Welcome to Veterans Radio.
I am Jim Fossone.
I'm the officer of the deck today.
We've got some great programs for you.
I think you'll find very interesting.
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And before we get started, we want to thank our sponsors.
First up, we want to thank National Veteran Business Development Council, NVBDC.org.
It was established to certify both service disabled and veteran owned businesses.
You'll find out how they can help your business by going to NVBDC.org.
We want to thank Legal Help for Veterans.
Legal Help for Veterans fights for veterans disability rights all across the nation.
You can reach them at 800-693-4800 or on the web at legalhelpforveterans.com.
And we have a couple of great interviews that we're going to bring to you today.
We're going to talk about growing marijuana, the business of it.
And we're going to talk to a Coast Guard veteran who used to run intradiction missions
and now finds himself leading a nationwide business, grasshopper farms, on growing outdoor marijuana.
Then after the break, we're going to talk about women veterans,
in particular the Wounded Warrior Projects Survey of Women Warriors
and what they found when they did this survey.
Both are going to be fascinating interviews.
Hang with us for the entire hour.
We want to welcome to Veterans Radio today Will Bowden.
He's got an interesting story.
It's part Coast Guard, part business, part marijuana growing.
So this is not your normal business entrepreneur here.
So Will, welcome to Veterans Radio.
Thanks Jim. It's really, really nice to be here. I appreciate the invite.
Well, it's always great to talk to a Coastie and we do it on Veterans Radio.
We talk to a lot of veteran entrepreneurs and businessmen.
I think sometimes the image of us veterans is that we're all kind of broken down guys and we're not.
Generally, we take our skills that we learned in the service
and turn them to really interesting and positive life outside of the military service.
But let's talk first how a nice kid like you end up in the Navy and move to the Coast Guard and have the career that you had.
The irony has not been lost on anybody for sure Jim.
So I was born and raised in Santa Cruz, California and the only reason I go back that far
is because this was an area that was very accepting of cannabis.
But my choices in life, law enforcement and military, did not allow me to participate either from a work or use perspective.
So I joined the Navy shortly after high school and I went into military law enforcement,
did a couple of things there pre-911 and had a really, really good time there.
And as I transitioned off of active duty to reserve, I went into the Coast Guard Reserve.
And what's funny about that is I thought that that was actually going to keep me in some geographical areas within the United States.
I ended up in a unit in the Coast Guard that actually does not deploy in the United States, it only deploys overseas, right?
I ended up being just a really rewarding tour in the Coast Guard and it's a nice way to start the Coast Guard.
It's called a port security unit.
And then 911 happens and I become more active in my time in the reserve time than I was the whole time I was on active duty.
So it was just, you know, everybody appreciates that no matter who you were in the military, very, very active time since then.
So all along that time, so when I transitioned from active duty to reserve, I also joined on as a police officer down in Naples, Florida in Collier County.
And I had an amazing time at the police department there as well, serving from road patrol all the way until I had to do when I was on the SWAT team.
The reason why I left the police department was because I went to school to get my MBA.
And while I was going to get my MBA, I thought it would be neat to work in corporate America and Florida has a nice way of allowing people with their active law enforcement license to leave and do other things and come back within a five year period and maintain that licensure.
So when I went to my administration and I said, hey, I'd like to go do this, they were completely supportive of it, amazing mentors and leaders there.
And so I went and did that.
That's what took me to a pharmaceutical company, Merck. Okay, and I'm still a Coast Guard reserve at that time too.
So I go there, I finished my MBA program and Merck ends up offering me a pretty cool position.
They said, hey, why don't you come up to headquarters, we're about to change our US commercial model.
And I was really excited about that because I just got done doing my MBA program.
This was stuff that was totally going to make sense. So I went back to my same administration and they're like, oh, it sounds like a amazing opportunity. It's only supposed to be about a year.
So I go up to Pennsylvania from Florida and I start to work with Merck.
And basically what ends up happening over the next 14 years was I really enjoyed the work that Merck was throwing me from an intellectual perspective.
And I was still getting my sense of duty and service from doing all those stuff I was doing in the Coast Guard.
And again, I was being deployed all the time and not even Conest. I was being deployed overseas. So doing really interesting work with the Coast Guard too.
So I just never went back to law enforcement, which is funny because now my cop buddies will call me and laugh at the fact that I'm in the Kennedy's.
