a people centered approach to helping veterans had simply become a numbers game where patients were rushed through appointments to meet Veterans Administration numbers, expectations to begin to feel burned out and you realize that other counselors were having the same experience. In 2018, he e mailed nearly 1300, that Center Counselors across the country to learn how the v is expectations and bureaucratic demands were affecting them. The results were so stunning, the ted decided to blow the whistle, resulting in a Government Accountability Office Report that in 2020, revealed that the new productivity standards were leading to counselor burn out across the country. A bill to correct these wrongs is pending in the congress, but it has not yet been acted upon. In the meantime, ted has written a book called broken promises, which chronicles his experience and provide insights into how to report problems in government agencies. Ted blick widow, welcome to the show. We are so happy to have you. Well, thank you for having the jobs. Great to be here. Ted. Lets begin with the end of your military career and the beginning of your 2nd career as a counselor. What made you want to go into this line of work . Was it that you saw a need based on your own experiences as well . Yes, i have a history of t. J is the exacerbated when i was in the military. I am a conduct veterans in the persian gulf war and you know, i saw a great need at that time for our military veterans and even active duty that really needed a lot of assistance. And ive always had an interest in the counseling field. And so when i retire from the military, i went back to school, got another masters degree in clinical social work from Rhode Island College where i then did an internship at the v. A Medical Center in providence, rhode island, and subsequently worked at the the va that center in warren, rhode island for 9 years in 2009 to 2018. Honestly, i cant think of many more important programs than providing counseling to our veterans who may be dealing with things like moral injury, post Traumatic Stress disorder, depression, or other Mental Health issues. We owe it to them to provide the best possible services. And you decided that your 2nd act would be to help those veterans. When did you realize that there was a systemic problem . A while in 2016, a memorandum came out from subject from the da Central Office, basically increasing our clinical productivity expectations. And this policy was such that it um increased the visit count with the standard visits of 50 to 60 minutes. Seeing individuals um where by we used to have to have i was referred to as 50 percent direct service time. So i have a 40 hour work week. We were to have face to face time with veterans or family members. Out of those 20 hours out of those 40 hours. Well by this increasing the way it did, one is 30 visits per week. What this meant was on a 50 to 60 minute session, this increase the face time that we are expected to have by, by 50 percent. So basically, 75 percent of our work week or 30 hours a week in 1. 00 and 1. 00 type situations was required to, to meet that requirements which did not allow enough time of all these additional administrative duties progress notes, treatment plans and such to be able to get everything done. So counselors were you know, not taking breaks, working through lunch and virtually put in an extra time that they werent getting paid for just to get the administration of the administrative portion of the, of the job done. And it just became stressful to the point where counselors were, were starting to burn out. Picking fmla leave worried, theyre going to lose their jobs because of a memorandum that came out that if you know, meet the requirements youre subject to h r i, you know, kind of interaction which basically is setting you up to think it fire is what that kind of boils down to so a lot of people were inside the written going on medication. Um you know, seeing their own therapist and such. And so this put us in an ethical dilemma. Do we meet these numbers . Hor, offer the quality care thats a veterans and their family members deserve. And that was that the position we were put in and, and it just put a lot of pressure on people and, and, and thats, you know, this was around after a year 2016 going into 2017 where over that year this was a parent, like most whistle blowers, you went through your chain of command when you realize that there was a problem. And you went armed with data. You had sent this email to almost 1300 other counselors around the country. So you knew that you werent alone in your conclusion that the department of Veterans Affairs was more interested in numbers than it wasnt actually helping individuals. What was the reaction to your revelations internally as well . Actually, you know, a lot of us counselors were were talking, we had even get this a deputy district one director for the Vet Center Program here in a ne, making rounds and doing clinical site visits. We unanimously were telling him at the site visit, you know, we got this problem that i was just describing. And, and, and he said, yes, ive heard that every where i go. Meaning other thats centers where he was doing clinical site visits. That was significant and and hes still working at the va deal. Well, as hes still in district one, somewhere, entered in his deputy. Uh, you know, clinicals director slot in, in district one and in one of the zones. And, you know, its just the unconscionable, you know, nothing got done about it we, we rate and so at that point is when i went out with an e mail to the chief r c s Vet Center Program officer in Central Office in washington at the v a and describes problems your work was causing the, the compromise, quality, Mental Health care, the counselor burn out. Uh frankly, it is an ethical. I have research in a book i published about the whole thing that. B so the fact that this, in fact is, is on ethical and what they were asking was basically affecting there to be negative treatment outcomes because of going over certain limit with, with visits per week. And you know, it just, it just got out of control and, and basically when they failed to respond back to me when mike fisher, they are as the as chief officer failed to respond to be after a week. I went out with that same email with additional comments, but this time i see said info, everybody in the Program District directors, that Center Directors and about 1300 counselors across the country. And at that point it, it got a response. And, and with what happened was within 48 hours after i had already received 57. 00 responses from its like 42. 00 vet Centers Across 25. 