 This is Think Tech Hawaii, Community Matters here. Welcome to Voice of the Veteran on Think Tech live streaming network series, broadcasting from our downtown studio at Pioneer Plaza at the core of downtown Honolulu. I'm your host, Helen Dora Haydn, veteran advocate. Joining me in this studio today is Robert Kent, immediate past department commander of the Disabled American Veterans Department of Hawaii. Today we're going to talk about the Disabled American Veterans and what's going on throughout the state. And at the very end of our show, we're going to talk about the last week's town hall meeting that the VA host did, Robert was there, and he'll talk to us a little bit about the highlights of the meeting. Glad to have you here, Robert. Remember that our talk shows are streamed live on the internet from 12 noon to 5 pm every weekday, and earlier shows are streamed all night long. All our shows are streamed on livestream.com. If you want the links to our live stream or previous broadcasts, which are available on youtube.com, or if you want to subscribe to our programs to get on our mailing list and get our program advisories, go to thinktechhawaii.com. If you want to comment during one of our shows, please tweet us at thinktechhi. We'll try to get to some questions by the end of the show. Robert, thank you so much. From one past department commander to another, I salute you, and thank you for being here. Thank you. Thank you. So as a member of Disabled American Veterans myself, I joined back in 1994, but tell me about your military career and what got you involved in Disabled American Veterans. Let's start with your military career. My military career started in 1955 when I joined the Army in West Virginia. And then I went through my training at Cape Cone, Georgia, and then I put little with Missouri. And then I came to Hawaii in 1965 and joined the 25th Division. Then I went to Vietnam at the 25th Division, came back to the station at school field for three years. Then I went to Japan and worked in the hospital in Japan as communications for HF Radio, Ham Radio, so that we could communicate with the veterans that was in the hospital and they could talk to the loved ones in the mainland over the radio. The only problem was, you say, hello, honey, how are you, over? That's great. So when did you get out of the military? I got out in September of 1975. Thank you for your service. Thank you for your service. Thank you. And so how did you get knowledge about the duty of Disabled American Veterans, better known as DAV? I had a friend of mine that asked me to be the hospital service coordinator, transportation network coordinator in 2008. And I took that job on for three years and then from there I went through, American Legion asked me to be a service officer, so I went to school to be a service officer. Then a year or two later, the DAV asked me to be the Department Commander. So I took the job as Department Commander. And you served two consecutive years, is that correct, as Department Commander? Yes. And you are the current outgoing, you're the immediate past Department Commander. Right. Perfect. I was Commander in 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016. They should make you Commander for life. That's interesting. You've been such a proponent for helping veterans on this Island, Bob. Whenever I talk to everybody, they go, do you know Bob Kent? I'm like, yes, I have the pleasure of knowing Bob Kent. And it's an honor to be in the same organization with these serving veterans and their families. So we've got some slides that I prepared, if we can just talk a little bit about them as they are being presented. DAV is a national service organization, a lot of people don't know about the organization. They're the top three. There's American Legion, VFW and DAV, we have over a million members. And so DAV.org, if you want to find out more information about DAV, you can check them out. In Hawaii we've got multiple chapters and we'll show the location of those chapters in a little bit. But I want to talk about the National Service Office here in Honolulu. It is located over at the east wing of Tripler Army Hospital. Tripler Army Hospital. How many national service officers do we have currently? We have three national service officers at this time. And they are, if you need to contact them on Monday and Friday, you have to have an appointment. And you can call 433-049-0 to set up an appointment. When Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, it's first come, first serve, walk in. And you're sent there and wait until they call your name and then you go in and get your information that you need. What you need to bring with you is your DD-214 and any medical records that you might have when you was in the military that shows that you got injured or you got hurt. Great. And also, I want to let people know, if you go to DAV.org, you can find any national service officer. Just type it in and bring you to any state. They're all over the nation plus Puerto Rico. So definitely check that out. It's one of the, DAV helped me. They do my claim personally when I got started back in the 