Veterans Affairs committee  We've made many mistakes in the last 10 years. The only reason we're here now and that we have created this system is that we continue to make mistakes and continue to improve the process. It's not perfect, because we have such a limited government. We have so many NGOs filling t

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely, sir. I've done many comparative studies of various countries, particularly the U.K., Denmark, Ukraine, and Israel. In the U.K.—and I'm sure you guys have a version of this, depending on the military occupational specialty—if someone is a heavy equipment operator in t

Veterans Affairs committee  That's an interesting question. Initially, a lot of what the media and the VA and Congress reported was that veterans are broken and need mental health services when they return. All of our data shows that this is not the case. We need to prevent mental health issues—with employm

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely. We have to work every day to destigmatize post-traumatic stress and what the media and, unfortunately, our own Department of Veterans Affairs have misreported for the last several years. Veterans are not dangerous employees. They won't bring this to the workplace. In

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes, sir. We actually partnered with our regional chamber of commerce and our economic development corporation to use the same branding they deploy to companies and to workers all over the United States and the world to engage them and attract them to come to Houston. At the end

Veterans Affairs committee  I don't know if there is much empirical evidence that shows the effectiveness of some of these animals, especially with equine therapy. I haven't seen that, but I haven't done a ton of research on it. As I said, I'm more on the employment side of the equation; I'm not a mental he

Veterans Affairs committee  Unfortunately, we do have a skills gap. In many different cases, the military doesn't provide credentials according to civilian standards. The only real cases that exist are for lawyers and medical doctors, which we all know are jobs that probably account for less than 2% of the

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely, sir. Thank you for doing that. That is one of the best ways that our community identified early on in 2008. It was shortly after the scandals at Walter Reed, which were very apparent in the media, that former mayor White and county judge Ed Emmett got together and cr

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely. When a veteran is referred to a different organization you can actually see that. If my organization, which provides employment services, makes a referral to one of your organizations that provides veteran benefit services, we can actually see that referral move alo

Veterans Affairs committee  All three branches of VA, most importantly, the health administration, which we want all of our veterans to enrol in so they have access to good health care; the benefits administration to help execute that; and, God forbid, the cemetery administration, which most of us hope we d

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely, and we firmly believe, as you do, that you have to support the family unit, especially in that sometimes difficult transition from military to civilian life when they're coming from different places all over the country, or even the world, to a large community like Ho

Veterans Affairs committee  We started with a small group, a brain trust so to speak, of six organizations that really identified the need to collaborate more effectively. At that time, during the Obama administration, we were facing large-scale reductions in force. We thought we would see almost double the

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely. That's a great question, and this will also help to answer the previous question. We actually engaged KPMG, which of course is a top-five consulting firm globally. They wanted to be a part of what we were doing here. They're a local veterans affinity group, so all th

Veterans Affairs committee  There is basically a corrective action provided by the backbone staff. We have five full-time staff members who work for Combined Arms. It really functions as a chamber of commerce, so to speak, for these organizations. If they don't accept the corrective action, then the board c

Veterans Affairs committee  We're capturing what category of service they're requesting. Typically, one in three veterans comes through the system looking for career transition, which I think is obviously the most important part. If we can prevent unemployment, we can prevent substance abuse, family challen