00 states. And they had shut down my computer. Otherwise, i would have had hundreds of responses fall escalating the very same thing i was saying how this is excessive, is hurting us as a Business Model thats, thats an ethical and you know, we cant keep going on like this and, and people just started, you know, looking for other work, a private practice and taking early retirement. And to this day theres still an issue with a high turnover rate because of this, it was then that you decided to go public with what you knew. And you went to the Government Accountability office. Thats exactly the place where you were supposed to go. Thats the organization thats supposed to keep the honest people honest, so to speak in government. They confirmed your allegations and turn the capitol hill for a solution. So i guess my question is 2 fold. First, with a finding by g, a o that you were correct in your allegations. Why didnt the department of Veterans Affairs just correct the situation . And 2nd, once a bill was written and introduced in congress to correct the deficiencies that you found, why wasnt action taken on it immediately . Oh, okay, well uh 1st of all, um, the reason action hasnt been taken based on the g o recommendations is that came out on the report in september of 2020 is because its easier for the va and any bureaucracy. You know, that this guilty of misconduct and abuse, you know, frankly, to silence someone speaks up about as a lot easier to do that and actually fix the problem. And then them having to be comfortable and, and held accountable for that. So thats just, you know, basic uh, retaliation tactics. Is this a pretty Standard Operating Procedure . And so as things move forward and the ga, all valid the smile occasions this led to the Vet Center Improvement at which they allowed me to edit the bill on before it went to the floor for a vote. And basically, this legislation was passed and signed into law just this past december as an amendment to the f y 23 National Defense authorization act. Its h r 76. Im sorry, h r 7776. Section 5126 pages 8192825 it lays out all the concerns and what the das require to do with g, a o, and congressional oversight. Now, the bill now in the bill, what it says is the v a has one year to actually start compliance with the bill. So they have time to get their ducks lined up, which means now going into 2024. They should be taking steps to implement which, which theyre required to do with g on congressional oversight, which basically comes down to counselors having an opportunity to give feedback in an electronic database that cannot be altered by any party. And this is a non of as feedback where the das required to establish an external working group to review this 3rd party is very never have access to this without it being altered. So the v a cant minimize things or trash things that they dont want to be known and, and then the, the a secretary based on that feedback is then required to submit a report to Congress Based on the findings of any corrective action thats being taken a ted, please hang with us. Were going to take a short break and when we come back, were going to talk to 10 look wadel about whos continuing work to write these ones through a very well received book called broken promises. States of the. 2 2 2 the, [000 00 00;00] the, by the middle of the 19th century, practically the whole of india had been under the rule of the british and by the colonial authorities that a post that heavy death, bringing the people into poverty, ex, 40 natural resources. And more over these authorities absolutely had no consideration for the physicians of the local population, treating them like 2nd class citizens. The british were showing signs of disrespect even to those who operated with them. The facts of ignoring the religious believes of the hindus led them. You may have, as the voice, mercenary soldiers serving under the british ground, 3000000000 began on the 10th of may 1857 in the garrison town of may. Ruth, sort of in the form of, of using the rebels quickly took over daily that he rode. The resistance of the indian people lasted for one and a half years. However, the forces were not the colonial authorities dealt with a rebels, cruel, late fee and slaves. The boys were tied to the mouth of the cannon and were shot right through their bodies for the amusement of the public. This type of execution was called the gables. With the obliteration of them you may result the death of 800000 inhabitants of the indians. However, the British Empire never broke the free spirit of the indians and their will will resist the welcome back to the whistle blowers. 2 im john carrie onto. Were speaking with Us Department of Veterans Affairs whistleblower ted, look wadel about his whistle blowing over the issue of counseling for American Military veterans. Ted, its good to have you with us. Thanks for hanging in there. Thanks again, john. Good to be back to you wrote a book called broken promises that has been very well received. The reviews are universally positive and most for viewers. Describe the book as important. Did you originally set out to write a book or was it something that developed over time . Well, this is actually something that developed. I never intended fact. I didnt wanna write a book. To be honest with you, then people kept telling me, no, you got to do this, you got to do this. So i, i had a lot of encouragement. You know that, that this could be very beneficial, that only to the issue, but other things. And so i decided to go ahead and start working on this, and i believe it was a 2021 is when i started putting things together from documents and things i had written already is part of the journal and and, and its finally got published this past month in august of 2023. In the book, you talk about retaliation from superiors at that centers. You talk about abuse and misconduct that you encountered while you were there. Tell us a little bit about that and knowing also that you are certainly not the 1st whistle blower to call out waste, fraud, abuse and illegality at the department of Veterans Affairs. Why do you think it is that the Department Just cant seem to clean up its act . Well, like any bureaucracy is like an Aircraft Carrier. When you try to turn in the Aircraft Carrier around, youve got to go about 5 miles and it turns very slowly. So the wheels in, in a large bureaucracy like the va, which is the Largest Health care system in the world. And, you know, thats, thats something, unfortunately, to be expected because of all the red tape you got to go through to make any changes. But more importantly, anything that does need to be changed has got to get elevated to a level where theyre going to be held accountable. And this is what happened when this legislation finally passed that i talked about in the last segment. That was important to that. And but what was also important is, is the local and National Media interviews i had done with nbc military times and p. R a and other networks and getting Political Action galvanized behind this and following through on the house in the senate side and with the Veterans Affairs committee through my congressional delegates in Rhode Island Center reading, congressman sicily. And, and so thats kind of what made the