90s. So I was very excited about being part of DAV as a member and learning about all the services that they offered. For people that are getting out of the military, they have a program called Transition Service Officers. And that is our next slide that we're going to talk about. And these are for people that are getting out. They have claim work that they do called BDD claims, benefits deliverable upon discharge. If you have 180 days from the time you're getting out of the military, you can file a claim with these men and ladies. So let us talk about what's available here in Hawaii. Well, hi. At Schuphill Barracks, we have a woman named Pamela, I can't remember the last name. Pamela was her name. And she's a retired colonel. And she does the Transition Service Officer for Schuphill, Pearl Harbor, and Hickam. Different things. You can contact her through the National Service Officer, 4-3-3-0-4-9-0, and they will give you direct contact with her. In Kanoi, we have a man named Orlando Perez, and he comes into the National Service Officer once a week, but he has an office at the Marine Corps base from the Marines. Perfect. And their contact number out there? I don't have his contact number, but I don't know. 808-254-7682. Right. So that's wonderful that they have all these services. Now these services for veterans and their families, if they want to file claims or get information about their services, they are free of charge. DAV is chartered through Congress from 1932, so they are here to assist veterans free. There's no fee whatsoever. If you want to become a member of the DAV or the Disabled American Veterans or the auxiliary, they always have applications for membership, so you can always talk to the service officers about that also. And not only that, if you're married to a service officer and that has passed away, the widows do have benefits, and they can get their benefits through the VA, through the Disabled American Veterans Service Officer. Yes, thank you for that. The next thing we're going to talk about is what's near and dear to your heart, because you mentioned that you were a hospital service coordinator that runs VAM program, transportation program. Right. Just a quick down in dirty history, there was the VA used to provide transportation to veterans, but because of funding cuts, they took that program away. And luckily DAV picked up that ball like we always do, and we worked together with Ford Motor Company and partnered up and got VAMs donated, and they're donated to the VA facilities, but the chapter raised money locally also. So let us talk a little bit about what's offered here. I know we have a gentleman, Mr. Donald Wood, here that works out of Tripler. Can you talk to us a little bit about the VAM program? Right here. Donald Wood says he is a hospital transportation network coordinator. He has to go to different islands, to Hilo, to Kula, to Maui, to Kauai, and to Honolulu. And he coordinates all the VAMs on each island. These VAMs were bought by disabled American veterans here in Hawaii. We provide half of the cost of the VAM, which is $14,500. And now we've got three VAMs in the big island, one VAM in Hilo, one VAM in Kauai. We've got two VAMs on Oahu and one in Kailua. I mean in Kauai. Perfect. Well, thank you for all that. I know that these VAMs are there. It takes a lot of effort and coordination to run this VAM program. And it's all volunteer drivers, from my understanding. Yes, we have all volunteer drivers. I'm one of the volunteer drivers here with Oahu. But to get a volunteer driver, you don't have to be a military. You can be in the fire department. You can be a police officer. Any time that you have some free time, you can call the 433-7749 and volunteer. They've got the full number there. Okay, we'll make sure that everybody's got that number, right? Yes, 77749 is the full number. And you can volunteer to be a driver one day a month, one day a week, or one day every two weeks, whatever day you might have off. And what the drivers do, they will go from Triplarm and Medical Center to the house of the veteran that has got a doctor's appointment. Pick him up and bring him into the VA for the doctor's appointment. We will pick him up and take him back to his house, free of charge. Great, it looks like we're going to have to take a break. I'm Helen Dorre Hayden, Veterans Advocate with the Voice of the Veteran on Think Tech Hawaii Livestreaming Network Series. We're talking today with Robert Kens, the media past department commander of the DAV Hawaii. We'll be back in a minute, so stay tuned for more of the story. I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. I have a story and I don't know where to start. I feel alone in a crowd. I can't sleep. I feel overwhelmed. I don't even know who I am anymore. I still have nightmares. I can't live like this anymore. I'm really not so good. Are you ready to listen? We help veterans get the benefits they've earned. My victory was finishing my education. My victory was getting help to put our lives back together. DAV provides veterans with a lifetime of support. My victory is being there for my family. Help us support