opportunity oversight hearing on veteran homelessness. i want to apologize first for being a little late. i had another obligation in my responsibility on the budget committee. and my breathe brad winstrup, chair of the health subcommittee will not be able to make it and so i'm going to preside. we have the vha subcommittee chair julie brownley and her capable leadership. thanks for being here. then my friend from texas and ranking member of the subcommittee for economic opportunity, o'rourke is joining me as well. our chairman is joining us. thank you, dr. rowe, for coming, i want to begin by also asking for unanimous consent for congressman mike kauffman, congressman scott peters and i guess that's it to set in on the dais and participate in today's hearing. i don't hear any objection. so ordered. i'm going to cut through my remarks here and break from my customary reading a script and just say that this is a subject that is heartbreaking. and when you look at the statistics on veteran home lessne homelessness and the underlying issues that our veterans struggle with, many and maybe mostly on the account of the burden that they bore for us and for our country and for our freedom, it just -- it's just gut-wrenching. and we -- there is not an issue i don't believe that is more, you know, important than to find ways to help and serve this segment of the veteran population. as i read and studied up and prepared on background, i noticed that there has been an exponential increase in funding in this area and there are some 20-plus programs across the various agencies with respect to the v.a., most of this is at the vha, but that's a lot of programs and that's a tremendous increase in funding. here's my deal, is it working? what's working? what's not working? how do we measure the success of these programs? because it is only because of the generosity of the taxpayer that we have this opportunity. and so i have a number of questions. i think it's encouraging to see a significant decline in homelessness over the course of the last several years on account of i think the commitment from the secretary and the administration in the past. as somebody once told me, if you throw enough money at something, you're going to see the needle move. but are we spending it wisely, effectively and then how do we focus these resources where they can have the greatest return? a, to help the veteran, b, to assure our taxpayers that their money is going -- is being productively spent. with that, i think we just -- let's get this hearing started. and, again, i apologize because i was not going to open this up, but let's go ahead and introduce our panelist -- okay, i'm going to defer to you, madam ranking member brownley, and ask that you provide any opening comments. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and i just would like to say that i concur with everything that you've said in your remarks. and i would add that in 2009, former secretary shinseki pledged a commitment to ending homelessness among veterans. in 2014, former secretary mcdonald also committed to this pledge to end homelessness among veterans. between 2009 and 2016, veteran homelessness was reduced by 47%. in 2017, secretary shulkin shared his top five priorities for the v.a., and as many may be aware, ending veterans homelessness was not included in that list of priorities. i fear based on the actions of this administration thus far that in the coming years we will continue to lose ground in our fight against veteran homelessness. in 2017, hud's annual survey found that veteran homelessness increased by 1.5%. however, when you drill down into these numbers and look at specific communities, the picture is much more alarming. los angeles county, which i represent a part of, saw a 57% increase in the number of homeless veterans just in the past year. i'd like to enter into the record a letter from the l.a. county board of supervisors, the mayor, united way and the los angeles homeless service authority that outlines the challenges ahead to end veteran homelessness. >> yes. >> thank you very much. >> these local partners are committed to working together with the v.a. and other federal agencies to ensure all veterans have access to safe and affordable housing. there is no doubt combatting veteran homelessness but be an interagency effort. in 2014 when we last held a hearing on this issue, and is why i wanted to hold this hearing because it's been several years since we've gotten an update, john downing, ceo of soldier on, said based on his experience that 100% of homeless female veterans encountered -- encountered and have survived military sexual trauma. without the v.a., hud would not know how to treat the underlying trauma and injuries that mst can lead to. without hud, the v.a. would not have the housing assistance expertise necessary to ensuring that veterans receive permanent housing as part of their treatment. and finally, without the department of labor, that veteran would be hard-pressed to overcome the barriers faced by many, if not all, transitioning veterans seeking employment in the civilian market. this is the same for many veterans, whether they are survivors of sexual assault, struggling with addiction or managing mental health conditions. these veterans are complex, their issues are complex, the solution is complex, but by working together we can build on the gains we made over the last seven years, which saw three states and 57 communities eliminate veteran homelessness altogether. the progress made during those seven years was, quite frankly, incredible, and it was in large part due to the hard work of the case managers, social workers, health care personnel, counselors, volunteers and veterans themselves. i commend the hard work of our boots on the ground organizations and the commitment of agency officials during this time, some of whom are testifying today. and i question why this administration would backtrack on that solution and risk the lives of homeless veterans nationwide. i hope the president's budget this year reflects a new found commitment to ending veteran homelessness through an allocation of funding that supports both the housing and wraparound services necessary to heal and house these veterans. mr. chairman, i thank you and i thank you for your commitment to this issue and i look forward to our discussion ahead. >> thank you, ranking member brownley. i now yield five minutes for opening remarks for ranking member o'rourke from the great state of texas. >> that's right. mr. chairman, ranking member brownley, i want to thank you and the staffs that work with you and the staffs that work on the economic opportunity subcommittee for the work that's gone into preparing for this hearing. this is why i love serving on this committee, the fact that chairman rowe is here, the fact that member who's are not even on the committees of jurisdiction have asked to have the privilege of sitting here and being helpful as we try to address this issue of veterans homelessness, which is not provocative, it's not sensational, it doesn't grab headlines, it's not one of those things that people are on late night tv screaming at each other about, but it could not be more important, and the fact that we're able to across party lines work together and do what's important, much the way we've addressed access to mental health and meeting the crisis of veteran suicide head-on and making progress in that very important underserved area, i feel that we'll be able to do the same thing here. the only thing, mr. chairman, i could add to your comments. you say because it is the generosity of the taxpayer that we have the opportunity to do this work, it's also thanks to the service of those veterans whose service we are honoring by our commitment to make sure that none of them are homeless, that we get that down to zero in every single one of our communities, whether that's functional zero or real zero. that may be part of the conversation today. we need to make sure the it's the resources, to your point, the oversight, the accountability, the follow through to make sure these programs are working. i'm so pleased we have such an important panel before us, those who understand and work on this issue directly, who are going to be able to inform the policy that we make here and improve our level of oversight and the accountability from the v.a. and the federal government. and, lastly, i just want to thank mr. john martin from the opportunity center in el paso as someone who makes this flight every single week, i know how hard it is to get from el paso to washington, d.c., and i know you almost didn't make it due to some problems with some of those connections. the fact that you'd take some time out of what you're doing, the important work in serving veterans in el paso to be here and help us, just know that we're grateful and i extend that gratitude to everyone on this panel. i yield back, mr. chairman. >> thank you, mr. o'rourke. and now we will get to our first panel. i'd like to welcome you guys again this morning. thank you for making time for this very important issue and we're honored to have you here. let's start with john f. clancy, the president and chief executive officer of the tri state veterans community alliance, which is located in cincinnati, ohio. mr. clancy, thank you for being here today and representing the ohioans you serve, angela f. williams is next. she is president and chief executive officer of easter seals incorporated. stephen peck, the president and chief executive officer of u.s. vets. john w. martin, the development director for the opportunity center, and finally, katherine monet, the national coalition for homeless veterans. thank you guys again for being here. mr. clancy, start with you. we now recognize you for five minutes. >> good morning, ladies and gentlemen. my name is john clancy. i'm an air force veteran. i serve as the president and ceo of the tri-state veteran community alliance in cincinnati, ohio. thank you for inviting me to testify today at this important hearing regarding support for our veterans in need. as an independent veteran-led nonprofit organization focused on improving the access to and the quality of services offered to veterans and their families, we appreciate the opportunity to share our perspective and provide recommendations to address the needs of veterans in distress. the tvca was created four years ago to serve as a backbone organization responsible for aligning veteran support in our region. we partner with over 150 local organizations and operate a veteran in-processing center that is meaningful serviced and met the needs of more than 1,150 veterans since opening. we piloted programs that fill gaps in our community such as an accelerated career training and placement program for midlevel non-commissioned officers and an educational story telling event for veterans to share their story with local citizens. we leverage our united way call center and facilitate data sharing efforts inside and outside our region. our efforts are characterized by the following aspects, we are practicing, seeking to engage veterans and their families before a crisis happens. we seek collaboration whenever possible. we work across sectors. we have many businesses involved in our efforts but also include social services veteran organizations and all major educational institutions, and finally we look for systemic solutions in addition to program improvement. that said, it is important for the community to assess how the resources provided by the v.a., hud and dol impact the lives of all veterans, but more urgently, our distressed and/or homeless population. based on our community needs assessments, we recommend that resources be considered for downstream programming related to behavorial health, wellness and social support, addressing what are often the root causes of homelessness and upstream support for collaborative programs that can intercept veterans and resolve issues before they become a crisis. over the last decade, the efforts of all three federal agencies have been commendable and successful. the v.a. designed a strategy called housing first to address the problem, especially throat veterans who experienced chronic homelessness. a co-sponsored initiate with hud to invest resources in stable permanent housing with chronically homeless veterans and case managers to help them prevent experiencing further homeless episodes. have also served to facilitate the successful transition of veterans from homelessness. with current strategy at its ten-year mark, the v.a. and hud housing first programs have successfully reduced veteran homelessness by nearly 50%. however, based on client trends seen in our region, we believe that client needs and demographic profile are beginning to show signs from traditionally homeless individuals to those transitioning or at risk. we should begin to adapt the current system to not only focus on homeless veterans but also successful life transitions for at-risk veterans. to accomplish this shift in mindset, a broader set of outcomes need to be developed that involves not just housing attainment, but boosting veteran self-efficacy, development of personal goals and developing or enhappening the motivation to succeed in the civilian world. how soon or at what -- at the individual level for those in acute distress, we need to ensure the right levels of care are accessible and available. at a systemic level, we need to ensure existing organizations are communicating and strategizing across sectors, including the continuums of care, medical centrals and other veteran wellness and support groups. finally and ultimately, we need tone sure that the transition system from military to civilian life is coordinated. veteran-centered and resourced. this includes a greater level of information sharing, new and improved programming focused on proactive investment-buildi proactive investment-building programings. we believe collaborators like the tvca and combined arms in houston, for example, are a key part of the solution. decrease competition and allow for the scaling up of efforts to support transitioning veterans. a coordinated community-based approach that brings together diverse sets of resources and identifies new opportunities across public and private sectors is needed. we applaud your review of the mix of programs available for veterans, assessing the correct mix for current needs and opportunities. in closing, we would like to stress again the importance of a relevant, trusted community organization that can initiate and sustain the conversation for strategy support, employment and wellness. thank you. >> thank you, mr. clancy. we now yield five minutes to ms. williams. >> chairman arrington, ranking members brownley and o'rourke and members of the subcommittees, good morning, i'm angela williams. i'm president and ceo of easter sales. a nonprofit organization committed to helping veterans and others reach their full potential through local services and supports. i'm also a proud veteran. thank you for inviting me to testify this morning on this hearing to assess the various programs designed to reduce veteran homeless necessary. east easter seals has been actively serving veterans for more than seven decades. my testimony will highlight our experience in responding to the needs of homeless and at-risk veterans through employment and other supports needed for their successful community reintegration. in 2010, about time easter seals started a new phase in its effort to help homeless veterans, our country's veteran homeless population grew to over 74,000. today that number has dropped nearly 46%, due to strong collaboration between federal, state and local partners and the complimentary alignment of programs across various federal agencies. in my written testimony, i shared the story of paula, a veteran who moved to new york city to find work and turn her life around. her job search was complicated by employment barriers that proved too difficult to overcome. defeated and homeless, she turned to a women's shelter where thankfully she was referred to easter seals for employment assistance. we leveraged our community partners to help paula with housing, resume development, interview preparation, obtaining the appropriate wardrobe and subway cards to get to job interviews. today, paula is living independently, working full-time and contributing to her community thanks to the national veteran homeless strategy developed by congress and implemented by federal agencies. paula's story highlights the effective collaboration and alignment of the department of veteran affairs' supportive services for veterans families programs or ssvf. the department of housing and urban development and v.a.'s supportive housing program, hud vash and the department of labor's reintegration program. it takes the strengths, resources and collaboration of many to help veterans succeed. easterseals'decision is to help veterans find jobs. our e -- made us a natural partner with the department of labor on its hvrp program, which is employment-focused and a perfect compliment to the housing focus of hud vash and the v.a.'s supportive services for veterans families program. the homeless veterans reintegration program taps into the existing network by providing grants to local organizations. easterseals operates 11a trp grants nationwide. we provide employment services to nearly 1,200 homeless veterans last program year. and are proud to share that 61% found jobs during that year. with wages averaging from $10 to nearly $21 per