You've gone to the other end of the spectrum. But because we so rarely get to talk to Coast Guard folks and I should say Will Bowen retired as a Lieutenant Commander,
tell us about some of those overseas assignments. I don't think folks really appreciate the depth and breadth of tasks that the Coast Guard gets pulled into.
Yeah. So first of all, the Coast Guard has stations all over the world and that's something that we all don't appreciate.
The things that we appreciate is the things we tend to see. So you see things like search and rescue. You see things like drug interdiction.
You see things like hazardous materials, cleanups and stuff like that. What we don't see is some of the units that were actually developed before and during Vietnam, the river impetrols.
And a lot of the support that was happening during those days. So Coast Guard has been long standing of being small boat experts.
And small boats can be like your 24 foot boats. It also can mean your small cutters compared to the larger ships that the Navy would have.
So being very small and agile, being a smaller specialized organization afforded the Coast Guard to develop those skills and be very complimentary when working with the Marine Corps, the United States Navy, Air Force in some cases too, and definitely with the Army at times too.
So one of my first deployments with the Coast Guard was actually to Guantanamo. We went down there and we were part of the initial detainee ops of when they were bringing detainees right after 9-11 to Guantanamo.
And we were part of the initial efforts to stand up that operation, establish good security protocols, working very closely again with the different entities that were already down there.
I don't think a lot of people understand that that's one of the places that we would deploy to and operate in. We were also active the entire time and continue to be active the entire time in the Middle East and all the Middle East operations that were going on.
Now everybody understands that we have a presence over there in what we do. I think when you think about the Coast Guard deploying overseas, what you want to think about is land or structure scenarios that touch water that need to establish normalization and security.
Right, so that could be the oil platforms in the Middle East, that could be Guantanamo Bay having a high threat security zone in a bay down there, and everything in between. That's one of the sweet spots that the Coast Guard does very well.
Well, and we've had some guests on on Veterans Radio when we're talking to Lieutenant Commander Will Bowden of the United States Coast Guard retired.
We've talked to guests about the Coast Guard being deployed in the Pacific over concerns with Taiwan and China. Again, those are things I think in general people don't know that the Coast Guard's out doing that,
but you sort of summarized it to the phrase of small boat experts really kind of helps you visualize where they are and what they can do.
It is, and there's a combined effort out there and sometimes we forget. So one of my final assignments was at the time it was called PAKOM, the combatant command, Pacific command, but it's been censored, renamed Indo-Pacific command.
In that combatant command, they have jurisdiction for 52% of the world, like the Pacific Ocean and all the continents and countries that touch that Pacific Ocean.
And so I got to work in a really neat policy group that really focused on Northeast Asia with more of a focus on North Korea and China.
So when you think about that kind of work, you don't automatically think of Coast Guard there, but at the end of the day, what you are talking about is the United States military working together to accomplish the goals that we need to accomplish both operationally and policy-wise in the world today.
And that requires everybody. That requires non-government entities as well as government entities. We had non-military entities at PAKOM as well as your military partners as well.
And it is a bigger picture than I think most of us see. But again, we tend to believe in the things that we see. So there's movies, there's television, there's my uncle was in whatever.
And that's the stuff that we formulate our opinions on, right?
It is. And that's why we do these shows on Veterans Radio to tell real life stories that broaden out those pictures.
And we always kind of end up asking the same question, which is, based on your experiences in the Coast Guard, if your niece, nephew, family member, friend, son of a friend came in and said, you know, I'm thinking I should do something like this.
What do you think about an opportunity in the Coast Guard? Where does it take you?
So Jim, this is so great because one of the things that I take very seriously is coaching people in general, but coaching kids who aspire to explore something in the military.
And my favorite example of this is somebody might come to me and say, hey, I want to go fly jets, so I'm going to join the Air Force.
And I don't throw them the obvious thing of where else jets are. I say, well, that's awesome. But do you know that the Army has more aircraft than the Air Force has?
And that usually stops them in their tracks and then said, I'm not asking you to join the Army. What I'm asking you to do is just do more digging, be more curious, because you're going to join an organization that has a bunch of different jobs that are in that organization.
And chances are you might want to try a few of those jobs in there. So make sure that you understand not just the job you're going in for and you want to join, but also what are the other jobs that you would maybe want to see or try or work alongside as well.
And it's really just getting people to do a bit more diligence, especially our youth, to say there's a lot of amazing jobs. There's amazing jobs in the Coast Guard and the Navy that never see the water.
