CARROLLTON --— Paul Henderson of Carroll County was an Army Green Beret, shot twice during his service in the Vietnam War.
At 73, he says he was healthy until just five or six years ago and didn’t so much need the additional military benefits he might have been receiving from the U.S. Veterans Administration, until now.
That is why Henderson and his friend Ben Shute, who served in the Army National Guard for 20 years, are trying to organize veterans from Carroll and surrounding counties to learn more about medical benefits and others they might have been drawing from the government had they known they were eligible.
Henderson said he has applied for benefits relating to exposure to Agent Orange, a tactical herbicide used to exfoliate the jungles of Vietnam. Diseases caused by Agent Orange are wide-ranging, and Henderson is still waiting to hear if he will receive those benefits after years of chasing them through the bureaucratic nooks and crannies of the VA.
On Tuesday night, Shute and Henderson joined about 25 other area veterans at the Carroll County Courthouse to talk about benefits and to join in solidarity as a group, to support one another in pursuing and receiving those benefits.
“How many people know a veteran who’s not sitting here today?” Shute said at the opening of the meeting, and every hand in the room shot up. An estimated 400-plus veterans live in Carroll County.
“How many of you got served benefits from the VA within five years of active duty service?” he asked, and no hands went up. “Ten years? Fifteen years?” Still no hands.
Single hands went up for 20 years, 25 years, 30 years and 35 years, and a few more went up at 40 years.
“How many haven’t gotten served yet, today?” At that, 17 hands went up.
“Why has this taken so long?” Shute asked, and a woman in the corner of the room shouted out it was because the government wanted them to die before they got their benefits.
Thomas Johnson, a 100-percent-disabled military veteran in the back of the room, chimed in.
“Everybody in this room should be collecting 10 percent for tinnitus,” he said. Tinnitus is chronic ringing in the ears, a common injury among military veterans and a condition Johnson characterized as a “presumptive injury,” one that if claimed by a veteran, the VA will likely not deny.
An older veteran said he didn’t know he could get benefits for diabetes until 1999, when he attended a ship’s reunion for his Navy unit that served in Vietnam. When he applied for Agent Orange benefits, he said, the Navy claimed he wasn’t there.
He wore a blue T-shirt he bought from the VA that read “WORN-OUT VETERAN. DO NOT DISCARD.”
Larry Harris, a 24-year retired military veteran and the Veterans Service Outreach Officer for the Delta, stationed at Delta State University, told the group that he was there to help them walk through the labyrinth of securing needed benefits.
“I’m going to come here twice a month to help you fill out the paperwork and try to track down your benefits,” Harris said. “Then I will hand-carry them up to Jackson and make sure they are processed correctly.”
Harris urged that the benefits are there and that changes in the system — such as using private contractors to conduct physical examinations, rather than requiring appointments at overcrowded veterans’ hospitals — are something vets need to be aware of to successfully pursue benefits.
“We’re going to come together as a team, and if you’ve got a leg injury, problems with your eyesight, PTSD, any service-connected disability, or if you want to change your status, we’ll fill out the right paperwork to do it,” he said.
Harris acknowledged that it’s a tough road and often a long wait to receive those benefits, but he emphasized that applying correctly in the first place, with the assistance of someone like him who knows the ins and outs of the complicated medical code, is essential.
“You can’t just give up,” he said.
Among the benefits that often go unclaimed, he said, are military burial benefits, usually amounting to around $2,000. He said widow’s benefits also often go unclaimed and can be retroactive once approved. Many people who served only a short time are not aware that they can collect a pension, but they must apply, he said.
Johnny Marlow, a 42-year military veteran of multiple wars and a Carroll County sheriff’s deputy, said he is being checked out for possible medical benefits and the process has required him to go to six different QTC’s or private contract medical facilities to get diagnosed.
“These benefits are yours,” he said. “You deserve it. But you have to know the system.”
Whether because of lack of information or because of a previous failed application, many veterans present expressed frustration over their interactions with the VA. Jeff Lusk of Carrollton, who served in the Air Force as a young man and then retired from the Army National Guard in Mississippi, said he got some benefits but not all that he needed. He is trying to get a hip replacement through the VA and said it’s been a struggle chasing those benefits through the massive government system.
Shute said he will continue to organize these meetings and hoped veterans from surrounding counties will attend.
“I know veterans living in poverty and not getting what they need,” he said, “and that’s just wrong.”
Larry Harris and the Veterans Outreach Office at Delta State University can be reached at (662) 378-7772.
•Contact Kathryn Eastburn at 581-7235 or keastburn@gwcommonwealth.com.