hour. once unemployed and homeless, these veterans are now working, paying taxes and contributing to their communities. their success represents a strong return on the federal investment which averages about $2,500 per veteran. easterseals is honor to be part of the solution in reducing veteran homelessness. but our work is not finished. i include recommendations in my written testimony to build on the strong foundation congress has set for addressing veteran homelessness. let me boil them down to two main points. one, congress should support full funding and a long-term extension for the homeless veterans reintegration program. easterseals supports the bipartisan effort to expand and expand -- additional funding is necessary to meet the growing needs of the chronicy homeless and hardest to serve veterans who will require more supports and time to find employment and housing success. two, congress should expand early access to community-based support services. the first step is to approve chairman winstrup and ranking member brownley's bill hr 4451 that expands veteran eligibility to services. congress should also consider ways to expand federally-funded community case management to proactively meet the challenges of veterans will before they meet the homeless and unemployed eligibility criteria of programs like hvrp and ssvf. thank you for your time today. i'm pleased to answer any questions. >> thank you, ms. williams. mr. peck, five minutes. >> good morning. my name is stephen peck and i'm the president and ceo of u.s. vets. i'm also a vietnam veteran. i served with the first marine division near da nang and i've been working with homeless veterans since 1991. u.s. vets is the largest veteran-specific nonprofit housing and service provider in the country, providing housing and services to 3,300 veterans every night and providing homelessness prevention, employment and mental health services to an additional 5,000 veterans in the communities that we serve. i'm also the president of the california association of veterans service agencies, comprised of seven veteran nonprofits that collectively provide housing and care to more than 25,000 veterans each year. despite hundreds of millions of dollars spent, numerous government policies and the best efforts of hundreds of communities, there are still more than 40,000 veterans living on your streets. and that number is rising across the nation. in california, the number of homeless veterans rose nearly 20% in 2017. and in los angeles, that number rose 57%. this is no time to be taking our eye off the ball. despite this upward trend, it seems to us that there is no longer an emphasis and determination to get every veteran off the streets. this shift in focus is evident in two ways. first, the proposal by the v.a. to take permanent housing, supportive service dollars out of the special projects category where it is protected and placing these dollars into the general fund where medical directors can redirect it at will. while they have said they will not shift these dollars, the vast funds remain in the general fund line item. and second, v.a.'s overall management of the hud vash program. it is plagued by lack of accountability, insufficient data collection and inadequate outcome measures. together, these factors can inhibit our ability to get veterans off the streets and into permanent housing and provide the case management and supportive services that will keep them there. the housing first model that the v.a. professes to follow follows a client-case marng ratio of 25-1. access -- with a simple phone call 24 hours a day. that is not what's happening. project-based beds at five of our sites and v.a. social workers are consistently failing to provide the required coverage. for 75 vash vouchers, the v.a. is required to cover three full-time case managers. we never have three. we rarely have two. and our clinical staff picks up the slack. if a nonprofit such as u.s. vets provided that level of coverage while contracted with the v.a., we would lose the contract. i've attached three letters from three different communities awarded hud vouchers. two in california and one in florida. in each case, the v.a. has indicated that it does not have the resources to provide adequate case managed coverage for the number of hud vouchers awarded. the result is that the vouchers go unused while veterans languish on the streets. if i understand correctly, funding that congress has appropriated to the v.a. specifically for vast case management positions is for some reason not available. veterans still living on our streets need every dollar of this funding. if the vash program where turned into a grant program, nonprofits would assume full responsibility, would spend every dollar appropriately and could be held to outcome measures that we are already meeting and exceeding. because our program are residential, we have staff 24/7 and used to responding to client issues day and night. u.s. vets provides case management for 423 beds with a 92% retention rate. a recent study reports a 70% success rate in the hud program. the study also states the vast majority of those veterans exited the program was unknown, quote, as hud's systems do not have the capacity to track this information, unquote. this is just careless. homeless veterans rate of attempted suicide is 20 times higher than the rate of sigh side attempts among all veterans. they are plainly at risk and desperate for our help and we need better data on how federal funding is serving or failing them. we've all been at this for a long time and you've put a lot of money into this so you might ask what is your return on investment? my 25 years of experience tells me if you pull back now, the number of homeless veterans on the street will continue to grow and they will use the only services available to them, expensive mental health and medical services. they will spend time in jail and homeless shelters and continue to die, having been abandoned by the country they fought for. combatting homelessness is it not a one-time fix, it is an ongoing effort to mitigate the inequality that exists in our system for veterans who through lack of opportunity, lack of education, mental illness, combat trauma or other deficits end up on the margins of society. we are paying for this tragedy one way or another. we simply have to make the decision that these veterans' lives are worth saving. thank you. >> thank you, mr. peck. mr. martin, you are now recognized for five minutes. >> good morning. my name is john martin. i am the development director for the opportunity center for the homeless in el paso, texas, and i think that statement in and of itself is important because my comments are going to be reflective of the community that is struggling as it relates to ending homelessness, whether it be veterans, chronically homeless or the families and youth. the other aspect of this, as i mentioned to a couple of folks as we started this, i felt a little bit like a fish out of water from the standpoint that i tend to live more in the hud world than i do the v.a., but it's also very important that we need to understand how the two need to overlap with one another as we work through this. the opportunity center for the homeless has existed now for over 24 years in el paso. i've had the pleasure of working with them for four. as a development director, i do a lot of strategy and a lot of thinking. many might consider my position to be that of a professional beggar. as a general description. the truth of the matter is, we care for a majority of the homeless in el paso, and that includes the chronic homeless. of our population that we serve, roughly 15% are homeless and these are individuals that do not qualify based on eligibility requirements associated with the v.a. so we're looking at the other end of the spectrum. as a direct result, we have to rely on hud funding for that purpose, and there has already been a reference during this testimony to the housing first initiative. an initiative that has severely hampered our efforts in el paso. housing first is an incredible program so i don't want anybody to take those comments the wrong way, but in respect, all of our funding within the community is now directing toward increasing our housing inventory and not that of support services and the two must go hand in hand. as an example, just over the last five years, we've lost $1.2 million per year as a community not as an organization as it relates to support services. now, that includes employment, legal, transportation, medical care, mental health, street outreach. in turn, as a community leave lost a little over half a million dollars with regard to overall funding. and so what we're facing is a struggle at this point is to provide the appropriate level of services that are needed, not only for placement within housing under the housing first initiative, which is an incredible tool, but also with regard to sustainability and how to present -- prevent recidivism. in my written testimony, i gave you some numbers. numbers that are reflective of us as an organization, an organization that has 14 programs and 10 different houses. those ten houses, seven of which are permanent housing, one of which is transitional, which is our veterans transitional living center which is the gpd program we operate within the community. the remaining are what you would refer to as emergency shelters. and that's where that 15% lie. and these are individuals that are defined as chronicy homeless, both based on disability as well as length of homelessness. and so in turn, when you look at goals such at 25-1 on a case management stated earlier, which is the ideal situation, we're working in situations where it's 200 to 250-1 and that is because of the absence of what we need for those support service dollars. because we as a community and general statement, we're a very poor community. a little over 50% of our population falls under 200% of the federal poverty level. so you would say that we have a low tax base. so we have no local investment with regard to the city or to the county. and so for us, the burden is placed on the service provider. and we're being asked to do more with less. and i think my conclusion here, if i so make that statement, is that in some respects as it relates to funding, you have to take a look at the unique characteristics of each of the communities because in many cases those parameters, those metrics that are imposed on us as an agency that receives funds are restricted in a manner that works in other communities but not necessarily el paso. we need to have that flexibility to be able to design a system utilizing those same mechanisms meets the need within the community and the unique characteristics of those we serve. with that stated, i welcome any questions when that time comes and i look forward to having further discussion. thank you. >> thank you, mr. martin. ms. knmonet, you are recognized for five minutes. >> i'm the ceo of the national coalition for homeless veterans. on behalf our our board of directors and members across the country, we thank you for the opportunity to share our viewers with you this morning. the resource and technical assistance center for community-based service providers and local, state and federal agencies that provide a range of housing and supportive services to hundreds of thousands of homeless, at risk and formerly homeless veterans across the country. we're committed to working with our partners to end veteran homelessness. the good news is that 60 communities, including three states, have achieved the federal benchmarks and criteria for ending veteran homelessness and this demonstrates for the first time ever that ending homelessness is actually an achievable goal. this progress is largely a testament to the dedication and hard work of local service provides and v.a. medical staff. in the abstract, this is progress towards this major goal, right? but in real terms, it's life-changing for the veteran who's have been able to access housing and assistance as a result. now the bad news here, as you've heard over and over this morning, our hold on this progress is tenuous as best, as evidence of the number of veterans between 2016 and 2017. 36 states and d.c. all saw decreases in veteran homelessness, other communities with particularly high-cost relentless markets saw dramatic increases. from our perspective, an increase of even one veteran is one too many. so this is a really strark remind tore all of us that now is not the time to take our foot off the gas pedal or reshift finances -- we need to focus on doubling down on these efforts to ensure that homelessness is rare, brief and non-reoccurring for all veterans and all americans. it really means looking at your community level data and knowing your homeless neighbors and their needs, right, so that you can really implement evidence-based strategies like housing first, community wide and homeless veterans can access permanent housing quickly and all of the resources like employment and supportive services that they might need for housing stability. we also need to recognize, though, that housing first never means housing only. so successful implementation of housing first really includes access to health and mental health care and wraparound services like benefit assistance, employment and training services and all the other things a veteran needs to make sure their housing placement is sustainable. here in d.c. doubling down means that congress needs to ensure that key programs that serve veterans experiences homelessness are sufficiently funded. we never advocate for the growth of resources for the sake of expanding programs, but the uptick in the count with rising rents across the country and the series of natural disasters that occurred demands nothing short of your leadership and attention with regard to both funding and oversight of these programs. homelessness is a multi-fasciated and complex problem that differs for every single veteran experiencing it. one of the best ways we can address it is for congress to support a permanent reauthorization for usich. the small team of experts at usich convenes federal agencies in order to set shared policy objectives that can actualize the plan to end homelessness among veterans. that would otherwise waste effort and resources. we can also encourage further collaboration between v.a., hud, dol and all other grantees to provide more seamless services to homeless veterans. one of the best examples is the hud vash program as it allows v.a. to focus its resources more efficiently by pairing v.a. funded case management with the hud funded section 8 voucher for some of most vulnerable veterans we see. distributed to medical centers through a special purpose designation as the case managers truly must be located where the vouchers are distributed to ensure adequate support for the veterans using these vouchers. as you know, last september v.a. sent guidance to directors regarding the immediate conversion of this funding from special purpose to general purpose funds. while v.a. has backed away from this decision for the time being, this could have dramatically reduced case management for vulnerable veterans using these vouchers. let be very clear here, we object in the strongest terms to this conversion or any action that would reduce case manager availability to the veterans using hud vouchers. these vouchers are well-known as critical resources that make housing affordable, incentivize affordable housing development and allow communities to end homelessness. any reductions would lead to veterans not receiving the care which they rely on to maintain housing and these case managers like mr. peck said are already stretched thin, sometimes carrying for far more veterans than indicated. to remove these would be catastrophic to the health, well-being and housing stability of all of the veterans using these vouchers. we insist they must be used for their intended purpose. thank you for the opportunity to present this testimony. it's a privilege to work with you and your staff so that every veteran has access to safe, decent and affordable housing paired with supportive services. thank you. >> thank you, ms. monet and all the panelists for your remarks. i want to now yield to our chairman, dr. phil rowe, five minutes for comments and questions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate that. i have another committee hearing i've got to go to, but i wanted to hear this testimony today because to me one of the -- and, first of all, all of you here, thank you for what you do and thank you for the service to our country. those of you who served in the military. i very much appreciate that. one of the frustration i think you have to take a step back is -- and i'd like oh hear any of you, what is the primary cause not for just homelessness in general, i think a have a fairly good understanding been out for veterans homelessness. these are very people who are in the military and had responsible jobs in the military and now they're out and are homeless. and i know there are three of us here. we were here nine years ago when general shinseki said we're going to end veterans homelessness by 2016, which i thought was an honorable goal to do and bring the programs to do that. number one, in veterans, what is the primary cause? is it relationships? is it mental health? is it substance abuse? what is it? anybody can take a whack at that. >> i'll jump in. it's all of the above. while combat trauma is the cause in some veterans, military