There's amazing jobs in the Air Force that never see aircraft. So you just have to understand that it's a bigger world out there than the thing that's tending to motivate you, which usually is that father, that uncle, that movie.
The thing that grabs your attention when you're a kid, as it should when you're a kid, but as we get older and we're graduating high school and we're considering military service, there is more diligence that usually can benefit people for sure.
Well, I want to congratulate you on doing that sort of mentoring, because I think we all have a responsibility who've served to be talking to the younger generation about the value of it, the skill sets you're going to receive, the crazy places you're going to get sent to and see the world.
Even though you thought you'd only be deployed in the U.S., so all of those are positive things. But I want to transition. As I said, we like talking to veteran business entrepreneurs, and you move from law enforcement to the corporate world.
We're doing really well and successful with a huge company there. What in the world made you transfer those skill sets that you had learned along the way? And Will is the CEO of Grasshopper Farms, which is a marijuana growing operation in multiple states, all outdoors.
But we'll talk about Grasshopper Farms in a minute, but I want to start with the mental process going on as you transfer your skill sets into this being this vetropinur.
Well, you couldn't have labeled it better than the mental process, because that's exactly what happened. So really what happens here is I retired October of 2018. So that was the moment when I exited the military. But before that, good 10, 12 years ago, I was watching the cannabis industry, and I was appreciating it for the business perspective of what it's doing, and then for the medical perspective of what it's doing too.
There's amazing things going on that go way beyond the Narcos, Mexico and reefer madness that we really need to understand better. So I was already appreciating it, but it was always from afar because it was not something that I was allowed to do simply because of my military service.
And I was really enjoying that. So the same month I retire, I end up meeting another guy who was also former military, and we're just getting to know each other. But when he learned that I had prior law enforcement experience, the things I'd done in the Coast Guard, and then my pharmaceutical experience, he said, Hey, I want to offer you a job.
I go, what's that? He goes, Well, he's starting what we call an industry in MSO, multi state operator. And he wanted me to help him go operationalize licenses in other states. And so I go home to my wife, I'm like, Is this really happening? You can't make this up.
I mean, it's just like, it's crazy. It's the same exact month I retired. So that was a bit of a jarring moment, mentally speaking, right? But at the end of the day, I talked to her with my wife, I was really excited about a new opportunity, almost in the same way of like being excited for a new command as we rotate through military service, right?
And so I sat down with my wife and we said yes. So I started and I went to work for him, learning the industry. First, I was sent to Michigan to operationalize licenses. I got three retail locations up and running and got indoor grow up and running, manufacturing was in the pipeline.
But all along that time, I developed an appreciation for the outdoor farming aspect of the industry. So that's kind of what broke me into this.
There's not a lot of farmland in Santa Cruz, California that you're relating to here. This isn't a family. I want to grow up to be a farmer thing. How did you say, Well, that's the, I like this field because it's it's brand new and a lot of opportunity.
How did you decide outdoor grows my niche?
So as I was going through all of this, it's really important as you enter any business that you really understand what are your operating costs. And when you do that analysis on indoor cultivation, you start to realize that energy in the form of power is going to be one of the main drivers of your
operating costs. And so as I was looking at that, I was like, Okay, so why aren't more people growing outside? And at the same time, I came across a study that was done back in 2011. So we're talking 12 years ago now that basically said that indoor cannabis cultivation was occupying 1% of the US power grid.
And I was like, Ooh, not sustainable. And it's not that indoor grow is bad and needs to be demonized or anything. That's not the case. It's just we haven't realized our balance yet of indoor greenhouse and outdoor grows. Right. That's what it comes down to.
So I got really curious. I started doing the research. And I started trying to figure out so why aren't more people doing the outdoor farm? Well, long story short, it's because farming is really, really hard. I will tell you that right now.
Okay, so but I but I started looking at the business model of it. And the other on the business side of it is, is when a person would go into a retail cannabis store, they would see different grades of indoor flower that they could select from. But usually there was only one grade of outdoor flower.
Usually it's discounted and considered to be lesser quality. And I said, Well, that's just not right. This plant was outside. And the only reason why it even went inside was because it came in illegal and people went into basements and pole barns. And that's just where it kind of evolved into.
And people then not surprisingly have stuck with that discipline because not just over decades, but generations, they've learned how to do that. Well, so now it's time to come back outside and do it well, though, because there's plenty of people who have done it well and can do it well.
