Supporting our veterans is about more than talk

As a Republican and a Democrat who serve in the state house in the great state of Maine, we spend our days on opposite sides of the aisle.

More often than not, we disagree.

However, we came together today because we believe that some things are more important than party affiliation.

Before we are Democrats, Republicans, or even Mainers — we are Americans. And as Americans, there is no more important issue than supporting our troops.

{mosads}As Catherine Rampell recently reported in the Washington Post, the workers who are actually supporting our troops are not getting the respect they deserve.

More than 400 men and women across our country make it their mission to support our troops.

Known as Soldier and Family Assistance Center specialists, they are the people who military service members or veterans turn to in crisis — they do whatever it takes to connect them, and their families, with a broad range of legal, medical, financial and psychological services.

In fiscal year 2015 alone, SFACs addressed more than 2.7 million inquiries, referral requests and outreach calls.

We are speaking out for SFACs today because their wages were recently slashed in half by the federal government.

Many SFAC specialists, and the SFAC coordinators that manage them — 80 percent of which are veterans or military family members themselves — are now being paid less than starting wages in some occupations.

Some were forced to give up a job that they describe as a calling because they could no longer afford to pay their bills. Others are hanging on, taking second jobs and facing severe hardship at home.

Still others are turning to the same services, such as food pantries, energy assistance programs and job-training programs, that they previously recommended to their clients.

These massive wage cuts were imposed because the National Guard Bureau awarded the contract overseeing the SFAC workers to a new subcontractor that changed their occupational classification and severely undercut their pay.

In Maine, SFACs are now being paid $13.88 per hour, a pay cut of almost $20,000 per year.

As a result, many SFAC positions, including four of the six that serve the state of Maine, which has the third highest percentage of veterans in the country, are now vacant — and this doesn’t count the many others who are actively looking for other employment.

This means that the men and women they so faithfully served are increasingly being left out in the cold.

One SFAC specialist helped a homeless veteran find shelter when it was 20 degrees below zero outside. Another negotiated with the insurance company when a soldier’s home was flooded.

Still others fielded calls from veterans contemplating suicide.

No matter the nature of the need, they worked hard to fill it — all while making sure that the person on the other end of the line felt listened to and cared about.

The SFAC specialists are organizing themselves across the country with the support of Good Jobs Nation, a campaign that supports federal contract workers fighting for their rights.

Now, they also have the support of the Maine legislature.

The thanks they get for going above and beyond for those we as a nation espouse to care about the most, is a paycheck that doesn’t cover their basic needs. This is simply unacceptable.

We have come together across the aisle to demand that Maj. Gen. Timothy McKeithen, Deputy Director of the U.S. Army National Guard, restore the previous pay rates for SFAC specialists and coordinators. We also are asking the members of Congress that oversee the National Guard Bureau — Republicans and Democrats alike — to do the same.  

We hope that our commitment to bipartisan action here in Maine will be replicated in Washington.

As Americans, we must rise above partisan gridlock and act now to ensure that the brave men and women who support our troops can do their jobs.

Ryan Fecteau is a Democratic member of the Maine House of Representatives and Chair of the Labor, Commerce, Research and Economic Development Committee.  Bradlee Farrin is a Republican Member of the Maine House of Representatives and Ranking Minority Member of the Veterans and Legal Affairs Committee.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.