sexual trauma among the female veterans who are also committing suicide at an alarming rate, but it's also societal issues. they go into the military perhaps to escape from a disruptive family life, perhaps to escape from gangs, they are in the military for two or three years and they come out really with knowing how to shoot a gun or drive a tank, so the transition is very challenging with -- among those groups that are coming out. >> i disagree. i think they come out with more skills than that. they learn leadership skills. they learn how to get up early in morning and work hard. as a matter of fact, there is no clock when you're in the military. you understand that and i understand that. >> i understand, yes. >> it's 24/7. so they bring out some very good skills, i think you learn in the military. >> absolutely. they also have -- when we were in the military, we knew what we were doing 24 hours a day, it wasn't our responsibility to go out there and determine what happens next, what happens a year from now. some don't transfer those skills well into the civilian workforce. >> a couple of other things, and i have visited the l.a. campus and what they're doing for the homeless there. i made a trip there several months ago. with the job market being at historic lows, in our state, we have a state unemployment rate of 3%, and i know california's economy is doing well. how do you attribute this -- and i think this point in time whether it's up or down, these point in time are never all that accurate, they're just a guess at how many homeless people there are at any particular point in time, but why do you think in california the rate's gone up? are people moving into california? is that what it is? what would be the reason? >> there have always been more veterans in california than anywhere else. more homeless veterans there than anywhere else. as you said, the unemployment rate is very low, so some of the veterans don't have the skills that they need to. the housing is very high. >> high, yeah. >> so they are unable to -- at a minimum wage job or even at $15, $18 an hour able to afford the housing that would take them out of homelessness. so a number of them are staying at our site in our permanent housing much longer than they would like to because they can't afford to move out into the community. >> that's one of the things we found, even in rural east tennessee where i live, a couple of things, one, finding housing that is affordable, even where we are, and to get developers to build housing that would meet these needs. it's a huge problem for our lower income people. and afterwards i'd love to discuss with you a program we have done at home beginning at home that seems to work pretty well. not to take all time, mr. martin, you mentioned also something, and we seem to be spending more and more money, but i feel like i'm running in place. you mentioned that -- and you're correct that every community is different. and that el paso, texas, is different than northeast tennessee where i live. so i think you were so suggesting that you need more flexibility in these grants to be able to do what you need to do, but i'm not sure whether it's to fill a hole in what your community wasn't doing or whether you need the money -- just the grant doesn't fit your community. >> in direct response to your question, chairman, it's not necessarily to fill a hole. we have created a foundation under what -- a continue of care model that was in place until roughly 2009/2010 when the new opening doors initiative came out. that model was the foundation for what it was we were doing in el paso and the success we had in el paso. and when we had that shift in funding, which was focused more on housing, it took the dollars away from the support services. because the veterans that we're working with in the opportunity center are those that are not v.a. eligible, and so they have very limited options. and they tend to stay with us. now many times they can access ssvf, but because of local requirements we had, that's limited limited to three months worth of assistance. if we go back to the comments that were just made with regard to a living wage, you can't do that with an entry level position. many times it's three months and you're out. we see that return to homelessness or recidivism that is going to take place. that's illustrated in the numbers i provided to you within the written testimony for our organization. now, it's too early to tell if that's going to be a trend, but we did see a significant increase in recidivism from 2016 to 2017 and we're also seeing an increase in shelter nights, which is how we gauge services. that's not unique individuals served, those are the individuals that come in and take advantage of the shelter because they simply don't have any other options at this point. so it's that support service component that is desperately needed at this point when we talk about case management. just to give you an example of some of the services that were lost, daycare, legal, transportation, mental health, okay? all of those are those wraparound services that these panelists have indicated are desired because we don't need to simply look at placement, we need to look at stabiliustainab and that's where that flexibility is needed. >> my time is eksz pierd, mr. chairman. i want to thank you for what you do in a very difficult population and situation. thank you for the effort you're putting into that. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i yield myself five minutes for questions. for me, just some context, and these are broad questions but -- and i think i can drill down and my colleagues may be -- it will be useful to them as well. ending homelessness is a very laudable vision. but if we can't measure it then we won't achieve it. so my question to each of you, and we'll just go down the line, define ending homelessness as it relates to your organization and then tell me specifically how you measure the success of achieving that outcome. just go down the line. start with you, mr. clancy. >> yes, sir. so at the tvca, we don't provide direct support, we don't receive any federal funding for hvrp or any of those programs so we network with the organizations in our community. what we see that drives the homelessness, important factor is is not unemployment but underemployment. as was talked about before. so -- it's almost like when you think about unemployment and you think about the nation, you never get to 0, right? >> right. >> there is always some factor in there. when you're at 3% unemployment, you're basically at full employment in the country and the same thing can be said on the veterans side. so to say you're going to get to 0 homelessness is probably not an actual achievable goal because there will always be folks through addiction or mental health don't take the support that is offered there. >> do you think we're at that function functional 0 or do you think where there are still ways to -- >> we've made a tremendous -- tremendous success over the last nine or ten years getting that down. we captured the low-hanging fruit, so to speak and getting that down to the veterans who really need the help. i've worked -- before i took this role i was the director of veteran services for easterseals in cincinnati and we had access to hud vash vouchers and hvrp and also on the rehab side, educational assistance for veterans. i can tell you, it's sometimes hard to find those veterans that you can apply those funds to in the cincinnati area, at least. >> why? >> what we try to do is get the transition -- >> why can't you find the veteran to apply them to? >> well, unfortunately, as we talked about before, not as we about before, not every part of the country is the same. you have some states that have decliered the end of veteran homelessness, and states like ohio that had a 7% decrease last year. the national rate ent up 1.5%, 568 veterans, but the state of california had 1,800 veterans. >> back to my original question, you're saying the underlying issue with homelessness, or at least a major underlying issue is employment, underemployment, and so you would define success as getting veterans a job? >> getting them a job, as well as, you know, housing, all those issues combined. but where they're -- they're not needing assistance. >> is it housing, or is it the job that allows them to sustain sel self-sufficiency so that think can have that independence and pay the rent and feel the dignity of all that's involved in that. >> that's absolutely right. >> would you define that as success. >> yes, sir. >> let me ask ms. williams. in the interest of time, i need to make it through the panel here. >> so easter sales focuses on employment. when you're able to get someone employment that helps them to be able to sustain housing. we measure success by how many veterans we're able to get employed, and then from there hopefully to become contributing members of the society, and be able to sustain themselves and families. >> mr. peck. thank you. >> four things. those transitional housing programs that provide the rehab that get them right off the street. the mental health counseling to address their mental health issues. the employment. there's never enough employment training money, ever. and the affordable housing. you need those four together. >> in the interest of time, let's just keep going. mr. martin? >> first and foremost, i'm not -- >> hit your mic, if you would. >> my apologies. >> that's all right. >> first and foremost, i'm not overly fund of the term functional zero. when you look at our veteran population, those that are not v.a. eligible, a vast majority of over the age of 50. we look at success as housing sustainability, not necessarily placement, but sustainability and the wrap around services that go with it. >> sustainability as in their ability to sustain their independence and because of employment? >> because of employment and the other related services. >> and rehabilitation, et cetera. >> you're absolutely correct, sustainability. >> ms. monet, then i'm gone. >> we want to look at how communities are building the systems that are making homelessness brief and nonrecurring. you're aware the federal government has a set of benchmarks and criteria they use to assess. it looks at, do you know your veterans, are you making offers of permanent housing, can you move them into permanent housing within 90 days or less, are you decreasing unshell forred homelessness? if you're in a shelter, you count as homeless. things like that are really how we would look at success. >> okay, thank you, ms. monet. my time is expired. i now recognize ms. brownlee, ranking member vha for her remarks and questions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and i too want to thank the witnesses today for being here and the work that you do every single day in support of our veterans in addressing this issue of homelessness around the country. mr. peck, you had mentioned in your testimony that you were particularly concerned about v.a. having an intention to rededicate some vash supportive services funds into the general fund. my understanding in terms of what their intention is, and i will certainly ask the v.a. when they're up next, but that they were going to take 5% sort of across the board from these funds to provide resources to meet sort of the priorities of the v.a., giving those dollars to directors, et cetera to be able to accomplish those goals. i want to make sure that we have pulled back from that. but my understanding is that 5%, that would roughly mean about $264 million taken away from supportive services to veterans. so i guess my question really is, you know, what are you hearing on the ground vis-a-vis that? are you hearing that, you know, these funds are going to be taken away? what do you know? >> we're in 11 different locations across the country. we're hearing different things. some of the v.a.s have assured us that those funds will be there. other v.a.s have not. as i said in my testimony, we're not getting the case management help we need today when those funds are to be protected. they're to be used only for case managers. they're not be. i don't know where they are. my fear is that if those funds -- if the directors have a choice to redirect those funds, that they will redirect those funds to other needs within their community. as i said, the suicide rate among homeless veterans is very, very high, much, much higher than the rest of the population. in effect, providing services for these homeless veterans is suicide prevention. >> i agree. i agree wholeheartedly. can you -- do you know what has been said in los angeles relative to this issue specifically? >> i've spoken to ann brown, the director of the west l.a. v.a., she said she will not -- >> homeless population in los angeles. do you know what percentage are female veterans? roughly. >> i don't. it's quite small. it's generally about 3%. >> and do they typically have children also? >> some portion of them do. many of them have lost custody of their children. but some portion of them do, yes. i'm not quite sure what that proportion is, sorry. >> and so as far as the case management or lack of case management, is the problem that the resources aren't there to hire or is it problem of constant churn and turnover? do you have any sense of that? >> they're hiring within that bureaucracy is challenging. sometimes it takes a number of months to do that. but the west l.a. v.a. with the number of vash vouchers in los angeles has something over 200 social workers. that's hard to manage. my recommendation is that they spread those contracts out among agencies that are knowledgeable in the community so that each agency is able to do that job with more oversight. because the oversight now is just not good. >> if homelessness in los angeles county has risen 57%, and i believe l.a. has approximately 20% of the homeless veteran population across the country, do you feel like your -- that los angeles is getting the proportionally correct amount of resources distributed across the country? >> los angeles has been pointed out before for funds because i think everyone who knows anything about homeless veterans knows there's an awful lot of homeless veterans there, and more than anywhere else in the country. whether we are getting the appropriate share, i couldn't tell you. but i think we've got something like 1,500 vash vouchers, something like that. >> thank you. i realize that my time is up. i yield back. i apologize. >> no, i'm a little faster and looser than the chairman over to my left. so you're okay. this is -- we're going to -- there's going to be a second round here. but great line of questions. now i would yield five minutes to the chairman of the vha, mr. wenstrup. >> thank you very much. i want to thank you all for being here and for what you do each and every day in the efforts that you make in trying to help our fellow americans, and those that defended our country. and i became familiar when i came back from iraq. i wasn't looking for a job. i had the medical practice to go to. but i became very familiar with the work of easter seals in trying to make those matchups, working not only with potential employees, but with employers in trying to make that match. so i'm going to direct my questions to mr. clancy today because i have a real geographic bias on where he is being from cincinnati, ohio, and being familiar with the senator. i would like, if you could, just comment for a minute, the relationships that you have been able to build with places like joseph house, and with our veterans court, and how that relates to reducing homelessness. >> thank, congressman. thank you, congressman. the whole purpose of this when it was built was to be the center of collaboration for the hundreds of veterans in the cincinnati area. we have built very good relationships. we don't compete with anybody for the federal dollars. when we have a veteran in distress that comes there our in processing center we can diagnose them and refer them autoto all the agencies out there, including easter seals. when i was with easter seals, we worked closely with the tvca, we continue to do that now. >> of course, veterans court and all those types of things that are trying to get our veterans in a better direction. >> absolutely. we have a very strong veterans court in cincinnati. and at the tvca we have subgroups on specific issues we work on, education, employment, health and wellness, and, for example, the employment -- the education subgroup right now is working with veterans court to try to get those veterans that need help access to the gi bill. >> i know that the center has been pretty robust, and a lot of interactions with veterans of all ages, not just recent veterans. but some from previous wars. and we always want to get lessons learned. and where i want to go with this is, this is economic opportunity committee and health committee. and what are you seeing or what do you think could be done better, you know, we engage in the transition assistance program, which is administered by d.o.d. are there things we can do before people take that uniform off that can help them in the long run as far as guidance, counseling, on the track to a profession, you know, rather than v.a., and what you do being reactive later, what can we do more on the front end? >> that's a great point, and we -- that's one of the goals we have, things we strive for is to contact the veterans upstream, even as they're separating, we have a program we call vet excel where we work directly with the national