difference to, to elevate this thing to put the v in a position where they can no longer just disregard, minimize and, and, and, and try to make it go away. One of the important parts of this book is near the end, where you talked about lessons learned. One interviewer said that it is something of a manual for potential whistle blowers have other potential or would be whistle blowers come to you to discuss their own situations. And if so, what advice have you given them as well . Absolutely, they have, but i 1st just want to do a quick caviar about the book and its value to that in the book was written to expose the issues with the recommendations and what needs to be done in the legislation thats needed, which finally passed. So thats important, also to raise awareness of to the general public and politicians. What happens to people that speak truth to power . So i very visually and very on a very deep personal level. Talked about the impact that had on me with the depression. The anger of being emotionally isolated the impact that had in my family, my colleagues, it was absolutely heretic legal and financial consequences that were, that were pretty bad. And, and. 5 sit quietly um, you know, exposing that and getting it names. These are actually malicious tactics that are use like mobbing gas lighting silencing. Um, you know, tower accusations, and one of the things they did with me was tried to paint me as a mentally unstable compact veteran, to discredit me and, and, you know, ruling my character as part of trying to sign with me. These are some of the things that the, that happened in the book details that and in a very, very graphic way. So people understand that. But then, you know, besides talking about the, the, the media and the Political Action that happened at the end of the book is youre alluding to now, is it just people who whistle blowers hope because congressional legislation came out of this, which is a very rare thing actually when people take all these kinds of causes, so it gives people hope to show the data can be july, and then number 2 with my lessons learned, i have like a blueprint from my experience, listing all the elements and explaining what needs to happen when someone speaks, choose the power what elements are important as part of the strategy in order to be maximally effective to have the most favorable outcome possible of and, and so thats what the, the book describes and, and to the. Busy most important things, as course, having or few is evidence. You know, backing up what youre saying, you know, with, with documents, with witnesses, with recordings, with whatever that might be. A self care, very important and make sure you get legal health upfront. Number one before you march off, because youre going to fall into all kinds of traps if you dont, and it will not end well, as i found out in my experience, which is why i pointed that out of the book along with the importance of establishing a network of support, and thats where i, i give advice on, not just nice things, but going to people like in organizations like whistle blowers of america with Jackie Garrick who is the founder and ceo of that organization and, and also the, the national with of lower center because they help whistle blowers understand whats, whats happening and, and whats being done, you know, and helping them understand, you know, how, how this all in full. So they can develop a strategy in order to deal with this encounter this and have the support they need. So they realize theyre not alone, and it just goes a whole lot more smooth or that way because you learn things and avoid pitfalls on that that, that help you with, with your, your map, your well being and your health as well as, you know, having more of an of an Effective App advocacy effort. Finally, ted, tell us about the work that youre doing now with whistle blowers of america and where people can learn more about what youre up to as well. I am in my mentor from best employers of america, jackie, sense of, you know, contact information. We have people that need to touch base that are starting out with uh, you know, whistle blowing for one reason or another. Um and so im involved in that sense because again, its a peer to peer support kind of thing that helps to build a network of support. So people can be referred to the Different Services they need along the way in their journey that needs their specific needs. And you know, that way they have a connection that kind of helps along the way. So theyre not going it alone because you, you cannot do it alone. And so to find out more about this and the importance is to get the word out about my book. And the reason for that is it is the source document that addresses all of this with, with the references for the book being so massive had to be instead of in the book on my website and the references tab and the menu bar bar for transparency and credibility, and its important for people to understand these things outlined before the book is a great source for that. And its of the title is broken promises it can be purchased on amazon as well as barnes and noble. And i have a website, w, w, w dot v, a breaking promises dot com. Again, thats v a breaking promises dot com, which not only where you can go to, to order to book it and share and spread the word you know, on and social media platforms to raise awareness. Because the focus now is to ensure that the compl. 9 is with the legislation now that is past and thats really my next step in this process. Thanks for taking the time to speak with us. Ted. The grid fi ologist, Norman Vincent peale. One said that quote, to be successful is to be helpful, caring and constructive. And to make everything and everyone you touch a little bit better. And Martin Luther king reminded us that flights most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others . Sometimes theres a price to pay for doing the right thing for the world is a better place. Thanks to people like ted look waiting. And thanks to our viewers for joining us for another episode of whistleblowers, im john kerry onto well see you next time. 2 2 2 the take a fresh look around it. Life kaleidoscopic isnt just a shifted reality distortion by tell us to do vision with no real opinions. 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Go ahead. Change and whatever you do. Dont want marshall stay main street because im probably going to make you uncomfortable. My show is called stretching time. But again, you probably dont want to watch it because it might just change the way you the at least 18 people are killed and dozens more injured in an air strike on the oldest Orthodox Church in gaza were displaced. Civilians were sheltering from intensive is really selling to american hostages are released by hun loss, as around 200 people still remain in captivity after the latest violence broke out 2 weeks ago. We hear from the relatives of those who are yet to be freed. And the student that we saw