Manatee Review

WASHINGTON — Congressman Vern Buchanan today announced that five of his proposals were included in the House-passed FY24 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

“These five proposals seek to address the health and safety of our active-duty military community, one of my top priorities in Congress,” said Buchanan. “I’m pleased to see these provisions pass the House this week and am very hopeful they will be enacted into law.”

The five Buchanan provisions include:

• The Rachael Booth Act, which aims to fix a gap in current law that prevents some individuals who suffer domestic abuse at the hands of a service member from receiving much-needed financial assistance.
• An amendment to require the Department of Defense (DoD) to study and report to Congress on the accessibility of mental health care providers and services for active-duty service members on military bases.
• An amendment to examine the benefits and feasibility of utilizing black box data recorders in tactical vehicles to prevent future accidents.
• An amendment to require the Secretary of Defense to submit a report to Congress on the effectiveness of the DoD “Drug Take Back Program” and provide recommendations to Congress on ways to improve or expand the program.
• An amendment to mandate the DoD promptly notify the Department of Veterans Affairs about an active-duty service member transitioning to veteran status with an opioid use disorder to help prevent the VA from prescribing opioids.

Buchanan’s first provision, the Rachael Booth Act, which was included in the base text of the NDAA, was named after his constituent from Lithia, FL. She found herself unable to access the financial assistance she should have been eligible for when her husband was convicted of domestic abuse in a civilian court and then discharged from the military on an unrelated offense. 

This provision would help dependents of service members more easily access Transitional Compensation to help them transition to financial independence after the service member has been discharged from the military for a domestic abuse offense.

The second Buchanan provision requires the DoD to study and report to Congress on the accessibility of mental health care providers on military bases, the accessibility of inpatient mental health services for service members and propose any steps that may be taken to improve the accessibility of those services.

Buchanan previously introduced this amendment as standalone legislation called the Treating Invisible Wounds on Base Act following reports of seven sailors taking their own lives while stationed aboard the USS George Washington last year. In March, a sailor assigned to the USS Montana in Newport News, Va. also died by suicide.

Buchanan’s third provision aims to evaluate if equipping tactical vehicles with black box data recorders could prevent future accidents, previously introduced as the DRIVE SAFE Act. Buchanan has been a leading advocate in Congress for reforming current training procedures and improving emergency response capabilities in Congress after his constituent, Army Specialist Panipinto, died when the M2A3 Bradley Fighting Vehicle he was driving overturned during a road-test in 2019 in South Korea.

Numerous safety and training failures contributed to SPC Panipinto’s death, including malfunctions of the vehicle’s communication systems, defective or broken equipment, a lack of medical services on base and significant delays in medical response to the scene of the accident.

Buchanan’s fourth provision included in the bill requires the Secretary of Defense to report to Congress on the effectiveness of the DoD’s “Drug Take Back Program” and report to Congress on ways to improve the program’s effectiveness.

The DoD’s “Drug Take Back Program” was originally established in 2016. However, from 2017 to 2021, the military reported 322 fatal overdoses among active-duty service members and nearly 15,000 non-fatal overdoses. Buchanan’s provision aims to find ways to improve the program to prevent these tragic overdoses moving forward.

The final Buchanan provision that passed the House would require the DoD to promptly alert the VA if a service member transitioning to veteran status suffers from an opioid use disorder (OUD).

According to the VA’s watchdog, it was found that VA officials routinely missed or struggled to check prior OUD diagnoses when developing treatment plans for veterans. Investigators found that of the 1,783 service members discharged between Oct. 2017 and Sept. 2019 with an OUD diagnosis in their DoD health files, only 421 of those patients had formal OUD records in their VA files. This poses a risk of veterans being mistakenly prescribed opioids as well as missing out on potentially life-saving substance abuse treatments at the VA.

Buchanan had a series of sweeping military training reforms included in the FY22 NDAA that required the Pentagon to implement more realistic training practices, develop stricter enforcement standards and ensure better oversight to prevent future military training accidents and deaths.

In 2020, Buchanan also offered an amendment to the FY21 NDAA that was successfully signed into law. His amendment required the DoD to examine emergency response capabilities and services currently available at U.S. bases around the world, and to report to Congress on the potential benefits and feasibility of requiring bases to have properly functioning MedEvac helicopters and fully stocked military ambulances.  

Original source can be found here.