RECOVER Act. First, there’s the sweetheart deal: few-strings-attached $1.5 million grants ($60 million in total over its initial three-year pilot period), with multiple awards per recipient allowed. Grantees could pocket taxpayer dollars without increasing the number of veterans served at all. These monies come on top of insurance and VA reimbursements that facilities already receive for care rendered. Dr. Harold Kudler, a former VA mental health senior executive, noted: “Given the way the RECOVER Act is currently written, a single entity with multiple sites of care could apply for several or even all of the available grant slots.”

Next, the act eradicates criteria to determine private-sector eligibility—the thrust of Cohen’s earlier unsuccessful congressional offensive. Currently, veterans’ health care is anchored on a principle enshrined in the VA MISSION Act: The VA serves as authorizer and overseer of veterans services. When the VA can’t provide quick or convenient care, veterans qualify for health care through the Veterans Community Care Program (VCCP), the external provider network. The RECOVER Act completely circumvents this approach, allowing veterans to bypass the VA altogether for unlimited VA-subsidized mental health care from grant entities. This creates a parallel care system operating outside of, and disjointed from, both the VA and VCCP. Even the sharing of health records, central to care coordination, would be eliminated.

Equally troubling, the RECOVER Act establishes grossly inadequate quality and training standards. While the legislation claims to ensure “culturally competent, evidence-based care,” grantees face no requirement that any provider be trained in evidence-based practices. Only one staff member must receive training in military cultural competency. Suicide prevention training isn’t required either—a glaring omission given that the bill explicitly prioritizes awarding grants in areas with high numbers of at-risk veterans. In sharp contrast, VA clinicians have specialized expertise in military-specific conditions like PTSD and traumatic brain injury, and complete mandatory suicide prevention training annually.

Grant recipients have no obligation to obtain accreditation from the Joint Commission or the Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities—standards that VA facilities must meet. There’s also no mandate for semiannual peer review, evaluations that are integral to quality assurance of the VA’s mental health care. There are no standards for timeliness of service, meaning grantees’ wait times could exceed the VA’s or VCCP’s. Symptom improvement is not reported.