So let's do it. So that's what I did. I formed the team. I left that last company and started this company. And we, we went to market saying that I think that what we can do is provide a higher quality of outdoor flower than is available in the market today in Michigan.
It ended up working out. So we expanded to Colorado, now in New Jersey too. And we're working our way into Minnesota and Massachusetts. And I want to try to build a collective of 10 farms is kind of the goal here. 10 different teams as we continue the mission.
Well, you've just identified a number of states, including Michigan, which are not warm weather states. They have a specific grow season. How does that factor into all this analysis that you're doing, which is probably pretty deep.
So that's the MBA, that's the role, operational role at the Coast Guard, where you were doing a lot of planning. But, but how do you look at this from outdoor grow operations and the seasonality of it all?
Well, first and foremost, if you're going to pick to do outdoor farming, you better operate where other outdoor farms exist. And then you got to pay attention to what exists as far as an outdoor farm goes as well. So where we're set up in Michigan, we're surrounded by blueberry farms.
And if you can grow blueberries, grapes or tomatoes, you're probably in the right vicinity geographically speaking to do an outdoor cannabis farm there too.
Location, location, location, right? It's just, you got to know what state you're going into, what kind of seasonality. You also mentioned, there is a season. You're absolutely right. We are a single season outdoor grow, which means we produce a crop once a year.
So we have to be very deliberate in what we do throughout that year to support being able to produce the amount that we need to to run a business.
Right. So there's, there's a lot of math that goes into that for sure. But when it comes down to picking the state or where in the state, because Michigan, much like California is much different at the bottom of Michigan from a growing perspective than it is up to what they call the UP or the Upper Peninsula
at Michigan. And I would recommend you probably don't want to do an outdoor grow for retail flower in the Upper Peninsula. You might do it for a smaller scale and for biomass, but you just, you just have to be careful on these things. There's ways to do them in a lot of different locations, but you got to be very deliberate in knowing what's going to work in that location and then go after that.
So when did grasshopper farms get started, Will?
Yep. So we started in 2020. The name grasshopper farms grasshopper represents two things for us. One is that we are on a journey of always learning. And the second one is the grasshopper hops from season to season because we are a single season outdoor grow.
We don't benefit from things that like vines for grapes and blueberries that we can revive. We literally have to start over with new plants every single year.
And in those three years now going, you've opened up in Colorado, Michigan and New Jersey. How many acres do you have?
So in Michigan, we bought 160 acres, but it's important to say out loud that we only developed 40 of those acres. And the reason why is because we were bringing a new type of flower to the market.
And so to do that, that means that we have to have a lot of focus and discipline. So we started by building out 40 acres because we knew that we could logistically operate that with a high degree of precision.
And we would not expand until we honed in our practices and then also the market dictated that it would be appropriate to expand.
So we've done that. We're ready now to expand in Michigan to an appropriate level, which will probably be just another 40 acres and we'll probably stop there.
That will probably be what grasshopper farms is in Michigan. So for each state, what we're going to do is we're going to always have that focus and discipline so that we don't get distracted with shiny objects.
We really stick to the mission and we're able then to provide that quality and consistency. And you're probably going to say, well, we could just substitute some of the names and call the military operation and you're absolutely right.
I was laughing at the focus and getting away from the shiny objects. It is a, as I said, a new kind of niche business, right? That there's not a lot of folks who can look to and talk to and say, well, how did you do it?
But how much of this becomes then a marketing and outlet? Because, okay, you grew it. You pick those flowers once a year. It's now got to be processed. It's not a retail.
There's a more integrated part of the industry. Talk to us a little bit about how you approach that.
Yeah, Jim, you're absolutely right there. So look, when we came to market, we told everybody, hey, we're grasshopper farms and you're going to know us because we're going to produce premium sungrown flower.
And everybody kind of gave us that virtual pat on the back and said, sure, you're going to buddy, you go out there and do your thing.
Good luck.
Yeah, that's right. There's a reason why most of the outdoor flower out there is in a discounted lower quality status.
And that's because it's really hard to do and those farms also focus on biomass for making things like edibles, topical, sublinguals and before.
So when we came to market, we had to be deliberate about what we were saying about who we are and how we're doing it, right?
So we were building a brand at that point too. And so this is really important when you're running a business, you not only have to know what product or service you're selling, but how are you going to communicate that to people as well?
And that's the marketing aspect of that. So we initially started out there when we had no product to sell by going around and telling our story.
