Interview transcript

Terry Gerton When we talk about the National Defense Authorization on the Federal Drive, we often get into the weeds of technical provisions around acquisition or force structure or policy. But your organization, the Secure Families Initiative, has been advocating for a very different type of provision, the Military Family Bill of Rights. First, tell us a little bit about SFI, and then tell us about this campaign.

Brandi Jones Absolutely, Terry. Our organization, Secure Families Initiative, it’s an organization founded by active-duty spouses and currently led by active-duty spouses. So we have a very unique lens into our everyday lives and also our community because we hear from people who are currently serving their families all over the US and all over world. And so having this vantage point and the ability for us to then advocate on behalf of our families, we’ve really been able to put together some awesome legislation points that really get to the root of the issues that we’re hearing in our community. So I’ve been very blessed to be the organizing director here at Secure Families Initiative for the past four years. And I was just really able to take a vision of meeting with families on a bi-weekly basis, specifically our families of color, all over the U.S. And the world and hearing what issues were impacting them. No matter where they were, I would say, I heard something as a throughline and that was concern for safety for the spouses and their children as we’re asked to change our permanent duty station every few years. So it really was like the foundation of hearing these stories and kind of saying, what if we developed legislation that really helped to get to the heart of the issues we’re hearing?

Terry Gerton As you’ve built this campaign, you talked about the invisible weight of service and you alluded to it there. Can you share more about what that looks like in real life? What are the protections that the families that you hear from are looking for?

Brandi Jones Yeah, it is really. I would say the weight of service is very invisible for our families, but also I would say that federal-state line that we cross when we go to live on installation is also invisible. Like there isn’t exactly a notification to our spouses and children that, you know, you’re now going to be on federal property, which has a different set of laws than on the state side of that line. And so because that line is invisible, like our service, it leads to a lot of grey area and I would say lack of protection that you might find on the state side sometimes because at the end of the day, our spouses and children, we are not federal employees. We are not active-duty men and women who serve and so we’re complete civilians behind the gates. And the things that I’ve heard from our families because of that issue is, you know, when I have an issue that comes up as a spouse, I don’t have a direct line of communication to the commander of the base. Even though that person is in charge of this installation, there’s no policy that says that they need to speak to me directly or that I can speak to them directly. And also I’ve had stories like I’ve been told that these resources were going to be available to me when I arrived on the installation or in the area. But then when I got here, there wasn’t any room at the child development center for me to have daycare or a home for me to live in. And so that leads to a lot of reliance on our neighbors, which is what is really, I would say, encouraged throughout the Department of Defense to our military families, like, use your neighbor for help. But what we’ve come to find out by talking to our families is you don’t necessarily know who your neighbor is like you do in a civilian, a state-side-of-the-line community. And that’s because when we cross onto federal property, there isn’t necessarily, like for instance, Megan’s Law, which when you’re in the town and you’re purchasing homes or renting, you get to research your area. You can see if there’s somebody who is a predator or [perpetrator of] sexual assault. And when we come onto that federal property line, we don’t have access to that information of someone who may be working on the installation or maybe someone who is a spouse of a service member, has a background in this instance that we would never know. And so how we kind of came to that conclusion about our safety and the concerns of that is by saying, we know that crime happens on installation because we have a military police department, yet unlike on our civilian state-side of that line, we don’t have access to any of that information. So, you know, when I’m waking up and I’m not inside of the base, I’m able to hear on local radio or in the local paper, like what were the crimes that happened that day? What can I be heightened and aware of that might be going on in this community to protect myself and my children? But on installation we don’t have access as the spouse or dependent of a service member to that information.

Terry Gerton I’m speaking with Brandi Jones. She’s the organizing director of Secure Families Initiative. So Brandi, you’ve just mentioned one really important feature of the Bill of Rights, access to information about crime and convictions on military installations. Tell us some of the other key provisions in the Military Families Bill of rights.

Brandi Jones Another thing that kept coming up when we heard from our spouses was not really, ahead of a PCS, having any information given to us as spouses about the place that we’re going to be moving to. So all this actually happens, I would say, is that you kind of get your installation duty station and the way that you’re given that information is by your service member. And so you find out, okay, now you’re going to, let’s say, Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. So as a spouse, the onus is on you and as a service number to then find out all information that you could imagine to the law that would go into relocating your family. So ahead of time, you’re not provided anything about the education system, the availability of special needs education. You’re not providing anything about like the data of the area, the racial, ethnic demographics of the area. Like we were speaking earlier, like the crime statistics of the area, or really any information — you have to go out and kind of start this search on your own about anything related to where you’re going to be asked to move. And so having thought through, like what would be some provisions that would really help our families, immediately on our Military Family Bill of Rights, we asked for more information and we asked that that information be provided to our families 45 days prior to our PCS, our Permanent Change of Duty Station.

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