Veterans Affairs Committee on March 9th, 2009

[Lindee Lenox]

No. Our national cemeteries are open during daylight. They're not secured at night. The hours are posted, and we don't want people on the cemetery grounds at night. And the only security we have is that normally we will have an agreement with a local law enforcement agency, depending on the location. If they're near a military post or installation, then the military police may cruise through there at night. But no, guards are not on duty 24 hours a day.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Do you handle any requests for burials at sea? I notice you have a lot of terrestrial gravesites, but I would assume a lot of naval personnel would like to be buried at sea. Do you assist them in that as well?

[Lindee Lenox]

We don't assist in that. If they elect burial at sea and they do that, then they would be eligible for a memorial headstone or marker to be placed in one of our national cemeteries. It would say “in memory of” whoever that person is. We still recognize them with a marker in one of our cemeteries.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

My last question for you is this. If someone is killed in Iraq or Afghanistan today, would their entire funeral costs be covered by the United States? If their remains are sent home, there's the repatriation ceremony part, but is the funeral cost—and not just the headstone and burial, but all the funeral home expenses—covered by the United States?

[Lindee Lenox]

I do not have an answer to that question. They're still on active duty, so the military may be picking up those expenses. I suspect it is, but I can't tell you that for sure. I can certainly get that answer for you, if you'd like.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

I appreciate that, and thank you very much for your time today.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you.

It looks as if our final questioner will be Mr. Andrews.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you.

I have a question on the markers you referred to. You said you would ship a marker to whoever requests it. Is that all done centrally? Obviously you want to have the same-looking marker as you have on your slide 8. Is that something that's centrally located, for the inscription and all that?

[Lindee Lenox]

We have contractors across the United States who work in marble, granite, and in bronze. My office manages those contracts. Wherever the contractors are, they will manufacture it and ship it. In some instances when it's a national cemetery, we have specialized contracts where we will have one contractor deliver blank markers to the cemetery and then we'll have another contractor to come in and inscribe it at the cemetery. We have different types of contracts.

Each national cemetery and state veterans cemetery orders its own headstones. They have an automated system. It's part of the VA's IT system. There is a specific inscription format. It's standardized. There's usually room at the bottom, after they have all their military information, where they can enter some term of endearment—“beloved father” and that kind of thing. For those who are going to private cemeteries, it's the same format as for the nationals and what not, but because those are individual orders, it's a very specific contracting method. They're produced and shipped from the contractors ,and so it's a production line kind of thing for the private cemeteries.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I have one final question that goes back to how you can improve in making people aware of this. Are the funeral homes and those people who look after them aware of this? Do they promote it if they know someone is a veteran? How active are the actual funeral homes and people who do that in promoting to veterans that they can get a headstone and that kind of stuff? Do they resist that because it may cut into some of their profits?

[Lindee Lenox]

We rely very heavily on the funeral homes, because they are the ones who are meeting with the families. One of the standard questions is whether the person is a veteran. If they have integrity, then they will advise the family of what benefits are available to them through the VA if the person is a veteran. Most of them do, as far as we know, and we work closely with them. We rely on them. They understand our procedures and know who to call and how to make things happen quickly. They really are our partners.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Are there some issues there? You used the words “if they have integrity”.

[Lindee Lenox]

We're not going to know if there's a funeral home out there that is not providing that information. It's probably not ever going to come to our attention. I just say that because I expect a business that has integrity would let people know. I don't have any specific instances.

[Scott Andrews, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you, Mr. Andrews.

I just have one question about the broader VA services, Ms. Lenox. A couple of times it was brought up that veterans don't know about benefits that they are eligible for, and that, by the way, is not uncommon here in Canada as well. What kind of outreach does the VA do in the United States to try to get the word out, not only for the memorial services but for the broader spectrum of the suite of services you have that are available to them?

[Lindee Lenox]

I can't speak too broadly about what the other administrations do, but I can speak about it a little bit. We certainly have a very robust Internet site that I invite you all to visit if you have the opportunity. Just type in “Department of Veterans Affairs” and it will take you there. That's got just phenomenal information on all of the benefits. It's got links all over the place, and anyone who goes there is going to be able to find out what they need to know. So we promote that very broadly. It's on all of our literature that we hand out and we speak about it.

We do a lot of events where we go out and speak. Of course we do our Memorial Day and our Veterans Day events and things like that where we're speaking to the public. But we also go out and speak to veterans service organizations, like the Vietnam Veterans of America. They have conferences, they have meetings, they have all those kind of things. We go out and speak to groups such as the AARP, the American Association of Retired Persons, or whatever that acronym stands for these days. We try to speak to those kinds of groups. We will go anywhere we're invited to go or anywhere we think we can reach a population that might benefit from our services.

There are also mailings that go out. I believe that VBA sends out mailings to veterans. There are a lot of things we do, but there's a whole lot more that we can do.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you very much. Now I want to give you an opportunity to make some closing remarks.

[Lindee Lenox]

I just want to say thank you very much for asking the questions and for being interested in our programs. Those of us within the National Cemetery Administration are really passionate about our work. We're proud of it. Every single person who works for the National Cemetery Administration really feels like their job is a calling, and I think that's something that is very special about our organization. But VA overall is.... I've worked here since 2001, and it's just a phenomenal organization. It is an organization whose mission it is to help people and do to good things, and we do a great job of it. I'm proud to be able to talk about it and I'm pleased to be able to share this information.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Since you've divulged that you have been at VA since 2001 and you said you're 37 years working for the government, that means you're a veteran--if I do a little bit of math--of at least 29 years in the United States military. It that correct?

[Lindee Lenox]

No. I'm a Vietnam era veteran. I served for two years during the Vietnam era. I served in what used to be the Women's Army Corp. It doesn't exist any longer. But I worked for the Department of the Army as a civilian for ten years. I worked for the Department of Labour for 12 years. I worked for the Internal Revenue Service. I've moved around a little bit.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Thank you very much. And really, the thanks are ours for investing your time as one of our guests of this committee. Also, we'd like to express our friendship to the United States of America as well. Having a good neighbour to the south of us is important to all of us.

Thank you.

[Lindee Lenox]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

Unless there is some other business, that will conclude our meeting for today. Is there any other business?

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

It would have been helpful today if we had known more about what we have, so that when she's indicating they have 12 new cemeteries getting built, we would be able to say, well, we only have four, or whatever. Just a bit of a comparison chart would have been helpful.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Sweet]

So your suggestion is that for these next three witnesses that we have from specific departments of the VA services of the United States, we have some background like that of what we have?