more victories for veterans. Go to DAV.org. This is Think Tech Hawaii, raising public awareness. Hi, I'm Helen Dorre Hayden, Veterans Advocate and this is Voice of the Veteran on Think Tech Hawaii live streaming network series talking about Hawaii's disabled American veterans with immediate task department commander Robert Kent. Welcome back, Robert. Thank you. Thank you so much again for being here on this show. As we wrapped up with the last segment, we're talking about the VAM and the coordination efforts and the volunteer drivers. Do you want to speak a little bit more about that? Yes. We pay for half of the VAM and the national will pay the other half of the VAM to get the VAM. They were shipping over to Hawaii. Once they get to Hawaii, they put their decals on it. Then we would give the VAM to the VA. The VA puts the license plates on the VAM, which is a government license plate. Then they would give a credit card in the VAM to buy the gas and pay for the maintenance of the VAM. And the volunteer drivers have to coordinate all the information in a book that is in the VAM to take care of that. That's a tremendous service. I helped out in Maryland before I moved to Hawaii with the VAM transportation program. It services so many veterans, and it absolutely makes a difference for these veterans to get to their appointments. Disabled American veterans is the only ones that does that. The VFW and American Legion own the other ones. They don't have the VAM program like we have in Hawaii. We're very proud of that program, absolutely. In Alaska, back in 2000 when I was department commander, we were lucky to have Ford Motor Company actually donated a whole VAM to us. It made the national magazine. It shipped from Bellingsview, Washington over to Alaska via a ferry. It was this big thing. It was amazing. It helped so many veterans in Alaska. I was proud to be part of that project as well. We're going to segue now a little bit about women veterans. The DAV has been a strong proponent about women veterans and making sure our rights are heard on Capitol Hill. We have our legislative walkthrough at every midwinter conference. Our last national commander, David Riley, had given his speech to the Senate committee, Joint Senate Committee. We're so proud to have him do that. This is a quadruple amputee from Alabama. I was proud to have known him when I lived in Alabama myself. We're just so proud of the legacy that we leave and the women veterans. This year, we have our first national women veteran on the national line. She's in the magazine. Her name is Delphine Metcalfoster. I just wanted to show this real quick, but she is the first woman on the DAV national line in over 90 years. She made history. We're very proud of her. We've had other women on the national line, but she is our first national commander. Congratulations, Ms. Lawson. Thank you. Thank you for that. Is there anything you'd like to say about women veterans? Now, the women veterans are in the service more than they once when I was in the service, because now they do combat. They do fly airplanes. They fly helicopters. They do everything that the men do. And they're serving right along the side of the men. And when they get injured, they've got the same benefits that the men have. So the DAV and the VA is supporting the women veterans more than the civilian outside do. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I'm a proponent here in Hawaii. I use the women's veterans health clinic at the tripler, at the VA clinic. And it's been an amazing process here. They really take good care of us. And if women veterans, sometimes, you know, we might have apprehension of using the VA services, but I'm here to encourage all women veterans out there to go. And if you need to contact me, I will go with you. I will hand carry you. I will introduce you to the amazing staff here at the VA clinic and get you plugged in. Because if you don't use these services, what happens is a lot of times these services get caught. And that's the last thing we want to see happen. So please reach out to me. I will go with you. A lot of veterans are fearful about things that happen to them that were traumatic, especially like military sexual trauma issues. They're fearful to talk to anybody. So if they need assistance, they need help. I'm there for you. Reach out to me. Helen Dora Hayden at gmail.com or at the station. And I will help you work through that process. The other thing I wanted to congratulate is Joy Illam. She's our legislative director now. She and I co-served on a women's veterans advisory committee back in the 2000 when I was very active on the national circuit. But I'm very proud of her for all the hard work that she's done. So congratulations to Joy. Yes. And when the town hall meeting we had a woman came up and I was talking about the women veterans sitting in the same room with the men veterans waiting on the doctor's appointment. And they're trying to get the women veterans to have their own waiting room so they don't have to sit in there with the men. And the next thing I'd like to talk about is the choice card. We have a choice card where