After years of talking about it, lawmakers on Monday announced legislation to create a new stand-alone Department of Veterans Affairs for New Jersey.
Services for veterans, currently housed under the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, would be dealt with by an independent, cabinet-level department tasked with solely focusing on serving the state’s roughly 350,000 veterans. The legislation also proposes moving oversight of the New Jersey National Guard to its own separate department.
The long-awaited bill sponsored by Democratic state Sens. Joe Cryan (D-Union) and Joe Vitale (D-Middlesex) along with Assemblywoman Cleopatra Tucker (D-Essex), comes after federal and state investigators uncovered abysmal care at state-run veterans homes. Advocates have for years been urging lawmakers to step up services for vets.
Legislators said the new department would give those service members a “direct line” to the governor and a “seat at the table,” in line with roughly three dozen other states with similar models.
“This is an outstanding opportunity for the state to recognize veteran services and prioritize how important the care is for veterans in New Jersey,” Jay Boxwell, legislative director for NJ Veterans of Foreign Wars, said in an interview with NJ Spotlight News.
“This isn’t the first time that New Jersey is trying to go back to a veteran-services model. Under Governor Kean we had the initial veteran services … and it worked well for many years until they molded it in under the National Guard and created the new position of DMVA,” Boxwell said. “So we’re actually going back to a model that really worked well and veterans were very happy with.”
