You need a place, but you also need the competence to do it. We increasingly will have staff visiting remote areas or have contacts in those areas for people who are experiencing trouble. We want to make it widely known that we can be called at any time, 24/7, with a problem, and we'll try to solve it right away. We can't perform miracles in remote areas, but not paying any attention to the problem is hardly the response either.
We'd certainly be open to suggestions. It's not a problem just for Veterans Affairs, but also for community service across the country, especially for older people or those with disabilities, or both. Add to that the multiplying effect of a psychological disability in a remote area and it's a real challenge. I understand that, and we're certainly open to ideas. I think the veterans health services review was trying to overcome complex eligibility, not where people choose to live, but we're certainly open to suggestions in that area.
I don't think there's any obstacle to asking veterans organizations to help out. The only challenge is that because of their advocacy role, they need to be at arm's length from government. We have partnership arrangements now with the Legion that don't violate or in any way put an obstacle in front of their arm's-length advocacy role. It seems to work out very well, principally in the area of looking at client satisfaction in all these institutions or facilities for veterans who are housed across the country--all 7,000 of them. I don't know that there's an obstacle there, except, of course, that they need to be able to advocate on the part of veterans to government and they don't want a relationship to government that impedes that, which is understandable.
We're certainly open to suggestions. It is a challenge.