To one point six billion dollars plus after two o'clock today, My early voting
continues with your balloting, but until then. Over the years, I've done
some work with the Claremont County Veterans' Service Commission and also with Butler County,
and each time I did it, I noticed there were many Hamley County veterans
that were going to Claremont County, in Butler County and Warren County in order
to get services, which generally included transportation. How do you get through the
morass the myriad of difficulties with the VA referral for a doctor's appointment, etc.
And each of the organization has told me separately something's wrong in Hamlety County
with a Veteran Service Commission, and so not much came of it. I
put it in the back, so well down the road, we'll see what
happens. And it's a great thing that Craig McKee of Channel nine has done
an ITEAM type investigation of the Hamley County Veterans Service Commission and specifically the executive
director, guy by the name of It appears that all the public moneys through
real estate. I think it's point five mills that are paid into this organization
and if the money's not used, it just goes to the general fund and
get stuck in with a bunch of other stuff. And so, Craig McKee
of Channel nine, We're nine stands for news. You're joining us now,
and Craig McKee, welcome to the Bill Cunningham Show. And can you tell
the American people in general what caused your ITEAM investigation of the Veteran Service Commission
here in Hamilton County. Well, Bill, it's a pleasure to be on
with you today to talk a little bit more about this. Ultimately, you
know, we need to be giving our veterans a hand up. And that's
where this all starts. A number of complaints veteran who said that he went
there many years ago, tried to get assistance and was pretty much blown off
because he didn't have an appointment. That turned me then to of course,
the world of social media and the internet, and I started I just put
a fishhook out there basically to say, hey, any other veterans had any
issues with any VSO in the Southwest Ohio area. And immediately some of the
initial responses were don't go to Hamilton County. Go to Butler County, go
to Claremont County, go to Warren County. You're not going to get help
in Hamilton County. I never have had to use I'm an Air Force veteran.
I've never had to use the services through the Hamilton County Veterans Service Commission
or the VSO. Even I've gone through the Cincinnati VA Medical Center and gone
through that process, but I've never had to use this office. But it
was clear that there was some concerns for veterans, so I immediately began reaching
out. And when I reached out, the initial call to the office to
speak to the executive director, William Betcher, I basically received a return phone
call from the administrative assistant there, who told me that he told her that
he didn't have time to sit down and referred me to their website. And
if you look at their website, their website actually had outdated information on it
on when their next meetings were going to take place, so the website didn't
have a lot of information. There are places to click, you know,
to try to apply for financial assistance and things like that, but that was
not the best answer I was looking for, clearly, because I wanted to
do a sit down conversation and talk about the services they offer veterans, and
they wouldn't do it. And to go back a little bit, as I
understand it, correct me if I'm wrong that point five mills in real estate
taxes are paid by all property owners. And many many decades ago, the
lawmakers in Columbus and all eighty eight counties created the Veteran Service Commission with Veteran
services organizations and the money goes into the pot point. It's not very much,
but it adds up in Hamleton County to tens of millions of dollars.
And I think the executive director, William Betcher, is paid north of one
hundred thousand dollars to administer this. And I've heard for years something's wrong in
Hambleton Counties. So let's get into the numbers you have in your story.
Give me the numbers of veterans serve compared to the other counties that surround Hamilton.
All right, So Hamilton County serves right now, according to their data
from twenty twenty to forty one, one hundred ninety nine veterans. It's more
than double what Butler County serves at twenty thousand, three hundred and forty four
and Warren County follows up at twelve one hundred and eighty one. Now mister
Bencher receives one hundred and twenty three thousand, eight hundred ninety one dollars for
his salary. And they could have requested we referenced the point five mills.
They are allowed to request up to seven million dollars in change, so seven
point zero eighty four and change they could have requested. Now they did request
one point three almost one point four million to then only spend nine hundred and
thirty thousand dollars. In comparison, when you look at say Butler County,
a Butler County, you know, comes in second with a number of veterans
that they're serving. And while they too sent money back to the general fund
of two point five million dollars, they were allocated four point four million dollars
in change. Obviously, you know, property values differ from county to k
and different counties spend different percentages. But Hamilton County said to the bottom of
how much they spend of what they're allotted by the point five mills at eighteen
percent of the funding and they spent, which was kind of astonishing. And
again every county is different. You know, Hamilton County does have a metro
bus service and other rural areas won't have those types of services. But you
know, when you look at Butler and Claremont County, they have transportation systems
set up where they can get veterans from door to door, they can pick
them up at their home, take them to critical medical appointments, and get
them back home. Whereas Hamilton County relies on the metro bus system and they
spent five hundred and thirty eight dollars on their own reporting for those services in
twenty twenty two, Whereas you have Butler and Warren County. Warren County spent
over a million dollars on transportation and Butler County spent over a quarter of a
million for transportation for veterans according to their reports. So the forty one thousand
veterans in Hamilton County, by the taxpayers, should have available to them up
is seven million dollars a year out of the Veteran Service Commission slash Veteran Services
Organization, and they Hamilton County in twenty twenty two spent nine hundred thousand,
which is a pittance compared to the other counties. Now, as far as
your services, can you tell the American people, Craig McKee of Channel nine,
what are specifically the services that we taxpayers want to provide the veterans?
