Morano asks about veterans unaware of discharge upgrade program
Morano asks how many potentially eligible veterans remain unaware of the discharge upgrade program. Mata and Nicole discuss the need for better awareness campaigns and note an anticipated increase due to the trans ban, with targeted messaging being developed.
How many potentially eligible veterans do you believe might remain unaware of the program?
Yeah.
The program itself, so at DVS, we do want to do a campaign awareness of the services, one that we provide, but also what the duals program is.
Oftentimes, if you are a veteran or have served in the military, you understand the, I would like to say the language, right?
However, oftentimes when it comes to family members of those that serve, they don't realize that this is a type of service that exists even for their veteran themselves.
So at DBS, we do have to do a better campaign awareness to showcase one of the services that we provide, but also when it comes to the duals program.
But even at that, the duals program itself.
It does take time, as Nicole mentioned.
It takes one to three years to do this type of support, and we would like support from this council to highlight the work that DBS is doing, to highlight the work when it comes to the duals program.
I think in addition to that as well is that there's also people who file for discharge upgrades separate of just a reason being whether it's don't ask, don't tell or whatever that may be.
What we do anticipate for, though, is an increase as more people are being affected by the trans ban.
And we're seeing that being more prevalent.
So that's something we're actively tracking with our partners at VAP.
To ensure we're doing more targeted messaging for those affected by that ban as well.