we can call in and they will make a doctor's appointment for us and then call us back and let us know when the doctor's appointment is. And this is outside of the VA. We do not have a VA hospital in Hawaii. We really need to have a VA hospital in Hawaii because there's over 400,000 veterans in the district of Hawaii. That means American Samoa, Guam, and all the Pacific Islands that we have. And these veterans, they don't have a VA hospital so they have to use a choice card. Yes. And a lot of times it gets outsourced to either the tripler or the choice programs to the civilian sector. I'm a recipient of the choice program myself. And in the mainland, if you're 40 miles away or more, you can use the choice card here. That's 40 miles away from the VA hospital. That's right. And since we do not have a hospital and because the timeliness, they really work on the timeliness to get us quality care because we don't have that here. Sometimes they're backlogged. We get to use the choice card. And it's been a wonderful program. I've used it a lot myself. I encourage all veterans to use their choice card whenever they can. You get to see great quality care. Just make sure that the records from the civilian side is incorporated in your VA health care records after you're done with an appointment. Just make sure that that all gets incorporated. Sometimes there's a disconnect a little bit there. And if you don't have a choice card, you can go to the VA. And the VA will set you up and get you a choice card and set the second floor of the VA. They have where you get your ID card. Yes. For the VA. Before we wrap up the program, is there anything you'd like to share with us? I know that you brought some information about the Disabled for Veterans for Life Memorial. Could you talk a little bit about that? Yes. When I was in Washington, D.C., they have this National Memorial for the Disabled American Veterans. And it's a very good memorial. If you ever go to Washington, please go by and see this. It's very close to the Vietnam Veteran Memorial. And if you go at night time, it's a little bit scary because they've got the pictures of the veterans in the wall. Like this one here, it shows the pictures of the veterans in the wall. Thank you for sharing that. I know that was a major project. It's been going on forever to get the funding to put up that memorial, but it's for us living disabled veterans. It's got its place in our history. And I can't wait to visit that next time I'm in D.C. Bob, is there anything else you'd like to share with the audience before we wrap up? I have one thing. The meetings. The meetings for your DAV chapters across the state. There's multiple chapters. In Hilo, two in Honolulu, one in Lihua, Mililani, Pahoa, and Wailuka. And so we have all these wonderful DAV chapter meetings. You can look them up on DAV.org. Look for a chapter in Hawaii, and you can get the information on when they meet. But it's here for you. You can resource this also that I put together for you. Please reach out to the DAV or any veteran service organization for that matter. Be part of. Get connected and get together back at the camaraderie ship. That's one thing I absolutely loved about being part of DAV, is the veterans that walked before me during active duty. You guys are my heroes. You're absolutely my heroes. And I was lucky to involve my son in the journey. He grew up in the DAV. So he got to meet walking, living, talking histories. And he understood what it meant to pay for the price of freedom. And now that he's active duty, he absolutely, I think it inspired him to go active duty as an adult. So I'm very proud of him for that. But I just want to thank you again for being on the show. And thank you so much for all that you do for the veterans here in Hawaii and all over the world, Robert. Thank you so much. Thank you. Wonderful having you. Wonderful having you. Okay, we are now out of time. We have to wrap it up. It has been a joy. I'm Helen Dora Hayden, Veterans Advocate Voice of the Veteran on Think Tech Hawaii Live Streaming Network series. We've been talking with Robert Kent, immediate past department commander for the Disabled American Veterans of Hawaii. Thank you all for being here. Thanks to our broadcast engineer Ray and our floor manager Cindy. And to Jay Fidel, our executive producer who put it all together. Thanks to you, our audience for watching. Please tune in and tell your friends to tune in every Thursday at one for more Voice of the Veteran. If you want to get our email and social media program advisories, click the link on thinktechhawaii.com. If you'd like to be a guest, I'd love to have you, underwriter or volunteer, or if you want to join us in the downtown studio in Pioneer Plaza, contact Jay at thinktechhawaii.com. If you want the links to our live streams or our previous broadcasts on newsstream.tv or youtube.com, just go to thinktechhawaii.com. Go there into our Facebook page and tell them that you like us. We'd love for you to like us. And of course, I will see you next Thursday for more Voice of the Veteran on Think Tech. I'm Helen Dora Hayden, Veteran Advocate. Aloha everyone.