Montana Veterans Affairs Town Hall Meeting Set This Month in Missoula

After the Veterans Affairs system faced a national scandal over long wait times for medical care, it began a system of town hall meetings to help create dialogue between VA administrators and the vets they care for. Montana Veterans Affairs Public Information Officer Randy Martin said one of these town hall meetings will be in Missoula this month at the Montana Army National Guard Readiness/Reserve Center.

"Town hall sessions were an initiative by the new VA Secretary Bob McDonald, in order to build new relationships with our patients and with our veterans across the U.S.," Martin said. "In Montana, we had town hall sessions at Fort Harrison in September and in Billings in November. Now we're going to have a town hall session in Missoula and we're really looking forward to coming out January 14."

Martin wants to remind vets that they don’t have to wait for a town hall to air a complaint or propose a solution.

"We want our veterans to know that we don't have to wait for a town hall session to have dialogue with our veterans," Martin said. "We are listening to our veterans 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. We care about our veterans. The town hall venue is important, but it certainly is not the only way."

One way veterans can communicate with the VA is through email by sending questions and comments to the address montanatownhallquestions@va.gov

The town hall meeting starts at 4:30 p.m. and will feature VA Montana Health Care staff followed at 5:30 p.m;. by a separate meeting featuring representatives from VBA. The town halls end at 7 p.m.