A set of bills in both the Texas House and Senate are there to ensure that the state’s veterans are able to use military training to obtain jobs.
Sen. Leticia Van de Putte authored the bill that ensures training and certifications obtained by veterans and their spouses while serving in the military immediately transfer with them into civilian life.
"Those certifications are in Department of Defense acronyms and don’t translate well. And it makes it very difficult for veterans and their current spouses of active duty military when they change and come into a state to be licensed and registered for a occupation or profession they already have credentials for," Van de Putte said.
Van de Putte also said her bill allows more veterans to return to work by taking this training and translating it into a state license. Another bill prompts state agencies to hire veterans by requiring them to interview a certain number of veterans for open jobs.
"We know that our unemployment for those who have protected us and have served us in the military is way too high," she said. "The state needs to take a good look at itself and some agencies are doing well and some state agencies are doing miserably in hiring todays veterans."
According to the Texas Workforce Commission, just under 5 percent of state employees are military veterans; currently 1.6 million veterans reside in Texas. Senate bill 162 was left pending in the Senate’s Veterans Affairs Committee.