We went around to retailers, we started talking about it on Facebook and Instagram. We went to a couple of conventions and we just told our story.
And then we just said, I know what you guys all think this is going to be hard to do and maybe impossible, but just give us a try when we come out.
And then what that did was it let the onus fall on us to produce what we knew we could, right? So we produced a product that ended up being a higher quality outdoor flower than was typically available.
And retailers and consumers did accept us for that. And because we did all that marketing work and continue to do all that marketing work, it's now developed a conversation with people in the United States and even outside the United States where they're paying attention to what we're doing.
And we've built a name for ourselves. And I think that's really important in any industry that you do that. You've got to build a name for yourself so that when other folks try to do what you're doing, it's fine that they do, but you've already solidified your name in this too.
Much in the way that in early days of Sam Adams, they never try to compete with your cores and Budweisers, right? They just made a solid craft beer is what they did.
And I know they're a lot bigger now, but eventually in our industry, you're going to have some legalization changes occur. You're going to have some bigger companies come in.
And if you haven't made your name for yourself as a smaller company, you run the risk of possibly getting just run over by those larger companies.
So how do we do that? You spend the time, you tell your story, you make a name for yourself. And let's not forget, you've got to have that quality and consistency of the product or service.
You've got to produce. You've got to mission accomplished. You know, one of the reasons besides being a Coast Guard alum and we love talking to you guys because you're hard to find, but veterans in particular are very interested in the cannabis world, the use of cannabis, the medicinal use of cannabis.
They run a foul at times, you know, because it's still a federally scheduled drug. They run a foul with VA sometimes, although that's loosening up. There's some legislation to do more VA research on the benefits of cannabis.
But by and large, a lot of interest in veterans in the use of cannabis because of the quality of life that it provides to them. I'm wondering is with your background and with the Weirgrass hopper farms are located and what you plan on doing.
How do you see the veteran world intersecting with what you're doing in the business and even in the employee world of yours?
Yeah, so a few different layers there. So I think a lot of folks when they were getting to know the medicinal benefits of cannabis, there was I think a lot of references to things like glaucoma and cancer.
And definitely those things exist for sure. For me, it was more so on the side of talking to men and women who had served and we're now benefiting from cannabis from either combat injuries or PTSD.
It's just at this point I've lost track of how many I've talked to who benefit from it from that specific angle. And it's really important to understand that cannabis has incredible medicinal value.
I wouldn't be doing it otherwise. It is a strong medicinal candidate for so many things out there. But we're just scratching the surface right now because we're in a phase right now where it was illegal for so long and the Reagan and Nixon administrations were so good at their anti drug campaigns and including cannabis in it.
So now what we're learning is that cannabis probably shouldn't have been in it. It probably is definitely is not a gateway drug. In fact, I've been calling it a reverse gateway drug because it has been helping people to have a healthier relationship with things like pain, medication and alcohol.
And so when you start to see this used appropriately or just used for sleep, there's so many people who are sleep deprived today that are not diagnosed as a medical condition and they use it for sleep and they don't even think they're using it medically. They take the stigma of using it recreationally when in fact they're not.
They're using it to get something that's one of the most important factors that you need in the world, which is a good night's sleep of both quantity and quality. Right. So I think that the implications federally certainly are they need to be contemplated and understood the severity of the scheduling and how that impacts men and women who might be able to benefit from this in the service.
I think that that will start to ease up as the federal changes happen as the VA learns more and as more research becomes available to as far as our our position right now and how we're trying to help. We actually just had a former Marine come and visit our farm with three of his friends.
And he benefits from a program in Michigan that actually affords him to have free access to cannabis products to help him with the combat injuries that he sustained from his service. And we were introduced to that program and now we're going to contribute product to that program as well to make sure that we're
contributing to that free access that he can obtain in the state of Michigan. And I'm glad the state of Michigan has actually stepped up and doing something for military veterans who need this product to basically just have quality of life. And then as far as veterans go, listen, anytime I can grab a veteran and put them on the team that's going to happen,
because we already come from a foundation that we can understand together. And I know what I'm already working with when I hire a veteran. So I'll hire a veteran every day of the week for for whatever positions that we have within our organization for sure.
Well, that's why we're talking to Will Bowden, CEO of Grasshopper Farms, which grows outdoor cannabis in three states. He's a lieutenant commander from the United States Coast Guard Reserve, retired now. And Will, I think, you know, getting the message out to more folk is part of what's necessary to do.
