Black veteran groups seek policy agenda on racial inequities

As a young man in Memphis, Tennessee, Robert Dabney Jr. wanted to blaze a path that could set his family up for a better life. So two weeks after high school graduation in 1998, at age 18, he joined the U.S. Army.

During nine years of service that included two tours in Iraq, Dabney was a combat medical specialist. But after he left the Army in 2007 and returned to Memphis, married with children, he struggled to see what he’d gained from his service.

“I had exchanged my youth, ambition and vigor for a future that is limited just because of my mental health,” said Dabney, who was formally diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and depression in 2013.

His experience seeking treatment through the veterans health care system was plagued with challenges, he said. After navigating the system as a Black veteran, he wondered if he might help others find more culturally competent services that the federal government seemed ill-equipped to provide.

Testimonies like Dabney’s will be shared at the first-ever national policy conference for Black veterans in Washington on Thursday. Representatives from nearly 20 advocacy groups for service members of color plan to collaborate on a legislative agenda to address longstanding racial, economic and social inequities facing more than 2 million Black American veterans.

“For many people from Black and brown (veterans) communities, we’re starting from a different place in life,” the 42-year-old war veteran said. “Being able to talk to people who started from that place, who have a mindset similar to yours as they went through the military, has a different meaning to us.”

In addition to disparities in the military justice system, homelessness, and unemployment, federal veterans benefits data show Black service members’ post-Sept. 11...