In honor of Veterans Day and in continuation of our series regarding new laws passed by our 2021 legislature, this blog concerns new laws that our legislature enacted to help veterans here in Nevada. Our legislature was very aware of the challenges facing our men and women in uniform especially those returning to civilian life. I am proud to live in a state where our legislators are on the forefront of protecting and helping Veterans in our state.

Our lawmakers in Carson City passed several bills in 2021 session to help our Veterans, even during the pandemic they were hard at work. Many of these laws focused on creating sweeping legislation which will require the director of the Department of Veteran Services to create and maintain a program to assist veterans and service men and women in reentering civilian life. The bills passed also provide for additional services for our retired service men and women who now require adult daycare facilities. These bills provide much needed benefits for our men and women in uniform to help them advance in their careers and aspirations when being honorably discharged from military service. Having grown up in a military family and seeing the struggles firsthand, I know that these new programs providing educational benefits and other services will greatly help our returning service men and women succeed in rejoining civilian life.

Our legislature was focused and stepped up to address the issues facing our veterans  head. The programs the approved will  protect and expand their opportunities. These laws are indicative of the progressive and democratic nature of our state. The following is  a summary of the new laws enacted to help our returning service women and men that were passed by our Nevada legislature during the 2021 session.

Veterans

Assembly Bill 22: Instructs the Nevada Department of Veterans Services to develop a transition assistance program to help veterans reintegrate into civilian life. Assembly Bill 22 is actually a new requirement for  the Nevada Department of Veteran Services to develop this type of assistance program to help veterans re-integrate into civilian life. This is a sweeping new program to be implemented by the Department of Veteran Services. It was shocking to me that such a program did not already exist to help our military men and women transition from military life back into the civilian world. But unfortunately,  there was not such a program like this in place in place in the past to help those returning from serving our county

Military personnel often have military housing as well as obviously their profession in place before leaving the military. Reentry into civilian life can be challenging in locating housing, childcare, medical care, employment and learning new career skills. Specifically, the bill requires that “the director shall establish and maintain a program to assist veterans and servicemen and service women in transitioning to life as civilians. The program must be designed to complement any similar programs of the federal government including without limitation those programs established pursuant to 10 US C section 1144.”  The legislature goes on to state that the program should include resources including employment and vocational training, starting or maintaining a small business, programs and services related to healthcare and mental health and housing. The bill specifically states that service man and service women will include members of the Armed Forces of the United States, national guard or reserve national guard forces as well Coast guard and other officers of the United States. I hope that this bill which has been codified at NRS section 417 provides greatly needed services to our reentering men and women in uniform.

https://legiscan.com/NV/drafts/AB22/2021

Effective May 26, 2021.

Assembly Bill 76: Authorizes the Department of Veterans Services to establish and operate programs to provide adult day health care services to veterans using federal funds. This bill  authorizes the Department of veteran services to establish and operate programs that will provide additional services for veterans residing in state homes as well. Such services may include adult daycare and therapeutic outpatient programs including medical services rehabilitation therapeutic activities, socialization and nutrition. This bill is only available to the extent that federal funding is available to allow the director to establish and operate programs to provide adult daycare facilities for veterans. The bill also eliminated older provisions that required that  these facilities could only be in certain locations. I hope that this program will be funded to provide comfort and care to our older and injured Veterans.

https://www.leg.state.nv.us/App/NELIS/REL/81st2021/Bill/7329/Text

Effective May 26, 2021.

Assembly Bill 102: Expands free access to state parks for veterans with any disability. This expands free access to our nations state park for veterans with any disability which is still far too limited in my opinion. I personally think that access to our state parks should be free for any military serviceman and women and retired military service personnel however this bill is limited to veterans with disabilities. In fact, this bill changes very little. The prior bill required free entry into Nevada state parks for veterans with a 10% disability or more and this bill removes the 10% to allow a veteran with any disability to have free entry. Allowing all veterans into our state park without a fee  is the least our state could do in recognition of their service. This is an area that perhaps change in the next legislative session. If you feel it should be changed, locate your state representative online and send them an email to voice your opinion regarding free entry into Nevada State Parks for all of our retired and active-duty service personnel. If you have been reading this series, you will know that many of the laws passed are extremely specific and were clearing brought to the attention of our legislature by special interest groups or a result of public discontent with the status quo.

https://www.leg.state.nv.us/App/NELIS/REL/81st2021/Bill/7403/Text

Various effective dates through July 1, 2021.

Assembly Bill 165: Makes tuition permanently free for honorably discharged veterans at all Nevada state colleges and universities. Assembly Bill 165  is an amazing bill for our veterans that makes tuition permanently free for all honorably discharged veterans at all Nevada state colleges and universities. This is another important benefit allocated by our state legislature to provide our veterans with free college tuition  at all Nevada state colleges and universities for all honorably discharged servicemen and women in Nevada will be free. Nevada joins a list of select states including Alabama, Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois,  Indiana,  Maryland and Massachusetts to offer free tuition to Veterans.

https://www.leg.state.nv.us/App/NELIS/REL/81st2021/Bill/7512/Text

Effective July 1, 2021.

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