There are a lot of people in that industry, and you know, you can probably pick your industry and say, there's some sketchy folks. But I think it's important to, as you say, get out, talk about what you're going to do, and then follow through and do it.
And that's what you're you're in the process of now. Just quickly, because we're running a little long. Are you growing yet in Colorado or New Jersey?
Yeah, so so we had a full season this year in Colorado, they're in the middle of Michigan and Colorado are both in the midst right now of an outdoor harvest. In New Jersey, we've received all of our state licensure, and we're just waiting for the final licensure from Galloway Township.
And then we'll be what I would call plant touching at that point and operational. So I would expect that in within 90 days or less, we'll be plant touching within New Jersey as well.
Well, that's that's great. That's great expansion. It's got to be exciting to be in the middle of harvest and we appreciate you taking some time to talk to veterans radio and educate us about cannabis outdoor cannabis growing in particular and that transition from military to law enforcement to veteran entrepreneur in the cannabis space.
So we really do appreciate the time today.
Well, thanks, Jim. And it's not just an honor. I also consider it a duty. We got to help each other out. And the way we do that is we support each other through communication and helping each other to discover paths that work and then support each other to success.
So my honor, thank you very much.
That's a pretty interesting guy with a great an interesting career and story to tell. That's why we do it here on veterans radio and we couldn't do it here on veterans radio without our sponsors. The sponsors include the Vietnam Veterans of America chapter 310 in Ann Arbor, known as the Charles S. Kettles chapter VFW Graffle here.
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Now let's hear from the Wounded Warrior Project and in particular about its Women Warriors Survey to find out what women warriors and veterans are thinking about and what their needs are.
We want to welcome to Veterans Radio today U.S. Army retired Lieutenant Colonel Tracy Farrell. We're going to talk about the Wounded Warrior Project and women veterans in particular, but Tracy, welcome to Veterans Radio.
Thanks so much, Jim. I appreciate the opportunity to talk with you and all your listeners.
Well, let's talk about your Army career. How did a nice girl like you from Notre Dame, the University of Notre Dame, with a Bachelor's of Science in Mathematics end up in the U.S. Army?
Yeah, so I come from a line of individuals who served, both my grandfathers served in World War II, when the Army Air Corps at that time, later the Air Force, and when in the Army.
And then my father served 22 years as well, field artillery, and then he did operations, kind of like stop work more so.
And I'm the oldest of five, so I had to find a way to pay for college, and since then ROTC scholarship to Notre Dame, and then from there, I thought I was going to do four years and get out as most of us do, maybe not most of us, but many of us do.
You know, we all think...
Oh yeah, nobody goes in to be a lifer.
Yeah, yeah.
Very few people think they're going to be livers, and then at every point in my life, it was just so many great opportunities were presented through the military or through assignments that I ended up staying 22 and a half years.
Well, let's...
And as we talked earlier, I had some amazing, amazing assignments.
Well, let's talk about those because this ties back into one of the findings in the report, which is about, hey, would you recommend joining up to folks?
And one of the reasons people would is you get this great opportunity in terms of leadership responsibility and travel.
So tell us about yours.
Yeah.
Yeah, I ended up my first assignment was in Germany, and then I've also ended up in Korea.
And I had battalion command in Hawaii, and I ended my career in D.C.
And of course, there were some iterations of training deployments and spent some time in Hungary, Croatia, as well as Iraq.
But just for me, I think I look like the person I was when I graduated college.
And the self-confidence, I think I was lacking at that point.
And then how I progressed over the 22 years and who I am today, I can't say I wouldn't have been that person had I not joined the military.
The military definitely had an amazing impact on my confidence, my knowledge, my ability to lead others and just allowed me to see the world in other cultures and even other portions of the United States.
As you might know, each portion of the United States is a little different as well.
Well, you know, those of us who never got a duty assignment in Hawaii love how you just slip that in around everything else.
But you know, we are all jealous of a duty assignment in Hawaii.
I think each of us have somewhere we're jealous of.
I always wanted to come to Colorado Springs.
So then after I retired from the military, that was the place I chose to move to.
And I've lived here.
I call Colorado Springs my home in the first place I ever chose because the rest of my life, I was following my father or following the military or following a job.
And Colorado Springs I chose and this is now my home and I love it with all my heart.
Well, that's great.
And along the way, I should mention she picked up a master's from Long Island University in leadership.