What kind of services give me two or three or four things we should be
providing. If we had a competent Veteran Services Commission in Hamilton County, what
are the services? Well, the interesting thing here, Bill is that the
law says that they have to provide services for processing paperwork, applying for benefits,
transportation and other things. But there's no guidance. Each VSO or VSSE
and every single county can operate how they choose, So there's not a set
template by the state that says you need to provide XYZ. When it comes
to transportation, they leave it up to the Veterans Service Commission to decide and
then ultimately with the Executive Director to decide what is best for veterans. Now,
since this story ran on Monday, I can tell you that I have
had my inbox flooded with veterans and my voicemail flooded with veterans who had years
and years and years of frustration tied to the VSC in Hamilton County. And
the problem is that they got so frustrated that they actually went to then Butler
or Warren or Claremont County. And I've had VFW commanders reach out to me
on email saying that they send their veterans to other locations because they know the
problem. The issue is there are no official complaints on file when you do
a public records request, there isn't a laundry list of public at least according
to the records that they've kept. There are no official complaints about the process
because veterans get frustrated with the process and then they go elsewhere instead of filing
an official complaint. That's the quagmire right now for so many looking at this
that there's an entity in their county. The Hamilton County commissioners are looking at
this now. Hamilton County Commissioners approve the budget in the sense that the commission
the VSC submits their budget of what they plan to request, they submit it
to Hamilton County, and Hamilton County basically rubber stamps it, so to speak.
Hamilton County Commissioners have no fingers in the game plan of what VSC is
executing in their county. So right now Hamilton County Commissioners are trying to figure
out how can we help veterans more with the services, and they've asked that
the executive director himself, William Bill Betcher, comes in or representative of the
VSC to the commission meeting today. And I've been told just a little while
ago that they do not plan to attend this one PM meeting the Hamilton County
Commissioner. When I did some work with Claremont County Veteran Services Organization, what
they did was if if there was a veteran having mental health problems immediately there's
forty forty or fifty veterans every day that kill themselves, that they would have
an emergency meeting with other veterans. Some other veteran may be down on his
luck and need money to pay the rent for two months, and so he
would make an application in Claremont County that veteran, and there's a board and
Clairemont County would say, is this legit? We have to know this guy.
Someone might have a car payment due that he can't make, and the
group would get together and say, you know what, we got to help
Tony Bender. He's served in Vietnam, he's down, he is seventy eight
years old, and let's make a car payment. But we got to work
with this guy to make sure he's up on his own. Clairemont County and
Butler County and Warren County, I've worked with them, do fabulous work with
veterans and helping They do events out there where they have a bake sale,
they raise the election. It's a very active organization. And every time I
would say what about Cincinnati Hamilton County, and they just their eyes would roll.
And it comes down the executive director, William Betcher, is getting paid
one hundred and twenty three thousand dollars a year to serve the needs of veterans.
And either the guy doesn't care or he borders on in confidence because he's
not getting the job done. And the fact that at one o'clock today,
in about forty five minutes, your sources tell you that haven't been requested to
appear before the Commission, that Betcher and his band is not going to show
up. That is correct, That is correct, And you know, I
do want to be you know clear here that what they're doing is not technically
illegal their operation correct. It's an optics issue. If other counties have you
know, lower they don't have seven million dollars to spend. However, they
are running all of these other programs to help veterans and have more staff members
in their office to process claims. You know, it's an optics issue.
And all we want to know. All I want to know on behalf of
the taxpayers and veterans in Hamilton County is what are they doing and why do
they think what they have set up is the best game plan to help veterans
and to give veterans a hand up that they deserve. That's the essence of
it. And maybe William Betcher's the best thing since slice bread. Who knows,
But everyone you talk to around the Try States say, boy, don't
go to Hamlet And County if you're a veteran because and you have something in
your story about a veteran showed up at the office I think and spoke to
a woman there and the veteran tried to help getting through the VA morass and
benefits kind of describe what happened with that with that veteran. Yeah, as
Ernest Coleman went there again. He didn't have an appointment. He showed up
out of the blue, unclear of even how to navigate the process. So,
like so many veterans when we get out of the service, especially,
it's a little bit better now, but when I got out of the service
in two thousand, it was pretty much there's the door, see you later.
