OKLAHOMA CITY – Legislation that would dramatically change how appointments are made to the nine-member Oklahoma Veterans Commission sailed through a House committee last Tuesday.
House Bill 1080 would reduce the number of commission appointments made by the governor to two and, instead, give legislative leaders, the state labor commissioner, attorney general and lieutenant governor appointments to the board.
Under state law, the governor’s office is currently allowed to appoint all nine members of the commission, provided those appointments include eight honorably discharged veterans. Three of those members must come from the Vietnam conflict, and one shall be from the Persian Gulf wars.
The law also requires that members of the commission be based on recommendations from the American Legion, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Disabled American Veterans, the Paralyzed Veterans of America, the Military Order of the Purple Heart and the National Guard Association of Oklahoma. Each group, the law said, is required to submit a list of five persons qualified to serve as members of the commission to the governor, who chooses a member from the list.
The bill, authored by state Rep. Jay Steagall, R-Yukon, cleared the Government Modernization and Technology committee on a 9-0 vote.
Steagall said the bill was needed because the Oklahoma Department of Veterans Affairs was, by design, supposed to be a non-direct reporting agency.
“It’s very difficult to accomplish that mandate in current statute when there’s one individual who has all nine appointments,” he said. “That’s why we see the appointments among the several different members you see listed.”
Steagall’s bill would give the governor’s office two appointments, the speaker of the House of Representative two appointments and the Senate Pro Tempore two appointments. The remaining three appointments would be divided among the labor commission, the attorney general and the lieutenant governor’s offices.
In addition to changes in who names members of the commission, the bill would also force the terms of the current members of the commission to end when the law goes into effect.
Steagall’s bill follows several months of controversy involving the ODVA. Last year, Gov. Kevin Stitt removed five members of the nine-member board, replacing four of the five vacant seats.
Gary Miles, one of the five who was removed, said the five were told to fire ODVA Executive Director Joel Kintsel. After the members balked at Kintsel’s firing, they were removed, Miles said.
“They said you fire him (Kintsel) or we’ll fire you,” Miles said. “We didn’t, and we were gone.”
Kintsel has refused to recognize the new board’s authority. He said the new members were not lawfully appointed.
Kintsel ran against Stitt for the Republican nomination for governor.
Miles was one of about a dozen veterans who attended the hearing. He praised Stegall’s bill, saying it was needed to protect the ODVA’s mission.
“It’s a very, very good bill,” he said. “Right now, there are no checks and balances and no protection.”
Another veteran, Brian Ford, a member of the Edmond VFW 4839, said he too, supported the measure.
“I think it’s great,” he said. “I think we need to make sure the proper voice is in the proper place for the organization.”
Just a day after the committee vote, Attorney General Gentner Drummond issued a media statement saying the current appointments to the commission were not allowed by law.
“Governor Stitt has not followed the lawfully ascribed process, claiming the veterans groups were ineligible to submit nominees because they had not complied with an audit requirement,” Drummond’s statement said. “This entire episode has been nothing short of a spectacle. It is unfortunate that the governor has not followed the proper appointment process, and it is equally unfortunate that the executive director of the state Department of Veterans Affairs is acting irresponsibly and not in the best interests of veterans. It is wholly unacceptable that Oklahoma’s honorable veterans have been left without a functional commission.”
Drummond said state statutes show an audit of the board is only required every three years, upon or in anticipation of the expiration of a commissioner’s term. If a member is removed in a year prior to the statutory expiration of his or her term – as has been the case here – then the nominee must be selected from lists provided by the affected veterans organizations.
Drummond said state law prevents sitting commission members from being immediately removed because their successors were not properly appointed – nor have they been confirmed.
“As a combat veteran, I am deeply troubled that the proposed commission appointments have been made contrary to law,” the attorney general’s statement said. “However, I am encouraged that our state Legislature appears poised to resolve this matter. As such, I believe it is prudent to resist litigation by this office, let the legislative process run its course and ultimately ensure the integrity of the Veterans Commission.”
The controversy surrounding the ODVA isn’t new.
In 2011, after a series of stories were published about multiple cases of abuse, neglect and death and several of the state’s veterans’ centers, then-Gov. Mary Fallin ousted eight members of the Veterans Commission and forced Martha Spear, the ODVA’s executive director at the time, to retire.
Fallin designated Gen. Rita Aragon, her secretary of veterans affairs, as the lead in an effort to right the beleaguered agency. Since then, state veterans have seen better access to long-term care and VA benefits, despite infighting between members of the commission and other state leaders.
Miles, the former commissioner, said he remained concern about the veterans department.
“It’s terrible,” he said. “The direction the ODVA is going is toward privatization, and that would be a disaster.”
Lawmakers have until May 26 to act on the bill.