Montana Veteran’s Home may see funding drop
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News of a proposed drop in funding or even privatization for the Montana Veteran’s Home in Columbia Falls hit Mission Valley veterans hard.
The MVH is where veterans in northwest Montana go if they need a nursing home or residential care.
Don Lilley, former commander of the Veterans of Foreign War Post 2986 in Polson, said, “Montana Veteran’s Home is a good home. They treat people like people.”
Lilley has been contacting state VFW officers and local veterans to inform them of the proposal to cut MVH’s budget. Ronan VFW Post 5652 is also planning to protest.
House Bill 2 would cut $847,000 from the MVH’s budget this year and tear a $1.4 million chunk out of its 2012 budget.
“It appears to be all about the money,” Joren Underdahl, MVH Administrator said.
While the home’s $10 million budget looks huge, Underdahl said the home generates about $7 million or a little more than two-thirds of its budget.
The remaining $3 million is appropriated from the cigarette tax.
“It’s not everybody’s taxes unless you’re buying a pack of cigarettes,” Underdahl explained.
“I guess what’s to be gained if the place were to be privatized,” Underdahl said, “ is the money would revert back to the general fund.”
Underdahl, a veteran himself, as is his father and both grandfathers, said even at the $850,000 budget cut the facility would need to cut 12 to 15 folks.
For veterans like Nate Syverson from Polson, the MVH is home. Syverson served in the United States Air Force during Korea.
Living alone before he came to MVH, Syverson was putting half-eaten cans of food back in the refrigerator and gave himself a bad case of food poisoning. That’s how he came to MVH, and he’s lived there for 10 years.
Now 80, Syverson said, “MVH is a good place to be.”
He cites the activities, such as bingo, musical groups, the library, the exercise bike, walking paths on the grounds and visits from American Legion, VFW and other service groups. The home has its own bus for trips to the doctor and shopping plus Columbia Falls has a city bus so residents can visit the downtown. Residents in Syverson’s unit, the domiciliary, are allowed to have a car, too; but Syverson quit driving after he went in the ditch last winter.
“In here, I’ve got somebody to talk to,” Syverson said, adding he’d been depressed living alone. “If you fall down, somebody will find you.”
“The food’s good, too,” Syverson noted. “They’ve revised the meal plan, and we get snacks. The coffee pot is on all night.”
“Plus you aren’t going to beat the price,” Syverson said. He pays $1,500 per month.
“What I like,” he added, “is access to doctors. I’m able to get medical treatment and get it now. I don’t have to wait six weeks.”
“MVH is five-star rated,” Eric Feaver, president of the MEA-MFT, the union representing many employees at MVH. “Third-party evaluators say the care is the best. Persons whose family and friends are cared for at MVH all state it is the best.”
As far as what will happen next, Feaver said, ”HB 2 will soon go forward to the House where it may run into plenty of Tea Party opposition or at least this is what we have been told and is one reason why HB 2 looks so ugly. Once it hits the Senate there is some expectation that state-funded programs and services will be better treated, but Dave Lewis, chair of Senate Finance and Claims, is on of the leading advocates for closing and then privatizing the Montana Veterans Home.”