guard, which is big in cincinnati, we work directly with them with the veterans that are separating to help them with their resume, the culture change they're going to see from a military unit to a civilian office in terms of everything from the direct feedback you might get in the military that you might not get in the civilian workforce, even what to wear. we continue to see underemployment a big concern. we help them take the experience they have in the military, and be able to change the verbiage, or explain properly to a civilian h.r. department what they're capable of doing. we have a two-week program we do that, work with the companies with the h.r. departments directly and the veterans directly. we try to make the one on one match. it's combination. we need to be upstream helping the veterans understand the change they're about to have. >> and being local like that, the guard is a perfect opportunity to do that. >> absolutely. >> what kind of success or results are you having, and what are some of the walls, if you will, in the process? >> well, we're getting great feedback from the companies that we deal with. they love the veterans. there is no -- there is no problem in unemployment in cincinnati. if you -- there's a great opportunity for employment. so they want -- they love the veterans because they show up on time, they have a sense of mission, a sense of team. and so from the h.r. perspective, from the company's perspective we get great feedback on all the veterans we send their way. from the national guard side, they're very excited about what we're doing. they like that their veterans are hitting the ground running on their civilian side. >> from the veteran themselves? i'm looking for best practices here. what kind of feedback from the individual veterans themselves? >> the individual veterans really appreciate the mentoring that we can give. we're all veteran staff. there's plenty of corporate veterans out there that can be mentors for other veterans coming out of the service. and so one of the best practices we have is having those civilian, now civilian, former military successful businessmen and women mentor the new soldiers coming out of the military. >> thank you. i yield back. >> thank you, chairman wenstrup. we'll now yield five minutes to the ranking member of the economic opportunities subcommittee, mr. o'rourke. >> thank you, mr. chairman. this has been one of the most helpful panels appearing before the house veteran affairs committee in my five years too. thank you for what you've brought to the table today. some of the takeaways for me, mr. peck, i think you asked the defining moral question of this committee when you asked, are these lives worth saving? when you point out there are 20 veterans a day every single day in this country who take their own lives and the suicide rate among homeless veterans is 20 times the general population, that should catch everyone's attention and add some urgency to our work on this. i want to thank you for making it clear we're in crisis today. until we resolve this we will remain in crisis. we need to meet the crisis with urgent action. many panelists, including mr. peck and mr. martin, make an excellent point to answer the chairman's concern about the fiduciary role for the taxpayers' dollar. if we're not making that 25-1 ratio, and we're spending all this money to put a roof over a veteran's head, perhaps temporarily, perhaps permanently, but we don't have the wraparound support services, we're not getting the greatest bang for taxpayer dollar and we're not ensuring we end chronic homelessness, by providing mental health care, the day care, the transportation services that mr. martin talked about. you all made an excellent case for us, ensuring there's accountability and oversight for v.a. and d.o.l. and hud, making sure we fulfill that commitment of 25-1. the issue that mr. martin alluded to that many of us on this committee have worked on, which is that we have hundreds of thousands of veterans who have an other than honorable discharge. what we've been focused on lately is the fact that that precludes them from being able to see a mental health care provider, and we have an alarmingly high suicide rate amongst veterans who have bad paper discharges. we're working on that. i think we're going to get to greater access. it means these saveterans are ineligible for vash. it makes more of them be homeless. and taxpayer dollars being well spent, we have to expand eligibility to include those who have other than honorable discharges. i want to work with my republican colleagues and the v.a. and the secretary on the president on this. it's the right thing to do and we absolutely have to do it. the point many of you brought up about these hud vash dollars being moved to the general fund, that is very alarming. i'm very interested in what the v.a. has to say on this issue. i anticipate that question will come from both sides of this committee. last couple of points, i'm really glad, mr. clancy, that you mentioned combined arms. one of the outstanding veterans sfgs organizations in houston, what makes them exceptional is they take the mind-set the veteran is not a victim, but instead has so much to contribute. if we can unleash their potential, the experience, the expertise they've built in service by connecting them in some cases with the care they need and they're not currently getting the upside for everyone else in society is unlimited. i'm grateful you pointed that out. i'll end with this anecdote. the chairman held a really positive field hearing in lubbock, texas on transitioning service members into civilian life successfully. that morning we went to paul's project at grace campus, a homeless center. they said about 75% of their clients have some medical connection to their homelessness. they're out of pocket expenses were too great, could no longer pay the mortgage or rent. or their disability was so significant they could no longer go to work and they found themselves homeless. several of you mentioned health care as a connection. i'd ask mr. martin, i've got about a minute left, talk about how significant health care is as a connection to homelessness, and perhaps how expanding eligibility decreases our homeless population? >> in el paso at the opportunity center we do have one distinct advantage. and that is that we have an on site health clinic. it's operated by a separate entity. but that access to medical care is a critical component, as well as mental health care because we also have a community as it relates to mental health needs overall that's overwhelmed. and so we've got to look at accessibility as we sort of pick it up. in the absence of that, what happens is we see a large number of individuals to use a term that's been used in the past, that self-medicate through alcohol and drugs. that includes the veteran population. there's just that lack of trust in the system. that's one thing i haven't heard at this point, especially when we start to get into the older veterans. we have a lot of folks that simply say i don't want anything to do with the v.a. i just want out. and it's distrust, disillusionment, whatever the case might be over time. and so that goes back in to, to a certain extent, a cultural transition. we've talked about it in terms of employment. but we also have to look at it from a social atmosphere as well. because in many cases they elect to be there. and there is a right to have a choice. >> thank you, ranking member o'rourke. and we'll now yield for five minutes to mr. bilirakis. >> i appreciate it, thank you very much, mr. chairman. i have a couple questions. stakeholders from our supportive services for veterans' families program in my district in florida, i represent the tampa bay -- portions of the tampa bay area, they've highlighted the need for better coordination between the v.a. and hud, strengthening the continuum of care so the veterans homeless populations have the support they need for long-term success. they stress the importance of directing dollars we have provided to the v.a. towards continuum of care, support. so the program can focus their efforts on prevention and rehabilitation. so the question is for the panel, the entire panel. we can start with mr. clancy. how would you recommend v.a., hud and the department of labor, how could they improve their communication with community partners, like those each of you are part of? i appreciate your testimony today. >> thank you, congressman. in cincinnati we have a good relationship with our v.a. medical center. we're in very good communication with them constantly. i think there's an advantage to flexibility. and i think, as we mentioned before, and so i think -- i know there's a concern with -- with the hud vash program, the dollars not being specifically directed to them. again, in cincinnati, we don't have maybe the needs los angeles has. i think the flexibility of working with the v.a. medical center is crucial for us. we have a very good relationship with them. >> i will admit this is my third day on the job, so if you don't mind, i would love to submit an answer to you once i get that. >> very good, thank you. you're doing very well. i tell you that much. yes, please. >> i think it's important that we look at the entire continuum. there has been a tendency to try to find a single fix. housing first was the answer for a while. but i think it's critical that we provide those more intensive services that are now done through the grand per diem program at the beginning so that veterans coming in off the street are getting the services they need, whether it be mental health, substance abuse or education or whatever it may be. and then have a direct connection between those grand per diem programs and all the permanent housing available, not just hud vash, but also the supportive housing available through the hud program. and that they cooperate with counties so that the counties are providing a range of services, particularly in regards to mental health, and employment that can serve the veterans who are v.a. eligible and the veterans who are non-v.a. eligible. all those systems have to work together. >> i had to sort of think a little bit about the response to this question. because in our reality we have a wonderful working relationship with the v.a. in el paso. we truly do, that's through our gdp program. we have a lot of interaction taking place as we work through that. i think it was a week and a half ago i sat in on a teleconference call the v.a. hosted with regard to coordinated entry. i think that's one example of what we could use. we're trying to take two systems and having them use the same entry point. if you're not familiar with coordinated entry, it's one door in, simply described. everybody goes through a common assessment process. if they qualify for v.a., whether it's sfvf, hud vash, whatever the case might be, they go direction one. if they don't, they go direction two, which takes you to the hud funding side of the fence. okay? and so that's the intent to have the two work together. now, the reality is, when you look at direction two, we need to start looking at support services, and that could potentially pull in the department of labor. because a lot of the employment side of the fence -- employment's one of the keys to sustainability, desired employment, not just an entry level job as you work through it. you've got to take a look at what the strengths of the individual are, and you've got to get away from you must be job ready, as the underlying premise, and you've got to start working with that individual and develop the skill sets that are needed. and then, too, to be able to provide the coaching that's necessary for sustainability in employment. so, again, it goes back to support services. >> agreed. please. >> so i think this is a really important question, and i appreciate that you all are asking this. i'll tell you that i look at it from two perspectives. the first is from a top down approach where all the agencies are focusing in on sending coordinated messages and reenforcing the messages of others to grantees. the other to think about is the federal government is the largest vendor of homelessness assistance. if you can insent vise through funding mechanisms. the grand per diem program is moving good that in its current reboot. you also need to look at this from the bottom up and what is in it for providers, and coordinated entry is a great approach. conferencing and sharing resources and creating a solid system in your community is another thing that's a benefit to a provider and providers should be thinking about and looking at. >> thank you very much. i see my time has expired. i yield back, mr. chairman, submit the rest of the questions for the record. thank you. >> you bet, thank you, mr. bilirakis. we now yield five minutes to mr. takano. >> thank you, mr. chairman. mr. peck, i want to begin by thanking you for the tremendous work that u.s. vets does in my particular district and the wonderful facility being built with the wraparound services. so i congratulate you on that work. you mentioned in your testimony that there is not a lot of accountability for v.a. case management. and that contractor organizations are held to and achieve greater outcomes. you also said the inspector general study was unable to identify why veterans exited the program. would a comprehensive study by an entity outside of v.a. or hud or like gao for example be helpful in understanding the hud vash's efficacy, and where there are still issues in deliverance of services? >> absolutely. i think if we can bring transparency to the goals of the program as opposed to what is actually happening would be invaluable. i've not seen such a study. that oig study that i referred to was specific to the western -- specific to the california area. so i think a nationwide study would be excellent to make sure that they're providing that -- the service based on the model which they say it's based on, the housing first. >> mr. chairman, i'd like to make sure we look into getting such a study ordered. it's about the use of most effective and efficient use of taxpayer resources. if we could work with you on that, i'd appreciate that, mr. chairman. mr. peck, i want to continue with a line of questioning. in 2016 riverside county, which i represent, as you know, reached functional zero for veterans homelessness. but just because there has been some progress in our area, i know that next door in los angeles county, which is got a much larger population, they've experienced an uptick, and they have the largest number of homeless. we will definitely, i think, suffer if we don't, in my area, if we don't address what's going on in los angeles. and it doesn't mean we can let up our efforts just because we in riverside county have achieved functional zero. a continued and coordinated multiagency strategy is needed to end veteran homelessness. we've seen in california the number of homeless veterans rise by 20% last year in distinction to what's happened in riverside county. now, as service providers, as a service provider, do you feel that the v.a. remains committed to ending veteran homelessness? >> i should hope so. i think the directors that we deal with at loma linda and in los angeles are committed to this effort. it frightens me when people talk about the functional end of homelessness. it feels like the problem has been solved. and we have actually experienced, talking to funders, who say isn't that problem solved? and it is not. >> well, yeah. so here's my thing. i realize at loma linda and l.a. directors you may feel the support of. but has the secretary's decision to remove the elimination of veteran homelessness from his top priorities impact the work you do on the ground? >> it absolutely will impact if those funds are redirected the homeless population will go up. >> last year -- while the v.a. proposed moving money from specific funds to a general purpose fund. how would that have impacted the services you provide to veterans and the number of veterans you serve? >> it would not only reduce the case management we are getting currently from the v.a., it would allow a number of those hud vouchers to go unused? they cannot be used without the appropriate case management. so it's overall reduction in service to homeless veterans. >> the hud vash souchers would be unused because we aren't doing the wraparound services? >> yes, the three letters i've submitted with my written testimony indicate that in some cases they're only using half of the vouchers because the v.a. cannot commit to providing case management to 100% of the vouchers. >> so there's funding on the table we can't use. mr. martin, could you quickly respond to that same question? how would the proposed repurposing of the money affect you on the ground? >> well, when you're talking about v.a. dollars, like i said i'm in a different world. when i talk about the absence of case management, i'm referring to that crisis response system, that safety net, the emergency shelter where we have a large number of individuals. because in our v.a. funded programs we're able to maintain those levels as we work through that. it's a requirement of doing so. now, when you look at the vash vouchers, i believe we have about 29 is a community. and i've not heard any concerns that have come in from the v.a. in that respect in direct answer to your question. >> i would ask the rest of the panel to submit an answer to that question i asked in writing later. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you, mr. takano. now yield five minutes to ms. radewagen. >> thank you, mr. chairman, thank you very much. i too want to personally commend the panel for not only appearing today, but for doing this very difficult, challenging work. you're amazing. mr. clancy, your testimony suggests that regional veteran collaboratives are part of the solution to ending veteran homelessness. what are those? and why do you think they're needed? >> thank you, ma'am. the veteran collaboratives, as we mentioned, not only here in cincinnati with the pvca, but also combined arms in houston as the congressman mentioned, are critical because it enables the community to come together in a collaborative sense to provide the best of services for the veteran. we can combine best practices, different organizations receive different funding, and we can -- as best we can, move upstream to get those transitioning veterans before they become in crisis mode. >> thank you. mr. chairman, i yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you, ms. rad waggen. now yield to ms. custer. >> thank you very much, it's a very informative hearing. you've taken on kind of a calm tone in what i consider to be a serious change in policy that congress was not consulted about. and i want to make sure that we get a chance to get to the bottom of what the impact is on a daily basis for our veterans. and not just the veterans that are currently in the system, but perhaps more importantly the veterans who are not yet in the system, or as you mentioned have been disillusioned. i wanted to mention nashua, new hampshire, we have done tremendous work in my district, particularly easter seals, thank you to easter seals, ms. williams, and to our own harbor homes, a very effective program integrating health care and housing services. i had a wonderful story of a man, john, i met who had been living under a bridge with a group of vietnam-era veterans. they were, over time, brought in by the social workers. and it turns out part of his problem was a health care issue. he was diabetic and had not been receiving any health care. and when he was housed and got the health care that he needed, come to find out that he had been a middle manager in a company in our area. he had a family that he was estranged from. over the course of getting the housing and the services he was able to reunite with his family and actually now he's a part of helping other veterans. so my question to you is, are there lessons that can be learned? i'll direct this to ms. williams, from the programs that have been effective? particularly we've been talking a lot about los angeles. if you could turn your attention to rural communities and what more we need to be doing. and then i think in a bipartisan way we need to take back this discussion from an administration that seems to be turning a blind eye, or turning a shoulder toward those veterans in need and make a decision about funding, fully funding the services that are needed, the wraparound services, the health care, the social workers. so ms. williams, if you could talk about the lessons learned, and where we go from here. >> thank you so much for the question. and let me speak specifically, first, starting with new hampshire, that new hampshire does have many rural areas and with minimal staffing it's difficult to reach all the veterans in need and to provide the level and attention they need. that's the experience we're having in new hampshire. then secondly what i would say is that there needs to be greater flexibility to meet the unique needs of veterans. i just want to, again, highlight, easter seals' support of hr 4451 which is congressman wenstrup and congresswoman brown lee's bill, focusing on retention and maintaining jobs and increase employment, and not just any employment, but better jobs is critical. the final thing i would say, which again would tie into what my fellow panelists have discussed, is early access to case management. the community care coordination is vital. that's what we've heard. i would just encourage the federal agencies and you all to push for that. that is part of how we achieve success. >> could i ask our representative from hud, do you see the continuum of care as part of the mission to address homelessness from a holistics perspective to not only employment, but i want to remind the chair that some of these veterans are 65, 70, 80, employment is not the only solution, and if anyone else wants to add in, i have about a minute left. i'd appreciate your comments. >> direct answer on that question. when i look at the population that we serve, over 67% are over the age of 50. if i take that up a notch and get you to 65 and older, we're looking at 18%. so when we look at our mission under the continuum of care and our mission statement states this, we transition those that can and we protect those that can't. you've got to look at the long-term viability for those not in a position to seek sustainable housing through employment. that's where you look at the different options. >> thank you. the other question i have is about workforce. my time is limited. but if you have any comments on workforce, or if you want to submit for the record. >> i would be more than happy to. i know we're piloting a project right now which the local university, ourselves and workforce. which is based on the premise that anybody can work. but i will submit that in a written format to you. >> i would be very interested. and with the brief indulgence that veterans be included, both on the training side, but also the workforce for social workers and such. i'd be very interested in any thoughts you might have. and the chair is gone, but i wanted to invite him to new hampshire for a round table on homelessness. thank you. i yield back. >> thank you, ms. custer. will now yield five minutes to mr. higgins. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and thank the panel members for attending today. mr. chairman, ranking members, i would like to suggest we see a future panel addressing this crucial issue that would include d.o.d. because it occurs to me, as a veteran myself, that our nation invests a great deal of energy and money into training our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines to do their job within the military, largely soldier in today's military chooses his m.o.s. and yet we invest virtually nothing prior to their ets from the military to help them make the transition to civilian life. and all of us know that there's a term in the military called a short-timer, it seems to me that if our -- if our energies were invested in coordination with the d.o.d., to have sort of an ets, ait, advanced individual training, to help that military member be prepared for work. because these men and women that serve our nation, they lose their uniform, they lose their rank, but they maintain their skill. and yet they enter the civilian world as rookies. you have excellent mechanics leaving the military that don't have an a.s.e. certification, not qualified to change oil at a dealership. we could fix that if the d.o.d. would work together with the v.a. and the existing entities that help post ets transitions. we have heavy equipment operators operating dozers and cranes and, you know, very significant heavy equipments that are not certified to operate a forklift when they get out. welding certifications, heavy truck driving certifications, nursing and medical profession certifications. all of these excellent skills that are performed by our military members every day across the world. and when they ets from service, they don't have the civilian certifications that are equivalent to their existent skills. so they lose not just their uniform and their rank, but they lose their opportunity to serve their fellow man with the skills that they have learned and excelled at within the military. as a street cop for 12 years, i've had personal interaction with hundreds of homeless veterans. and i can tell you that there's sort of an underground culture in existence. and i'd like a couple of you to address this. we say we have 40,000 homeless veterans. we have 184,000 veterans incarcerated in america. at an average cost of a conservative average cost of 32,000 a year per veteran, that's 6 billion. so there's a culture that a veteran, because the very nature of a military veteran is independent and strong and mission oriented. they don't expect to be bantered about busy civilian housing directors and people of that ilk. so many veterans house themselves in jails. they'll commit -- they're smart. they'll commit a misdemeanor crime that requires incarceration. they won't make their bond. and they'll do three, six months, eight months in jail, in a local jail. then they're back on the street. and they'll live on the street for a while until they repeat that cycle. so i would ask you, mr. peck, and ms. monet, if the chairman would allow the time, i would ask you to address your consideration regarding a future that we could envision working with d.o.d. to help these military veterans make the transition with the skills that they have in the service to acquire the civilian certification equivalent of their skills so that we don't have this problem. >> i think you've hit on a very important problem. that transfer once a veteran -- once a serviceman or woman comes out of the military and hits the street, they do so without appropriate help. the t.a.p. program is there. once you get to be a short-term, you want out of there and you don't necessarily want to talk to anybody. so starting a program well before they get out indicating the possibilities of -- their possibilities once they get into civilian life, and giving them a connection in the community where they are discharged. so that the v.a. can contact them and, you know, 90 days later, six months later and say how you doing? do you have a job? are you all right? is your family okay? just rather than the veteran running out of resources after six months or a year or three years, and being so disconnected and disillusioned that they won't connect with the v.a. so i think that that connection is critical. and we have to find some formal system to make that transition. >> if mr. chairman would allow ms. monet. >> go ahead, ms. monet. let's make it quick. we're lun running late already. 30 seconds. >> from our perspective at nchv, one of the most interesting things we do saz an organization is we have a toll free hot line where veterans who are experiencing a housing crisis can call in and say they need help. we've heard from a good number of young and recently returned vets, i'm getting ready to get out, i have nowhere to go. i live on base housing and i don't even know how to find an apartment. i don't know what that means. so i think to your point about d.o.d. getting involved in transition planning, they need to be thinking not only about employment, do you have a houszing plan, somewhere to live when you get out. if you don't, can we connect you with v.a. or a community provider in the area you're going so they can help you out and wrap services around you to get you started off on the right foot. i think to the thing you're talking about with incarceration, any transition planning is important, not only from d.o.d., but when you're coming out of jail or prison or coming out of mental health treatment or a hospital. i think folks need to be cognizant that big life transitions are points that are -- they're points of vulnerability where we could be doing more for services. >> thank you, ms. monet. >> mr. chairman, thank you for the indulgence. >> you bet, mr. higgins. now we yield five minutes to mr. correa. >> i wanted to first of all thank or veterans for your service to our country and wanted to echo comments made by colleagues regarding the redirection of funds without properly notifying congress. a couple questions. i'm from california. the question i'm getting asked by a lot of my veterans is, what impact would cannabis use by veterans have on their eligibility to access the various programs, the services that you offer? how are they affected in terms of their eligibility? >> that's a tricky one. i know the v.a. does not allow cannabis use. there are some verifiable medical uses for marijuana. it's -- it is a tricky area because so many of the veterans we have in our housing have substance abuse issues, addiction issues. so -- >> we have an issue of opioid use abuse, then we have right now the issue of the famous cold memo that has been essentially repudiated by our attorney general, then in the state of california we do have medical cannabis use. there's a doctor, patient relationship. there's recommendations made by physicians to their patients for use of cannabis. so we have -- what we have is a conflict of laws here, state versus federal. and my veterans are asking me what's going to happen if i medicate with cannabis, will i have -- be affected in terms of my benefits from the v.a.? and i've gotten conflicting answers. and i'm asking you here publicly because i need to give my vets an answer. if you don't have the answer now, can i ask you to please submit your answers to me in writing? >> i will do. i will -- >> the best you can given the -- >> yes. you're right, there is a conflict between state and federal, and where there is verifiable medical benefit, that should be allowed. so i'll ask all of our commissions and get back to you. >> mr. peck, you talked about more efficient use of funds, and unused grant programs, turning them into vouchers. i'm out of orange county. we have some great folks providing great services like the illumination foundation, a group that's about 10 or 15 years old. gets homeless folks, gets them into converted motels, you know, gets them on their feet, wraparound services. is that the kind of services you're talking about in terms of also aiding veterans, in terms of getting them back on their feet? >> absolutely. nonprofits really have extensive outreach into the communities, much more so than the v.a. >> i say that because the only limitation these folks have is resources. >> yes, absolutely, yeah, i'm a big proponent for the v.a. to contract. i think those dollars would be much more efficient, and we'd reach more veterans. >> let me -- the few seconds i have left, i want to follow up on wenstrup's and higgins comments about following up with veterans after they take off the uniform in a meaningful way. it's one thing to give them a survey when you leave. some of these vets may be in many ways lacking of the skills they need to survive out there, given the invisible wounds they have once they leave the service to our country. so do we have a system to meaningfully follow up with them, six months, a year, two years out, other than a surveyor fill out the card is send it in. >> there is no such system. a lot of us are advocating they have to opt out rather than opt into a program to allow the v.a. to contact them. >> given that we want to do what's best for the veterans, we want to figure out the best way to use taxpayer dollars, i'd rather just follow up with them the best we can, six months out, one year, five years later. as mr. higgins said we have too many of our veterans in jail today. that's just -- there's no excuse for that. >> 90-day follow-up, six-month follow-up would save a lot of lives, for sure. >> how can we do that? what do we need -- >> i think my fellow marine secretary mattis would support that. i'd love for people to talk to him about that. >> what do we need to get moving -- >> congressman, if i may, any vet han that comes through our processing, does get follow up, to make sure everything is going well and the veteran is still squared away. >> thank you, mr. chairman, i yield. >> thank you, mr. correa. we now yield five minutes to the gentleman from indiana, mr. banks. >> thank you, mr. chairman, thanks to each of you once again for the important work you do. mr. chairman thanks for this incredibly important venue today to talk about this important issue. ms. monet, i wonder if you could talk more about the housing first model. you said a minute ago, i thought quite profoundly, that housing first should not ever mean housing only. multiple times the v.a. has reiterated its support for housing first. i hear from leaders in my district who serve homeless veterans that it doesn't provide the best option, that it might put a roof over a veterans' head, but it doesn't get to the underlying problem, such as drug addiction. could you elaborate on that? what you mean by that, and talk more about the housing first, and why it might fall short in those cases? >> absolutely. that's a wonderful question. thank you for that, sir. housing first really means you're indeed putting someone in houszing first. then you're following up and offering services. you're saying hey, i see you have this issue. can we help you address your diabetes or your opioid use, or you're unploimd? do you need a job? let's get you employment services. houszing first, it's important to make the distinct that your ability to stay in the housing is not predicated on the requirement to access services. you're not requiring them to go to aa meetings in 90 meetings, not requiring them to jump through hoops to stay in housing. what you're really doing is enticing them into the services while they're in housing. research has the shown that when a person is in housing they can better address the other issues they're facing. >> very good. now, as a segue from that, mr. peck, you talked a bit ago about the importance of gpd up front. and i wonder if you could talk more about that, what