secretary schoenhart, i was pleased to hear the va announce they planned to hire 19 mental health workers. my discouragement is how long it took for the va to pass -- in 2006 an act was passed that was a piece of legislation i introduced to encourage, authorize and insist that you hire those two professionals within the va, and now five and a half years later i'm discouraged how long it took to see that you move in that direction. i encourage you to hire those people and put them to work as rapidly as possible. part of our state is as rural as kansas, in which mental health professionals are more limited than urban and suburban states. we need to take advantage of the wide array of professional services that are available at every opportunity. and so i'm here to encourage you to -- now that you've made this announcement, let's bring it to fruition, and thank you for reaping the conclusion and getting us to this point. i want to address my questions to major jones. i have candidates with me that have organized a program with the same kind of focus and effort with what you're doing. it's so

secretary schoenhart, i was pleased to hear the va announce they planned