Veterans from the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe joined a #NoDAPL rally in North Dakota in August 2016. Photo by Cheyenne River Veterans Association
VA Black Hills Health Care Closes Eagle Butte Clinic
By Jim Kent
Lakota Country Times Correspondent
lakotacountrytimes.com Fort Meade, S.D. - The VA Black Hills Health Care System has announced that a “change in service” is planned for veterans in Eagle Butte, Isabel and Faith. That change consists of the closing of the healthcare clinic serving veterans in those areas. As a result, the 290 mile roundtrip drive from Eagle Butte to the Black Hills VA health care facility in Sturgis may be a journey some Native American veterans will be forced to take once health care services supported by the Veterans Administration on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation and nearby areas come to an end on October 1. C.B. Alexander is associate operations director for the VA Black Hills Health Care System. “VA Black Hills Health Care System has decided not to exercise any option years and received no bids for a contract for the … community based outpatient clinic in Northwestern South Dakota,” Alexander explained. “We had put out a solicitation for bids for a new contract. We did not receive any bidders. That solicitation closed on August 25. And so to give out veterans as much notice as possible we announced last week that we would not have a clinic up there.” Alexander noted that the former contractor in the affected area did offer to operate 3 clinics – one in Faith, one in Isabel and one in eagle Butte as opposed to the one that had formerly served those locations. “But we’ve always advertised just for one Community Based Outpatient Clinic in that area,” she said. Veterans in the affected areas can obtain care locally through the Veterans Choice Program, Alexander added. That program pays for approved health care services to any veteran who needs to travel more than 40 miles to a VA health care facility. But Cheyenne River Sioux Veterans Services Officer Robert Dunsmore isn’t happy. “Nobody bid on these contracts,” Dunsmore observed. “So we’re asking questions why they didn’t bid on it. Veterans Choice…that don’t work anyway. You call that 800 number you’ll be on hold for at least a half-hour before you get anybody. And then when you do make an appointment there’s…there’s no close providers.” As a result Dunsmore has sent veterans as far as Omaha, Minneapolis and Denver for health care. Additional problems exist once an alternative provider is finally located, Dunmore added, no matter where they are. “Then we have to contact the VA to make sure they’re going to pay the bill,” he commented. “I’ve got a situation right now we’re a veteran has been told he has to go see a specialist in Aberdeen while he’s still getting all these bills that are going delinquent as a result of the VA not paying them. And that was a referral through the IHS and the VA.”
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C.B. Alexander insists the Veterans Choice program is working. “When Choice was first instituted there was a little bit of a rough start all the way around,” she recalled. “But I can tell you that we worked diligently over time to correct any problems our veterans were experiencing.” The Veterans Choice Program was initiated in 2015 as “a new, temporary benefit that allows eligible Veterans to receive health care in their communities rather than waiting for a VA appointment or traveling to a VA facility. However, Dunsmore’s experience is that one year down the road he’s still seeing problems that Alexander claimed do not exist. Although a Memorandum of Understanding has been signed with the local Indian Health Services facility Lakota veterans don’t see that as a viable option. The federal agency has been plagued with issues – especially across the state – in recent months and Dunsmore noted that many veterans feel they’ve already received poor service there. Cheyenne River Sioux tribal leaders are calling for a meeting with the VA Black Hills Health Care System’s director to address their concerns. (Jim Kent is a freelance writer and radio producer who lives in Hot Springs. He is a contributing columnist to the Lakota Country Times and former editor of The New Lakota Times. He can be heard on South Dakota Public Radio, National Public Radio and National Native News Radio. Jim can be reached at kentvfte@gwtc.net) Find the award-winning Lakota Country Times on the Internet, Facebook and Twitter and download the new Lakota Country Times app today.
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