South Dakota’s Department of Veterans Affairs is now three years old, but is just getting started with its initiatives. Secretary Larry Zimmerman decided the department should be the voice of South Dakota’s veterans to help them navigate local, state, and federal benefits. Governor Dennis Daugaard named January 14, 2014 Operation RAV Day to kick off the department’s outreach.
Operation Reaching All Veterans is designed to help all veterans utilize the benefits and services they might not be aware of, whether they served in World War II or were recently deployed to Operation Enduring Freedom. Governor Daugaard says rather than waiting for veterans to ask for help, Secretary Larry Zimmerman has a different approach.
“Historically, the county officers and the state employees who work for the State Department of Veterans Affairs are responsive—they wait for veterans to come to them. Larry said we should go to the veterans, we should have special events that attract their attention and get them to come, or we should try and contact them directly and say, ‘Hey, come in and let’s talk. There are lots of opportunities for us to help you.’ Especially as we have so many new veterans,” Daugaard says.
Daugaard says this initiative has the support of the federal veteran’s administration. Lieutenant Governor Matt Michels says despite holding more than 150 outreach events across the state this year, it’s not costing the state additional funds.
“We have a lot of organizations, veterans organizations, whether they’re on-campus organizations or other people, so we don’t have a budget for this, we actually have it built into, I would say, our institutional mission of the Department of Veterans Affairs,” Michels says.
Michels says the department’s goal is to reach all 75,000 veterans, and he’ll know that mission’s accomplished when they contact him. Michels actively served more than four years in the Navy.