you mean, and why that would be important. >> the case management is more robust in the grand per diem programs which gives us the opportunity to offer them the rehabilitation that many of them need and are asking for. while housing first is a good model, it's only one avenue. and i think a number of them would welcome the opportunity to get into a program that could provide the mental health, the substance abuse treatment, the education, educational opportunities that a gpd program can offer, which a housing first permanent housing program cannot. there's simply not the robustness of the case management assistance. >> do you sense that the vachld v.a. is continuing to support the gpd up front? the posture of the v.a. from your perspective? >> they have supported. thankfully they've reduced it somewhat with a few thousand beds they have reduced and those beds may not have been well utilized. they've redesigned the program. to make it more proactive. you have to state what kind of service you're going to provide. they really are focusing on outcomes, and the outcomes largely are getting those veterans into permanent housing. whether through the income they earn through employment, or disability income. so they are now, i think, measuring that program better than they were before. >> you're optimist about the way forward? you're not concerned about those changes? >> those are good changes, yes, absolutely, and i think they will continue to support that. i'm hoping they will. >> okay, thank you very much. i appreciate once again all you do. i yield back. >> thank you, mr. banks. and finally we now yield to mr. peters five minutes for questions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i thank the leadership for holding this hearing. for allowing me to participate. even though this isn't my subcommittee. i represent san diego, the home of a tremendous veterans population. because of that the nature of our homeless population, it's heavy on veterans. we have a lot of programs in san diego that are community based. we think are doing well. but obviously they depend so heavily on the federal participation. so let me turn to a couple observations, and then ask a couple questions. first of all, we are all very supportive of the interests of the secretary in suicide -- veteran suicide. we don't want to come at the ex-tens of housing because the two are so related. we've heard from you all that suicide rates among the homeless veterans are much higher. so keeping them housed, and off the streets, is, nevin effect, t of the suicide battle as well. we urge the secretary to keep that in mind as he talks about where to spend money. the other observation, the importance of the department of defense in this. the most cost effective expenditure of american taxpayer money is to really prepare transitioning vets to come out and be productive, be employed, have a plan. and i think that we may want to ask more of the department of defense to take that on as one of their task. they train great warriors, train them to have the skills the chairman had, but not necessarily trained to deal withwith civilian life in the way they could be and should be at the time of transition. mr. clancy as talked about the efforts he's done in his area on that. i commend that. maybe you know of 0800 in san diego, a transitioning program that tries to do the same thing. go on the base at the time of transition, introduce the community at that point so that when people walk off the base as civilians, they're not strangers to that. mr. clancy? >> absolutely, san diego has a great program. it's in my written testimony, but i didn't mention it today. the san diego veteran coalition and military family collaborative is a group we have conference calls with, best practices, what are they doing that's successful, what are we doing that's successful? there are a number of collaboratives around the country that are working together to, again, learn from each other and learn how to best prepare the veteran for separation from the military. >> terrific. i think it's worth observing that even if the v.a. and veterans committee were functioning at 100%, we couldn't replace the importance of community involvement. that's something we can't do as a government. not every solution that comes from the government. community involvement has been so helpful. in the time i have, though, the question i wanted to ask was about vouchers. in san diego we get reports that there's a large number of vouchers that aren't used. maybe, mr. peck, you could address how that is possible, why does that happen? and maybe what could we do to make sure the resources we do have are being employed to make sure veterans have housing? >> in some instances, unfortunately, it's due to high housing costs. i've worked closely with the vvsd down there, very good program. so some landlords are not taking those vouchers. i know in los angeles 500 veterans are walking around with vouchers in hand that cannot find housing. so they stay in bridge programs like the ones we run, and others. so creating the affordable housing, talking with landlords is critical to be able to get those veterans into the -- into their housing. and additionally a shortage of v.a. social workers is contributing to the -- those vouchers not being used. >> so the landlord, the work with landlords is a more local issue. >> yes. these -- it is critical that there's a local plan for each of these federal issues. >> right. >> as you said, the community-based nonprofits are the ones that know and are familiar with the community. >> as a federal lawmaker, what would you suggest i do to see that more vouchers were used in san diego given our high housing costs, mr. peck? >> i would -- two things need to be done. check with the v.a. to make sure that they are providing the appropriate number of case managers. and talk with the city who can talk to the landlords which is what's happening in los angeles in an effort to get them to look more closely with the vouchers and we have housing locators to reach out to those railroads. >> we have to make sure that support system is provided. >> thank you, mr. peters. i would like to say as the chair of the subcommittee for economic opportunity, i associate myself with much of what you said and what my colleagues on both sides have said which is what i love the most about this committee. somehow when you walk through the doors and you are thinking about the customer which is the veteran, you just put everything aside and do everything you can to put america and the veterans first. i appreciate the candor and responses to our veterans and our country in that regard. one final comment before we conclude. as an economic committee that oversees the program and the comments were made repeatedly about sort of the ounce of prevention and transition. the assessment of the veteran or the service man or woman coming out of active duty into civilian life and all that we do to invest and time and resources to prepare these good americans to defend united states and our freedom and our allies. all that we do to prepare them to be warriors and in my opinion how little we invest to transition them so that we don't need much of your service. on the front end, we made it as much of a priority to transition and assimilate them back into civilian and to happen the skills we learn skptd responsibilities that they had and rehabilitated where there is trauma and their experiences. i hope in the next year and this is something i have made known to my colleagues who are staffing the committee, i want reform of the program to be of the first and foremost priority for our committee. after some of the hearings we had on tap, we know how much money we spent. we don't know what outcomes and we don't have much to any outcome that they are doing a good job and we can do a lot better. i hope you can commit to transforming the program to really work on the front end and so we have less drug addiction and less suicide. less homelessness and joblessness from our hero account of a program that actually works. maybe it is working. i don't know. there wasn't much data to suggest it was. thank you, guys. you are dismissed and we would ask that the second panel come and join us so i can introduce and you we can get on with the second panel and the discussion. in the interest of time, i'm going go ahead and make the introductions of our panelists. joining us now this afternoon is matt miller and the secretary for the veterans and training service for the u.s. department of labor and we have alongside of him, dominique blum, the general assistant secretary for the u.s. department of housing and urban development. also dr. thomas lynch, the deputy under secretary for health and clinical veterans for the u.s. department of veterans affaired who is accompanied by dr. keith harris, the director for the homeless office. we thank you for joining us. mr. miller, let's start with you. you have five minutes for opening remarks. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> ranks members of brownlee and o rourke and distinguished members of the subcommittee. thank you very much for providing statements on veteran homelessness. as a former chief of staff in this body i want to recognize you and committee staff for tireless efforts to make sure you fulfill obligations for veterans and their families. my name is matt miller and i'm the deputy at the veterans employment and training service for vets. i'm also the department's representative on the u.s. intern agency on homelessness. secretary acosta stands behind our service members and veterans. he has a clear goal that will assist our veterans in finding and keeping good jobs. for the department, one veteran experiencing homelessness is one too many. we look forward to working with the subcommittees and those who served with the employment support, assistance and opportunities they deserve to succeed in our partnerships extend the ability to achieve its mission and bring resources to bear for america's veterans. one important component is the homeless veterans reintegration program which provides grants to organizations to assist in reintegrating homeless veterans into meaningful employment. grandes also provide wraparound services to link homeless veterans with healthcare and housing opportunities provided by our partners. hp rp is like a canoe compared to carrier size programs it honors homelessness among veterans. each hp rp participant receive customized employment and training service like operational classroom and on the job training, the hbrp program succeeds because of the hard-working local connections like us fed but also collaborative efforts that partners at the federal, state levels. two weeks ago i had the humbling experience of touring one of our locations on skid row, los angeles, california. i heard about jeremy, and honorably discharged marine corps veteran, he had been incarcerated for 7 years and began working with our grantee volunteers of america. jeremy's council worked with him to develop a career plan and within four days of enrolling in the program jeremy got a job with a construction company and since starting his wages of increased from $12 to $14 an hour. in 2017 the hbrp program received $45 million to provide services to 16,000 homeless veterans with 67% and an average salary of $12.88 an hour. the veteran population are women, hbrp funds are used to serve them along with veterans with families and incarcerated veterans. we also support standdown events where we partner with federal and state agencies, local businesses and social service providers to offer critical services to homeless veterans and to assist with hurricane harvey relief effort, $50,000 for three standdown events in houston, texas, serving a total of 756 homeless veterans. i would be remiss if i didn't highlight a significant challenge we face, statutory definition of homeless veteran. if jeremy i mentioned earlier had first received permanent housing from one of our counterparts at 11:5:09 pm on monday he would not be eligible to apply for programs at 12:01 am tuesday and not able to take advantage of our employment services. studies have shown the barriers to employment still exists after immediate housing needs are met and individuals still run a risk of becoming homeless again. the 2016 annual report to congress proposes a solution to this and i would like to work with you to further discuss how to rectify this problem. ranking members, distinguished members of the subcommittee, we are committed to the goal of ending veterans homelessness, we look forward to working with you come our federal partners and the interagency council to ensure the continued success of our efforts. this concludes my statement, thank you again for the opportunity to testify today. i'm happy to answer any questions you may have. >> we now yield five minutes. ranking member beto o'rourke and members of the subcommittee. and federal partners for ending veterans homelessness. i am dominique blom, deputy assistant secretary for the office at hand. my office is responsible for the hud program. it is good to is working toward the goal of ending veterans homelessness with federal and local partners by maximizing our collective resources, thanks to funding from congress in this collaborative partnership we have made remarkable progress. the general homeless programs run by hud's office of community planning and develop and provide $2.4 billion annually to help homelessness primarily through permanent support of housing. 97 million of these fund or approximately 17,000 veterans through continuum of care program including 10,000 veterans with disabilities, thousands more veterans are served with emergency shelter and other assistance. the program combines rental assistance provided from hud, case management and clinical services provided by the va. this program is one of our most effective tools that reducing veterans homelessness. since 20008/131,000 veterans and their families have used a hud voucher to move into safe stable housing and as of september over 77,000 veterans warehouse through hud. shortly had will be awarding 5500 new vouchers with an additional $40 million that was appropriated last year. although we have seen incredible results through the program we continue to make changes to address local needs. first, it is changing the distribution of homeless veterans, between hud and the va plan to develop a process to recapture unused vouchers and reallocate them to high needs cities. seconds, we have awarded 4700 vouchers as project vouchers allowing for the development of affordable housing and high cost areas. we are encouraging public housing authorities to project base their existing vouchers which was made easier through the housing opportunity through modernization act of 2016. these efforts demonstrate our commitment to optimizing the effectiveness of hud while allowing for local flexibility in addressing homeless veterans population. building on this success congress appropriated $5.9 million in 2018 for the pilot program to begin addressing veterans homelessness in indian country. as of last week, 299 native american veterans receiving case management, of those, 234 were already housed under the program. one of the lessons learned from the demonstration in the indiana housing needs study is homelessness looks different in indian country. as tribes face severe housing shortages, close family ties result in overcrowding as family with other families. it has become instrumental in getting entire families into appropriately sized homes. with army infantry specialists, returning to his reservation in arizona. sharing one room with his girlfriend in six children. after receiving a hud voucher. his family now lives in a four bedroom apartment. most communities across the country showed a decline in veterans homelessness, sharp increases were in a few areas with extremely high housing costs needs and that led to the overall increase. based on the 2017 count veterans homelessness increased by 1.5% between 2016 and 17. but the larger story here is veterans homelessness has declined by historic 46% since 2010 and the results are largely due to the success of the hud program. perhaps one of the best examples of federal partnership. to the other hud and the va and us interagency council on homelessness implement a joint decisionmaking structure to administer programs and policies related to hud veterans homelessness. we have also jointly created a set of standards to evaluate whether communities have ended homelessness. since 2014 more than 880 state and local officials have set the goal is ending veterans homelessness and as after january 11, 6 communities across 30 states have achieved this goal. this is an amazing accomplishment. in conclusion we must continue to find ways to maximize the effectiveness of hud programs and continue to work collaboratively between critical housing and health resources to veterans while also utilizing all available homelessness assistance resources. thank you very much for facilitating this work and i welcome any questions you may have. >> you now have five minutes. >> members of the subcommittee, i appreciate the opportunity to discuss the va commitment to ending homelessness among veterans. i'm accompanied today by doctor keith harris, clinical director, director of clinical operations for the homeless programs office. let me state up front, va remains committed to ending veteran homelessness and is working in close collaboration with our partners to ensure veterans have