So the guidance the veterans today receive is better than it used to be,
But for so many veterans, you know, trying to navigate the process
on how you get benefits and how do you apply and what boxes do I
need to check on this form? And how do I submit the form?
Well, I mean he went to the office he the according to him,
the receptionist was very rude, did not provide any information, hammered him about
not having an appointment and just coming in. And then when he asked for
a supervisor, as he explained, and another older gentleman came in from the
back, and he says, pretty much gave him the same run around,
and then he was like, that's that's it. I'm going elsewhere. And
he actually went up to Dayton to get some information instead, And you know,
he's not alone. There are so many veterans that go through this process.
In fact, Congressman Winstrip who I've spoken with on many veterans issues,
he even had his own, you know issues when filing claims and going through
his process, and he's a representative. So this goes across the board that
that you know, it's not a simple task. And while the government is
has tried to streamline this process for veterans and it is better today than it
used to be, it's still a process. And if you are unsure how
to navigate that process, we need people in offices. And it's nothing against
the Veteran Service officers who are doing the work doing the work in Hamilton County.
The men and women in the offices there are that are filing the claims,
that are doing what they're supposed to do. And so many of these
vsos across the Southwest region and even across the state, they are doing great
things to process claims because I see the numbers of claims that they have all
processed. But that said, clearly, Hamilton County appears from the outside,
you know, when you compare them to other operations, they just aren't doing
necessarily what they could be doing, there's so much more money left on the
table that they could be using. And just to let your viewers not because
I know you have a broad range of viewers that listen online as well.
We actually mind the data for five years. That's where the third over thirty
one million dollars comes from. The it's unspent over the five year mark.
Hamilton County VSC did not request They left thirty one million dollars on the table,
so to speak, did not request that for any services tied to veterans.
And again many counties do return money. But we have put in this
story online at WCPO dot com slash home front. In this story is a
graph for every single county in the state of Ohio. You can go click
on your county and it'll tell you how many veterans are there, how much
money they spent, how much money they didn't spend, and how much went
back to general funds and other data as well. So I encourage your viewers
that are in other counties to definitely go check out and see what their own
county is doing, and if they have any concerns, certainly reach out to
me. And lastly, Craig McKee, I would say that when the money
is not spent or not requested, it goes into the general fund, which
is hundreds of millions of dollars, and a set of we taxpayers who put
zero point five mills, which is a very small amount each into the end
of the pot to help veterans, that simply has sucked into the whole system.
And there needs to be a refe of the Veteran Service Commission. And
lastly, I would say that at this point it appears from your story Hamany
County commissioners requested somebody coming at one o'clock. But they're a separate organization.
They're not part of the Haminy County Commission. In other words, they're just
by themselves out there, and like Alisha raised an each three house, they're
not in charge. They can hey, they can request it, maybe the
county prosecutor. There's nothing criminal here we're talking about, I don't think correct.
And so it's like one of these government entities is floating around exactly.
And I've reached out to the Ohio Department of Veteran Services as well with additional
public records requests. Somebody at the tipster on the inside has told me that
these vsos are not even audited. There's no kind of checks and balance.
I've obviously reached out to the state to verify that information and to see if
there are audits taking place, give me copies of them, let me know
what you are keeping an eye on. And there's certification questions as well that
have popped up, and whether or not certifications that are required, whether or
not they're in place. So we are continuing to ask the questions and push
for answers to make sure that our veterans again are getting the hand up that
they deserve in our community. Too many vets slip through the cracks, and
we can't let that happen. Well after the election, there's so much going
on, which youry now on Tuesday, and of course Mike Dwine, I
got him coming on, I got Frankle Rose coming on. He's a veteran.
After the election, state government's got to put some teeth, some audit.
Something's got I'm sure Mike DeWine will do it, Frankle Rose will do
it. Bill Sites will do it somehow. Because of your investigation, this
needs to rise up to a higher level where since it's public money being spent,
we have to have audits. We have to know what's going on.
At this point, they're on their own doing their best. But after the
election, let's work together with political contacts or whatever, change the law so
that veterans the forty one thousand in Hamlin A County are treated as they should
be. Craig McKee, great work, and thank you for coming on the
Bill Cunningham Show. And let's touch base a week or two after the election.
That sounds great, Bill, Thanks for having me. All right,
God bless you. Let's continue with more zero point five mills. I don't
know what that is. It's about. Each taxpayer is paying about one hundred
and ten dollars a year in Hamilton County for veteran services, and we have
a department here that's not functioning properly by any fair estimate, and we can't
you can't get answers. There is separate entity, so state government's got to
get involved. They created the entity, now they need to improve it.
So let's work on it together after the election when things calm down, if
they ever calmed down. Bill Cunningham News Radio seven hundred WULW Genesis Diamond's biggest
and last seat