Tag: House Bill 132 (2023)

House votes to increase state efforts against veteran suicide

      The House has voted to improve the state’s efforts to prevent suicide among its veteran population. 

Representative Dave Griffith (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Representatives voted 156-0 for House Bill 132, which directs the Missouri Veterans Commission to work with the Department of Mental Health to come up with recommendations on how Missouri can prevent veteran suicide.  It would require the Commission to report annually, beginning June 30, 2024, on new recommendations and on the implementation and effectiveness of the state’s efforts.

      The bill is sponsored by Jefferson City Republican Dave Griffith, a U.S. Army Veteran who served with the 8th Special Forces Group as a Green Beret.  He has spent much of his career in the House dealing with veterans’ issues, and with ways to stem suicide not only among current and former service members but in the population in general.

“Many of you know, I’m very passionate about this.  I can tell you of friends that I’ve lost in the last month – veterans that have committed suicide.  A young man that was 27 years old, that grew up across the street from me took his own life.  This has got to stop,” said Griffith.

      Griffith speaks often of the social media campaign #22, and his personal goal of decreasing or eliminating what that number represents. 

      “#22 stands for the number of veterans that commit suicide every day … If we can start to look at programs and we can look at procedures that can be done and best practices that are being done by not only our state but throughout the entire United States, we can start making a difference in this, but we need to do more than just talk.  We need to do research.  We need to look at non-traditional methods of treating [post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injury] and veteran suicide.”

Representative Ashley Bland Manlove (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Though he and others in the legislature and state government have been talking about these issues for years and developing related programs, Griffith said Missouri has a long way to go.  Representative Ashley Bland Manlove (D-Kansas City), who has served in the Missouri National Guard, agreed. 

“For a lot of people these conversations about mental health are brand new … so a lot of people are still like, ‘When I was in the military we just had to grunt through it, and talking about your emotions made you weak,’ but what we have found out is that that’s not true.”

“I think the biggest population that we should be talking about is the one percent of American population that raises their right hand for this country,” continued Bland Manlove.  “The best way that we can thank our veterans for their dedication and work to this country is by taking care of them.”

Rogersville Republican Darin Chappell (R) has a great deal of experience with the issues faced by military members and their families, as he is a veteran of the Navy and the Army Reserves and has many service members in his family. 

      “I have long believed, and have advocated for, the philosophy:  ‘If we send them we have to mend them, and we have to bring them all the way home.’  It’s time for us to do all that we can to make sure that occurs.”

      Before casting their votes for the measure, legislators reflected about their own personal experiences.  St. Clair Republican Brad Banderman solemnly told his colleagues, “About two years ago my little sister laid down on the grave of my older brother that shot himself in 1990 and killed herself.  Anything that we can do as a legislature, as a body, as individuals, to help prevent the suicide of our veterans, I’m in full support of.”

Representative Brad Banderman (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Missouri as of 2020 had the 14th highest suicide rate in the U.S., with about 1,125 people having died by suicide in that year.  The rate among veterans is approximately 1.5 higher than in the rest of the population, and experts are telling legislators they fear that suicide rates are going to increase. 

      “I think we need to do better and I think this is a good start,” said Representative Robert Sauls (D-Independence). 

      The same bill passed out of the House last year but did not come to a final vote in the Senate. 

      Anyone in need of help for themselves or someone else for a mental health, substance abuse, or suicide crisis is encouraged to call 988.

House efforts target suicide especially among veterans

      One House member continues his push to reduce suicide in Missouri, particularly among the state’s veterans. 

Representative Dave Griffith (Photo: Tim Bommel, Missouri House Communications)

      Representative Dave Griffith (R-Jefferson City) has made veterans’ issues a priority throughout his five years in the House, and now chairs the chamber’s Veterans Committee.  Over the summer he also chaired an interim committee on Veterans’ Mental Health and Suicide. 

      Griffith said one of the most important things that committee learned is that in Missouri the 988 Suicide and Crisis Hotline is not fully funded.   

      “The recommendation we had out of the committee was that $27-million be added to the budget to enhance and to continue the 988 program.  988 is one of the most effective tools because just in the first six months that that was used, it was used over 200-thousand times.  They’re estimating that in the first year it’s going to be used over 1-million times,” said Griffith. 

      Griffith is again this year sponsoring legislation to give guidance to the Missouri Veterans Commission about how to use the data it collects on veteran suicides, as well as to require it to report annually to the legislature on that data and what it’s doing to reduce the number of those incidents. 

“Where we rank in this in the entire country is not good,” Griffith told the House Committee on Health and Mental Health Policy, saying Missouri is around fourth or fifth among the states with the most veteran suicides. 

He added that even though his proposal, which this year is House Bill 132, didn’t pass in 2022, the Commission is already doing much of what it would require.

“Their heart’s in the right place and I can tell you that they get it and they’re dealing with it.”

      Griffith said his aim is not just to increase awareness about mental health and suicide in the military and veteran communities but among the population as a whole. 

“Two and a half years ago we had a nine year old down in Eugene, Missouri that committed suicide because he was being bullied at school.  If it can happen at that age it can happen at any age.”

      This week Griffith presented HB 132 to Veterans Committee and presented the report from his interim panel to the Committee on Health and Mental Health Policy, showing that the issue is again his top priority as the 2023 session gets underway.  He spent much of both presentations speaking about the 988 hotline because of the importance of listening to those considering suicide, whether it be when they call the hotline or in other settings. 

“For someone that has suicide ideation, for them to be able to step forward and say, ‘I need some help,’ that’s one of the hardest things for them to do.  When they do they need to have someone that’s going to be able to sit there and to listen to them and hear what they’ve got to say.”

      He said one thing discussed at a recent symposium on suicide in the military community that resonated with him is a question that was put to commanders:  “Do you really know your personnel?”  He said the same could be asked of managers in the private sector.   

      “In order for us to be able to make a difference they’ve got to be able to know and be able to identify and recognize when there’s something going on in [their subordinates’] lives,” said Griffith.  “What my hope was, is we can take that same model and we can bring that into the private sector.  We’ve got companies like Scholastic and we’ve got Hitachi, we’ve got Westinghouse, large companies across the State of Missouri and each one of them have got supervisors.  If we can train those supervisors and we can get people that have got the aptitude and really the forthrightness to be able to do something like that, it’s something that I hope we can learn from our military background and military friends.”

      Griffith’s proposal passed out of the House unanimously last year but didn’t reach Governor Parson.  The Veterans Committee will likely vote on it soon.