permanent sustainable housing with access to high-quality health care and other supportive services, va and our partners at the department of housing and urban development and us interagency homelessness have developed systematic protocols for ending veteran homelessness which include the identification of veterans experiencing homelessness, to provide shelter immediately and the capacity to help veterans swiftly move into permanent housing. veterans experiencing homelessness in the united states has declined by nearly 1/22010. this is an unprecedented decline as it relates to ending homelessness in this country and in comparison to other public health efforts. to date 60 communities across 30 states have achieved the goal of effectively ending veteran homelessness. over 600,000 veterans and their family members have been assured housing through hud's targeted vouchers and va's homeless programs. va dramatically increase the number of services available to veterans that focus on housing, clinical care and social services as well as resources aimed at preventing homelessness. overall the message is positive and important. communities in partnership with the va are preventing and reducing veteran homelessness. recently va proposed reallocation of specific purpose to general-purpose funding. this shift did include funding and support of the hud program. the goal was to give facilities greater flexibility in the effective use of their budget to reduce homelessness, reflecting local variations in the use of resources. this unfortunately resulted in unnecessary confusion. please be assured that our commitment to veteran homelessness remains unchanged. there will be no change in funding to support our homeless programs until we solicit further input from our congressional colleagues, our external stakeholders and local va leaders. over the next several months va will engage in a formal interagency process to solicit further input to ensure any realignment of funds best supports our nation's veterans. va's way forward is to work with federal partners to implement our interagency strategic plan to end veteran homelessness. important objectives include enhancing integrated services for homeless veterans struggling with suicide risk, substance abuse, addressing high need communities by recapturing and reallocating available resources, emphasizing efforts to improve employment outcomes and fully committing to coordinated entry efforts in local communities, to expand on these objectives 57% of veterans who are at risk of homelessness or are currently homeless and mental health diagnosis and 46% have a substance abuse disorder. our homeless programs work closely with mental health and suicide prevention offices to respond to these clinical priorities. va's efforts must comprehensively be lifted to all community efforts as well. we heard this in the first panel. one size does not fit all when it comes to ending homelessness. all va medical centers are now required to work with their local communities to develop and operate coordinated entry center and system for all homeless individuals including veterans. this ensures coordination of communitywide services for veterans experiencing homelessness, systemwide awareness of available housing services and easy access to an appropriate prioritization for these resources. after six years of persistent progress, it shows a continued decline of homelessness in most communities but stalled progress to high rent and low vacancy rates. we are promoting development of affordable and permanent support of housing are working with all partners to encourage efforts in developing additional housing stock. when veterans are at risk for homelessness, va and federal, state and community partners must work together to rapidly connect them with appropriate assistance provide housing stability. sustaining the momentum and preserving gains made so far requires continued attention, collaboration and investment of financial resources. this concludes my testimony. my colleague and i are prepared to answer any questions. >> we will go in reverse order. you are prepared to ask questions. i will defer to you for 5 minutes, the gentleman from louisiana. >> thank the panelists for appearing today regarding this crucial issue the challenges our nation. mister miller, particularly like to ask you and i thank you for your dedication to the department of labor. to what extent do veterans affairs coordinate homelessness programs by job-training to prevent unnecessary duplicate of processes, particularly asking because one of our challenges as we heard today is funding and an effort to protect the people's treasure and provide needed services for our veterans we are duty-bound to find areas where there are duplicative services that may not be necessary. to what extent do you coordinate programs and are there similar programs operated by dol and va that absolutely need to be operated separately? >> of course, as i stated in my testimony, we do a collaborative effort, very much so with the va, hud, fema and other organizations, but when a grantee for a hbrp program puts forward an application, they have to have an application as a strategy of how they are going to work with agencies such as the va and hugs and overcome housing and healthcare needs of the individual. we use things such as va supportive services for veterans families, to encourage the veteran affairs supportive housing, or continuum of care. in addition you mentioned the federal level but we also work with state and local levels to do that as well as our grantees. we provide $45 million for grantees all over the country nationwide in her and -- urban and rural settings for 125 randys all of the country and we urge them to work together. that is what makes our program such a success, collaborative effort between our grantees and partners. >> thank you for that thorough response and let's shift gears in the remaining time regarding services provided for incarcerated veterans. it is a good program. how is funding and staffing for that, are you able to touch the local, state and federal jails where veterans are incarcerated and provide these services, give the committee an overview of where you are in the program. >> we provide incarcerated veterans transition program that we use where we provide grants to incarcerated population. we are aware this could be duplicative of what exists in state and correctional department of corrections within the state so that is something we take into consideration but we do provide grants for folks who work with incarcerated veterans. >> thank you again for that answer. i yield the balance of my time, mister chairman. >> we now yield five minutes to mister peters. >> thank you for calling on this, like christmas in january, appreciate that. you heard the comments i made to the previous panel. any actions hud is taking to address high cost markets. >> thank you for the question. we have seen particularly in western cities, those in california and seattle that what has been increased investment in homelessness largely driven by decrease of affordable housing and high cost of living in these cities. we recognize we do believe there are potential solutions here. to project-based these vouchers, these vouchers can be used to be made easier, the result of changes congress made in 2016 and we will continue to encourage these outers for development of affordable housing and it is available long-term for veterans. secondly we are also changing and allowing housing authority slicks ability for their payment standards so they can go above a certain amount that had generally provides housing. going above that in high cost areas and third, we are also encouraging housing authority provide additional outreach, finding landlords that will be more willing to serve veterans. >> there is a on 20%. is that something you are considering raising or if not, why not? >> in the last two years, hud has the flexibility to allow housing authority to go above that 20%. so hud vouchers are part of that pool of vouchers housing authorities project base without any need for approval from the department. >> can you tell me how hud vouchers expire in 120 days if you consider extending that. >> when we say it expires it expires for that particular servicemember. the voucher would then go back to the housing authority and the housing authority that receives a referral from va would be able to reissue the voucher but what you are asking, is there a possibility to extend the 120 day period for that particular veteran? we will see if that is possible. >> you one to put some urgency behind it but in a tough market it may present different circumstances. >> precisely. >> are you satisfied local agencies are taking advantage of this flexibility about vouchers? if not, is there a way we can help them understand the benefit of that? >> particularly in la we will have concentrated efforts occurring there. we were taken back by the increase in point in time count for veterans homelessness in la. we need to do concentrated outreach to talk about targeted ways to be increasing the success rate of vouchers and project basing is one of those solutions. >> really appreciate the testimony. we want to encourage your continued attention to housing the veterans we have on the streets. i yield back. >> we yield five minutes to the health subcommittee chair. >> question for you. how many veterans are homeless in the first five years or so? >> i honestly don't have the answer to that. do you have a quick estimate? >> i don't have an estimate but we have a work that looks at the transitioning servicemembers following them to va and assessing homeless rates but we are very early in that process. >> it is a key number to figure out the problem, why does this occur. it reminds me, you see situations of the child who present the emergency room every three weeks or so with a cough, you treat the cost, they get a little better and you are back with the same cost. at some point you want to go into the home and figure out why they are getting the cost and you find there is mold growing or whatever the case may be. this is important information because it is current and it is now. this goes back to what we want to do and consider doing in the transition process. if the majority of people are homeless in the first three years, why does that happen? what is missing that we can get them on the right track before they take off the uniform. this is something you can affirm, you are trying to track as best you can, sometimes those numbers are difficult to track but as best you can i hope that is the process taking place. >> a couple follow-up statements. number one, it really emphasizes the importance of prevention which is a process are homeless program is focusing on, two aspects of that, one preventing that going back into homelessness and preventing veterans getting into homelessness. i would like to emphasize we initiated two programs initially focused on suicide prevention but easily converted if there is an opportunity. we are actually reaching out to veterans after they transition, offering them help in the enrollment process and the opportunity to schedule an appointment at the va. the president's recent executive order focused on a transitioning service member. and that looks at how we begin to provide services, how we integrate with dod. >> as you can tell, moving that timeline, how can we get there, to make sure that it doesn't, and dod or whatever. something we need to fix. to the veteran as soon as you can. >> we are in a position now better than we have ever been to collaborate with dod, looking at how to provide services to the transition servicemember to address problems with suicide prevention or homelessness before we get to the critical decision, treat them over the suicide risk. >> describe the relationship that is starting to form. >> the suicide prevention program, doctor franklin who comes directly from dod is helping us reach out and collaborate with dod the collaborates with the programs they have. >> some communities have homelessness, what does that mean for the future, do we do anything more in those communities, a constant light that needs to be on. >> it goes back to 0 homelessness. we continue to be on the alert for homeless veterans and provide immediate shelter, whether it is transitional housing or permanent housing and provide them the wraparound support that keeps them in housing and keep them from going back to homelessness. an ongoing effort. >> yield back. >> my ranking member. >> doctor lynch, a couple witnesses in the previous panel including mister martin from el paso mentioned case manager to client ratios that are out of whack from the best practices, one to 25, mister martin mentioned el paso, one to 250, and to a manageable level. by talking about the importance of wraparound services, how do we make sure we follow through? >> it was apparent to me when we listen to the first panel, there is no correct answer. there are unique opportunities in every community. >> should we be at one to 25? >> we understand the veteran. they need greater support than other veterans? >> giving me a little bit of context, a case that having case management improves the likelihood that a veteran will transition. you seem to dispute that there may be a benchmark. >> i don't think i am disputing case management. i am saying trying to put a number on it is a difficult thing. >> we can never measure it. that is what the resources are. >> some veterans need greater support and as veterans become more acclimated, >> i would love a better answer from you. hope you can it back something we can measure and act upon. otherwise we are just taking subjective measurement that is different in each case. to get resources to those community providers, you just heard them right now saying they don't have what they need to take care of these veterans and improve their chances of escaping homelessness and living to their full potential. switching to a different subject, many of the panelists mention the connection to access to health care. there was a recent announcement by the president and the secretary of the va about improved access to mental health care. does that specifically include veterans with honorable discharge and by extension will that allow those veterans with a bad paper discharge to access the hud voucher program which today they cannot? >> we are aiming to try to focus on every veteran who is transitioning. right now we can address 40% of them because of eligibility. we need to explore the issue of other than honorable and dishonorable and how to address those veterans. there is an opportunity working with hud to give vouchers to veterans with other than honorable discharge because we can work with the community to provide wraparound services. we have the opportunity to work with ss bf to provide care for veterans who may receive other than honorable discharge. >> i want to nail down the specifics in your answer. will veterans with an honorable discharge be eligible for the voucher program? >> do you want -- >> i can address that. we have had a partnership to start piloting a program, to have a portion of those hud vouchers served other than honorable discharge members and this is decided on a local level with the va medical center and continuum of care partner that provides those wraparound services, case management and that referral has come to the public housing authority. we have two housing authorities and localities participating in this pilot and expanding it in the future. >> how many veterans with other than honorable discharge status are participating in this pilot program? >> i will be able to get that information back to you after this hearing. >> would you mind if doctor harris commented briefly on el paso? >> appreciate the question about staffing and understand the concerns about that. i don't want to speak to the prior panelist but he was not speaking to the hud program, the 200-1 ratio that does not exist in our program. the positions are funded on a model of one to 25 medical centers, they have some leeway within that, they might hire two peers or something like that. el paso is 100%, one of the rare medical centers that is, staffing is not a challenge there. there vouchers are reasonably well utilized. >> the point i took from that, they -- there are not enough resources dedicated to support services which includes funding the appropriate case manager to the ratio, it is making it harder for those providers to extend mental health care, transportation, family care to their clients that in turn helps them to transition out of homelessness. if i am using the wrong nomenclature or measure, let me know. i want to resolve the discrepancy, we have got everything filled and john martin saying we are at one to 250. is somewhere there, a breakdown. i would love to find out who is responsible, not to punish them but to make sure we get the resources to those providing the care in the community where there is a gap right now. i want to thank the previous panel for hanging out. looks like we will wrap this up soon. the fact that we are all in the same room maybe we can get together and resolve the discrepancy and come up with a solution for el paso, i will yield back to the chair. >> i think the ranking member, that is an excellent line of questioning. i will yield five minutes, miss brownlee. >> thank you, doctor lynch, for stating on the record that there will be no funding transferred to general-purpose funds. >> can i have the corollary? the secretary is