East Pasco residents flocked to the Dade City Courthouse to meet face-to-face with Rep. Gus Bilirakis (FL-12); State Rep. Danny Burgess, R-San Antonio; and State Sen. Wilton Simpson, R-Trilby.
About 100 residents gathered inside the Board of County Commissioners meeting room on Aug. 22 to voice their thoughts and concerns with their local representatives via a question-and-answer style town hall meeting.
One topic broached extensively throughout the nearly three-hour session: greater veteran care.
From left to right: State Sen. Wilton Simpson, U.S. Rep. Gus Bilirakis and State Rep. Danny Burgess.
(Kevin Weiss/Staff Photos)
One speaker voiced his concern about the increasing suicide rate amongst veterans, and the steps being taken to combat the epidemic.
The issue is a serious one, according to an August 2016 report by the U.S. Veterans Affairs Department that revealed a 32 percent increase in veteran suicides between 2001 and 2014. In 2014, veterans accounted for 18 percent of all adult suicides in the United States, with an average of 20 veteran suicides per day, according to the report.
Burgess suggested a possible solution is to have the state collaborate with federal partners to help fund more alternative therapeutic methods — hyperbaric oxygen therapy, yoga, and service dogs — for vets.
“It’s a staggering number of veterans that commit suicide regularly,” Burgess said. “They’re in combat, they’re overseas, they’re in horrible conditions, and then they come back home and that adjustment period, sometimes, is very difficult to make.”
Providing more jobs for veterans, too, is another prong to combat mental health issues, Burgess said.
“We have highly skilled, highly trained warriors coming back from overseas — let’s bridge the gap between their skills in the military and what they can do in the state of Florida,” he said.
“We should make it easier for them to get licensed in the same skills that they’ve been trained for in the military,” Burgess said.
Bilirakis, vice chair of the U.S. House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, said funding needs to be better allocated toward high quality medical care for vets.
“We’ve got to make the VA stronger, but we’ve got to give our veterans options to seek private care if they wish,” Bilirakis said. “We need more veterans who are mental health counselors, and we need more diversified therapies within the VA. “Not one size fits all — that’s the problem with the VA,” he said.
Bilirakis noted there are still significant issues within the VA’s leadership structure, and its spending habits.
“We need to hold the VA accountable,” Bilirakis said. “We passed legislation to give the secretary the authority to fire individuals for not doing a good job — most of them are on the executive level.”
Another topic presented during the gathering were failures within the criminal justice system.
One speaker, a former inmate and drug user, shared her personal struggles within the prison system. She said that increasing diversionary and rehabilitation programs are, in some cases, more impactful than long-term incarceration in reducing recidivism rates.
The three politicians agreed that programs such as PACE Center for Girls and Bridges of America are examples of ways to help decrease the rate of repeat criminal behavior.
“Rehabilitation—we need to do more there,” Burgess said. “Some of the key factors to reducing recidivism is family and being close-knit within the community that you live in. We have a lot of lower-level, nonviolent offenders who are stuck in state prisons along with some very violent offenders, and sometimes that only puts them deeper within the criminal justice system.”
Simpson concurred: “You have to have that transition opportunity — to stop the cycle.”
He believes most people can be rehabilitated, especially youth.
Texting while driving was another area of focus during the meeting.
One speaker said the law, a secondary offense, needs to be harsher, especially in school zones.
Burgess agreed, but noted the initial passing of the “Florida Ban on Texting While Driving” was already a major hurdle, and bumping it up to a primary offense would be a significant challenge.
“We just need to keep plugging along,” Burgess said. “There needs to be something more done to curb that behavior. Texting while driving is becoming a growing problem.”
The problem is prolific, according to a Florida Highway Patrol report that revealed there were more than 45,000 crashes caused by distracted drivers in the state during 2015.
One of the most animated moments during the town hall occurred when one speaker, representing the group Save Southern Heritage, lambasted Simpson for endorsing the removal of the Confederate battle flag from the state’s official seal.
The state senator was unapologetic for his decision-making.
“I don’t make excuses for my votes,” Simpson said.
“I’m not going to support a symbol that is meant from such hatred to such a large part of our population,” Simpson added.
The Save Southern Heritage speaker also scolded Burgess for supporting the removal of the Confederate Gen. Edmund Kirby Smith’s statue in the U.S. Capitol.
The state representative buoyantly defended his action to remove Smith from the National Statuary Hall in Washington D.C.
“I respect our history, I respect our past,” Burgess said, but he added, “I don’t believe Gen. Kirby Smith represents the third-most populous state in our union,” Burgess said. “I believe there are so many other people that should represent us in our nation’s capitol.
Burgess said he stands by his vote and is excited to see who will be chosen, because the state has many great representatives, ranging from Henry Flagler, to Mary McLeod Bethune, to Walt Disney.
Published August 31, 2016
