LISA YOUNG: Tell me a little bit about yourself and your military service.
LINDA REEVES: I joined the Army in 1991. I spent twenty five and a half years in the Army. I retired in 2016 as a Sergeant First Class. My duties were in 82ndAirborne Division, third Infantry Division, 1st and 10th Special Forces and 2nd Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment. I was also a drill sergeant in Fort Leonard Wood. I was a jumpmaster instructor for 10th Special Forces Group, and I have ninety five static line jumps. I deployed to Iraq twice and Afghanistan once.
YOUNG: Tell me why you became a veteran services officer.
REEVES: So when I first retired, I decided to go to college, and I didn't think I was going to work again. I had my retirement, so I'm like, oh, I'm happy. And then for work study, I became the Veterans Service Officer there. I worked in their office helping veterans use their GI Bill, and I really found that I enjoyed working with veterans since I worked with veterans for twenty five years, and then county Veterans Service Office position opened up and I'm like, oh, I get to meet more veterans, older veterans, and I like to talk, and most veterans love to talk. And I really found that I knew I was going to enjoy this job and helping other veterans apply for their benefits and their service connected disability benefits.
YOUNG: And it's a great way for them to talk about their service with someone who understands what's going on. How many years have you been in the role in Delta County?
REEVES: I started July of 2020 and I my last day was October 31st of this year.
YOUNG: Tell me a little bit about your role here at Delta County and the services provided for vets.
REEVES: So as a County Veteran Service officer, we provide service connected disability claim help. We whether it's a new claim or if we're helping them increase any current disabilities. We also help them with education benefits. We also help with appeals. If VA has decided a decision on their claim that they submitted and they disagree with what VA has decided, we can help them with appealing those decisions. We also help with in-home care and assisted living benefits. We help them apply for those benefits, and then surviving spouse benefits will help a surviving spouse apply for survivor pension or dependent indemnity compensation and then we also help them with burial benefits.
YOUNG: So you said that your last day here was October 31st, as far as Delta County. You're moving on up, as they say. Tell me about your new role.
REEVES: My new role started on Monday. I am now the Region 3 Lead VSO, and in that position, I will be helping other county veterans service officers. If they have any questions about a claim, they'll be able to contact me and I can walk them through some of the steps. We can do some of the research together. I will also continue helping veterans. They will still be able to see me if Delta County VSO is on leave or if another county has gone, has retired, I'll be able to help them help their veterans so that there's no loss of continuity between the counties and the veterans.
YOUNG: You sound really excited about it. It sounds like a wonderful opportunity for you. What are you most looking forward to in that role?
REEVES: Just still continuing to help veterans and making sure that our veterans in Colorado are still being helped with their service connected claims or anything like that.
YOUNG: And speaking of services to our veterans, the current government shutdown. Tell us a little bit about how that is affecting the veterans in our state. (NOTE: This interview was conducted during the federal government shutdown.)
REEVES: I know for me and my dad, we had dental appointments that was scheduled and our dental appointments were canceled because they just didn't have the manpower at this moment. So they've had to cancel them and reschedule them. And my my appointment was canceled. I had one in October and it was cancelled and rescheduled for April.
Also, as a county veteran service officer, for any new VSO if they're not accredited yet, they're not going to be able to get accredited right away and without being credited. Those county veterans service officers are not able to see veterans helping them with their claims.
YOUNG: So it is impacting veterans and others. You know, it is difficult to go through the process with VA, with hospital and and different things. And so this is going to create quite a bit of a backlog. I spoke with the VSO up in Montrose County. He told me he was absolutely swamped with trying to to get things done. Of course, you've already transitioned out of the VSO here in Delta County. Is there a replacement for you?
REEVES: We are going through interviews and that'll start on the twenty first of November. We have, as of right now, thirteen applicants that applied for the position. And if we get more, we'll still continue to look at those applications. And with and that's something else I should mention. Like if Montrose County is swamped, the lead VSO's will be able to help them. If they've got too many claims on their desks, we'll be able to take some of those and try to help them alleviate some of their workload and get them caught up.
YOUNG: Your military background is really fascinating to me. The first time I spoke with you and you told me, I just kept thinking about Wonder Woman. You know, I was like, this is an amazing military career. But going from that into a lot more administrative paperwork, which do you like better, the action or the paperwork?
REEVES: I like the part about helping veterans, and if that means doing paperwork, that is because if you look at the forms, if a elderly veteran looks at the forms, they get really confusing and one form can be fifteen pages long, and they'll look at the form and they get frustrated and they put it down and they never apply for their benefits. And that's what county VSO's are for, is to be able to help them navigate through doing the forms. One claim could have five five different forms to submit with their claim.
YOUNG: Linda, is there anything else that veterans should know about?
REEVES: I would like to mention that if there's any counties that do not have a current county VSO, those veterans in those counties can go to other counties and their VSO can do any kind of claim that they would like to do. They also have the ability to go to VFW or the American Legion. So no matter what's going on in their county, they'll still be able to get services throughout all of Colorado.
YOUNG: I have to say, it's super important for those who have some difficulty with working on computers and all of the forms, as you mentioned before, to go to someone who can walk them through that. So it's a tremendous service that you provide. And again, thank you.
REEVES: Thank you.