committed to getting input not only from our federal partners but community partners as well and stakeholders. this program is 10 years old and it is time for us to have a critical evaluation and what i took from the first panel was the fact that there are different ways to manage problems in different communities. we need to hear that and understand it and figure out how we adapt programs to be more effective. >> i couldn't agree more. i welcome that interaction with community partners and hope to have a discussion here as well. thank you for stating that on the record. people were concerned that was happening today. we have been talking about the hud vouchers. i represent los angeles county, all of ventura county. we have the issue of expensive housing, that is an issue for us. another issue has been our housing authority in the city of ventura was told by the va that vouchers have outstanding vouchers, right now i think the city of ventura is only using 67% of the vouchers that are allocated to them. so what the va has been telling them is those vouchers can only go to chronically homeless veterans. i one to know whether that is true or not. if it is true, to be chronically homeless, you have to be out on the streets for a long time, almost like you have to be on the street for a year before you could even qualify to be chronically homeless at least based on my understanding of that definition so could you speak to that? >> i will ask doctor harris to speak for va to begin with. >> we concur on the numbers, 70% utilization. it is clear utilization is low inventory county and part of that is a result of lower staffing in that period and there are aggressive efforts to recruit for that. in terms of the question about chronic homelessness, it is true that it is targeted to the chronically homeless population which need that intensive support. it is not true that vouchers can only be allocated to chronically homeless, that is the message we need to correct to the medical center. >> we don't have a medical center inventory. >> greater la. and supervisory chain. >> very good. i think clearing that up will be very helpful. i do applaud this bloom, what you are talking about in terms of using the vouchers or unused vouchers for project-based projects as well as high need areas. providing that flexibility is very good but i want to make sure in a county like ventura county they can utilize their vouchers because the need is there before they would give up those vouchers to another area but i want to follow up on mister peters's line of questioning with the project based opportunities. he was saying it was capped at 20% at that is eliminated so local housing authority, local government can decide we want to use all our vouchers for a project based? >> housing authorities can use all of their hud vouchers for project abasing. there is no longer a cap on that measure. >> that information is out to housing authorities across the country? >> we believe it is but we have specific instances where we haven't communicated that or happy to reinforce it. >> it is the first i heard it today so i will check in with our housing authority to see if they understand that. in terms of homelessness and high cost areas, has there been any conversation about raising the level of the voucher so it can be competitive in these expensive marketplaces? >> we have been talking about that. we currently allow housing authorities to go to 110% of the payment standard and housing authorities believe they need more flexibility to go above that. we will consider that on a case-by-case basis. housing authorities in high need, high cost areas will make a compelling argument for that. >> is there anything new coming forward in terms of addressing suicide but particularly for female veterans suicide which we know is 20 times higher than the suicide attempt -- excuse me. among women veterans, exponentially higher than suicides among civilian women. is there anything new in terms of trying to address homelessness for women and certainly homelessness for women and their children, any new opportunities? i have a bill, there are other bills out there but is hud looking at other opportunities? >> at this point that the parent hasn't targeted an additional population specifically to focus on. in our current areas of the system, women veterans at this point. there had been conversations to see what resources we could dedicate for veterans. >> thank you. any comments? >> va is in the process of reengineering a suicide prevention program, trying to continue our emphasis on those at immediate risk but trying to move further to the left to understand is high risk groups, women would be included in high risk groups, and the goal is to begin to focus outreach to those groups that could potentially become at risk for suicide over time. so va is beginning to look at this and beginning to look at it in terms of targeted populations. >> i yield back. >> i think the gentlelady for her questions. you have five minutes, mark tanako. >> we heard earlier this morning, the hud program is very successful at housing veterans in giving them the support they need. communities all across the country including mine, the hud program is helping veterans rebuild their lives. my colleague from pennsylvania representative boil, has a bill to improve oversight of hud contracts. it is a straightforward bill that requires the va to give those to congress before the contract expires to help lapses in service for veterans. it is supported by several, are you familiar with this bill? >> only vaguely having heard about it this morning but i think va looks forward to reviewing that bill and providing feedback. we don't have specific positions right now. >> tell me, as to the core intent of the bill, do you agree congressional notification is a straightforward fix to help reduce lapses in service for veterans? >> without having looked at the whole bill, i am reluctant to come into. >> i'm not asking you to agree with the whole bill but the principle of timely notification to congress that the program could lapse or funding would lapse, oversight roles are somewhat enabled here. >> i would submit it is important to communicate with congressional colleagues, particularly with issues that arise in their district. >> with regard to homeless services that are about to lapse, shouldn't congress know about that? shouldn't congress be informed this program is about to end, shouldn't we be notified about that? >> i'm trying to understand that this relates to the review that recently occurred of some of our homeless programs. >> it requires congress before a contract expires to prevent lapses in service to veterans so it is about a contract experiment, and a contract expiring. with a provider. >> at this point i am going to have to say and so we have offered a chance to look at the bill i will reserve my opinion. >> thank you. let me move to another question. october 2013, the va identified many veterans with hbc diagnosis. given the diagnosis, the advancements in hepatitis c treatment in march 2017 the va has been able to successfully treat 84,000 veterans. va continues to work through the list of nonveterans, what is va doing to identify the untreated poor that exist out there specifically at risk homeless veterans? >> we are actively working in the communities with our partners to encourage veterans to come forward for testing. this is our current emphasis. to identify those veterans who haven't come forward to be identified. >> thank you. i assume there are adequate resources to try to find these veterans? >> we are successfully partnering with a number of associates to try to encourage that outreach into the community. >> in early 2017 the secretary laid out 5 priorities that include greater choice, modernizing the system, foundational services, timeliness of services and suicide prevention. of note given the topic of this hearing is the fact that homelessness is missing. since late 2009, homelessness has become a priority and as a result, veterans experiencing homelessness have been cut in half. in 2017 hud's annual survey found homelessness had increased by 1.5%. do you believe the agency's downgrading a veteran homelessness from top priorities is having a direct impact on its ability to help the at risk population? >> i don't believe the agency has downgraded the emphasis on homelessness. we continue to have a strong emphasis in identifying and treating homeless veterans. >> even as veteran homelessness increased 1.5% and the secretary has not included this in his top priorities you can say that with a straight face to me? >> yes i can. >> will you back that up to q1.5% over 2016 figures, facts contradict what you are saying. >> there have been circumstances in certain communities that the decrease of availability of housing we are working on aggressively. va continues to be committed to the homeless program and basically to ending, addressing homelessness among our veterans, yes i do. >> i would say the statistics show otherwise. i am not satisfied with your answer, sir. i yield back. >> thank you, mark tanako. any follow-up questions from my colleagues? i will take a few minutes and follow up with some questions. you mentioned, doctor lynch, the term permanent housing. explain what that means. >> there are two options when we house veterans and i asked doctor harris to expand on this little bit. there is a process by which we put a veteran into transitional housing, surround him with supportive services and attempt to move him into permanent housing on a long-term basis. there is another model called housing where we try to move the veteran into a permanent housing situation and wrap services around him at that time so -- >> i will ask the same question i ask your partners. what is success when it comes to addressing homelessness in the veteran community? >> success can be defined as identifying a home for veterans, putting services in place to keep that veteran in a home and trying to find appointments to make the veteran self-sufficient moving forward and finally having an aggressive prevention strategy that keeps veterans in the home and prevents veterans from entering homelessness. >> that is well articulated, the stages of success but ultimately the outcome is a self sustainability and self-sufficiency. what is the rate of success with respect to the ultimate outcome for everybody i have listened to in this discussion which is self sustainability of the veteran? >> would you like to answer that? better numbers than i might give. >> if i'm following your question are you asking for a percentage, without a subsidy? >> you identified this person as homeless, this veteran, you have done this necessary wraparound service to stabilize or rehabilitate, transition through temporary assistance and they are completely self-sufficient. >> it is an incredibly important question as we look at long-term sustainability of our effort. there are 1 million ways we can go with that. the first is if you look at the grant program, the largest of transitional programs, two thirds of the veterans do so with no subsidy. that is incredibly important and why you heard such emphasis from our providers on the importance of employment. that is one place we are seeing independence. the point being there are successes through these programs that are not requiring subsidies. >> could you give me the same outcome measurement for all the programs? you do have them. >> we could have that. >> i would like you to submit for the record the outcome of self-sufficiency once you have identified a homeless veteran and matriculate through whatever program you have. that you are responsible for. >> if i could add one piece. i'm interpreting this as a question about employment which it may not be entirely that. employment is not a feasible goal for everybody we serve. a third are disabled at the point of assessment if you add in retired or volunteers of students it never gets much higher. >> the way to do it is those that are able to be self-sufficient what is the success rate? i recognize there are situations where there are none. >> half of veterans who are able and searching do attain employment. that is a sizable chunk, not everybody, we would like it to be higher. >> i am not picking on anybody, i just think we have to define success, measure that and to know which of the 20 programs are working and i am not against spending more money. of the program is working towards our desired outcome to get veterans the help they need in self-sufficiency. in addition to those things, the right partners and for me, those who are closest to the problem are best able to solve that so i put a lot of faith in community partners in regard to these programs and the program success but another driver of success of effective programs and services would be accountability and that is the accountability of the panel that preceded you and the accountability of the veteran and what they are asked to do and what eligibility whether it is time limitation or work requirement or whatever it is, could you talk about the accountability measures built into this with respect to key stakeholders, veteran and community partners and providers, start with you and go down the line and wrap up. >> with h brp programs there is accountability built in, we monitor our grantees on a regular basis and subject them to criteria. if they don't meet the criteria we set them up on an action plan, corrective action plan to work with them and partner with other folks to work with them to make sure they deliver services that are needed to the specification of the grant in which we get the money for. h brp, we don't measure homelessness as much as we do how many people get a job. the secretary talks about jobs jobs jobs. that would be our goal. the basic goal of the part of labor is to make sure veterans homelessness is rare, and on reoccurring and brief. 60% job placement is what i understand. i was blown away by that statistic. i would like to drill it down at another time but if that is the success rate we have identified at least program we might make a greater investment in because ultimately you can't sustain a home if you don't have a job so kudos to you guys if that success measure is accurate and i have no reason to believe it is not. accountability, you believe it is they are sufficiently in your programs? >> we hold housing authorities accountable for utilization of the vouchers. nationwide we have an 88% utilization rate which means 88% of the funding provided to those housing authorities is being used to help veterans. another 5% of funding going to 93% of funding available is in the hands of veterans but not in the form of housing for them. these are veterans that are searching for housing so we do believe 93% success rate is very good. we want to see that pickup in high cost areas like la. >> what is the 93% success rate? >> a measurement of funding being expended to house veterans. today that is 88% of all funding dedicated to the hud program being used to house veterans. we have 70,000 veterans currently housed, another 5% of funding is in the hands of veterans to be able to search for a house so -- >> do you know of the 90% you give assistance to for housing, how many of those individuals move off of federal assistance who can sustain their own housing? >> we rely on the va for those statistics, tracks, exits of vouchers as positive, neutral or negative as a result of ending their participation in the program. >> doctor lynch gets the last word. >> pretty much what miss bloom said. we are tracking how many veterans our house following involvement in our programs, how many do not get housed and how many fallback into homelessness. these are solid numbers and we are able to track those across the country. >> one last question if my colleagues will indulge me. a rapid round closure and we will start on this end. everybody comes putting their best foot and presentation forward and i appreciate that, i bet there is success, some may be more wildly successful than others but i just have to believe there is something that is not working so i am a continual improvement guy is a lot of things working in my own operation i would like to fix and am working on so tell me what is not working about your program where we can help you. if we can't help you, tell me you are working on it and to a greater availability for our veterans. >> doctor harris would like to start. >> the biggest one is lack of prevention. too many falling into homelessness. it is not a failure of the homeless system but a broader failure of the entire societal system and we need to go upstream. >> that may address the discussion around tap. >> i would say briefly the greatest opportunity is to look at how to partner more effectively particularly with the community, learn from their experiences and incorporate that into the program. >> i focus on the tribal had, senate bill introduced, 133, that would authorize the tribal hud program to help communities to project base those vouchers and produce stable housing. >> final word. >> i stated in our annual report, what we would like to work with you on is technical amendment to the term homeless veteran to include recently housed. we estimate if that were changed, we would serve 10,000 more veterans. >> god bless you guys and thanks for coming. no further questions, the panel is now excused. i ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material. without objections awarded. this hearing is now adjourned. 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