So, Tracy's got to…
I got to be at West Point for a while as a tactical officer and that was part of the job requirement and it really was a great opportunity.
And that word keeps coming up opportunity.
And again, this will factor back into some of the findings of the report we're talking about that's been issued here this fall in 2023.
But Tracy, for those who maybe don't really understand what Wounded Warrior Project is or maybe have just seen TV commercials, which may or may not be informative,
tell us a little bit about Wounded Warrior Project and the efforts that it undertakes.
Sure.
So, Wounded Warrior Project is an organization that has over 240,000 registrants members nationwide and we're even in Germany at Launstall where there's a medical center, as you know.
And we serve warriors and their families who were injured or ill as a part of their service to the military.
And that doesn't have to be physical injuries.
I think that's the biggest misconception.
Even though we have these ongoing dialogues about traumatic brain injury or post-traumatic stress or anxiety as a result of service,
a lot of people think that Wounded Warrior Project focuses on the physical injuries and we do.
Absolutely do.
Making sure that somebody who transitions from service is able to thrive in their communities in a holistic manner,
whether it be focusing on their financial needs, their mental health needs or their physical needs, or even just societal, wanting to connect with others,
that is the focus of Wounded Warrior Project.
The key thing is that due to the generosity of the American public, it's at no cost at all to the warriors and family members who participate.
And it's huge.
It's been 20 years now, which is absolutely amazing to me.
But this is our 20th year anniversary and we're going strong and we're still looking ways to be innovative with the population that we have dedicated ourselves to serve.
And I should mention that Tracey Ferrell is the program partnership and operational vice president for the Wounded Warrior Project.
So we're talking to somebody at the top of the food chain, which is always good because you get the real deal of what's going on.
And what was interesting to me and I wanted to make sure we got this out to a wide audience for Veterans Radio,
is that you released the Wounded Warrior Project, W.W.P. released its Women Warriors Report, which highlights the sort of unique experiences and challenges of women veterans.
So why don't you go ahead and tell us about this survey and some of the results from it.
Sure.
So just to provide a little bit of background, Wounded Warrior Project has been doing surveys of our population for years now.
And a few years back, we acknowledged that women represent the fastest growing population in both the military and veteran communities.
We were seeing some disparities between the results of our male population and our women population.
And so we launched this initiative to try and dig into the information and the data that we have about women warriors in particular.
And so this report that was released in September is based on the responses of 5,000 women warriors, as well as roundtable discussions that happen both virtually and in person across the United States.
And what we've found is that Wounded Women Warriors, and you have to remember this is our population, the Wounded Women Warriors,
we face unique challenges while we serve in the military and then as we transition to transition into civilian life.
And those could be with regards to financial wellness, access to care, mental wellness, social health, military transition, and military sexual trauma.
And so this report, which is absolutely beautiful, not only in its layout but in its information, that only gives those statistics and that data.
But it gives some quotes from women warriors and it gives some recommendations on what we can do as a society, not just legislatively, not just with the VA, not just with veteran service organizations,
but what all of us working together can do to better serve women warriors as a transition.
Yeah, I think there's a couple of points here. One is we all relate to anecdotal stories where somebody we know or in this instance in the report, the female veterans there and there's generally a quote or a story you can relate to.
But it helps, it really helps in thinking these things through when you have the data.
And you begin, you know, you talk to 5,000 folks, you've got a big data set and you're going to get real solid information out of that, aren't you?
Definitely. And I think what resonated the most with me just because of my service was the conversations around the military to civilian transition process and how we might enhance it,
include ongoing support. You know, I think probably a lot of the listeners know I approach transition as like this singular day or month in my life.
I was just going to get out of the Army, take off the uniform, put on something in my closet and be absolutely successful after that.
And it's a process and ensuring that the support is there through TAPS, which I know both DOD and VA have been looking at this, the toll transition assistant program and what we can provide through that,
but also afterwards, who's there in the community that has reached back and you can ask questions and you can connect with, for women warriors in particular,
who can, who's in your community that you can connect with and ask questions about that really resonated with me, as well as the challenges with accessing care in the VA healthcare system.
The VA has been doing an amazing job in expanding their women's healthcare. It's not across the United States.
There's still some opportunities to leverage community-based resources and even telehealth to address some of the barriers of care that we're hearing about from our women veterans.
And it's those kind of key findings based on data and based also on stories people can relate to. They help policymakers, don't they?
You did a stint in Washington, D.C. You did a stint on Congressional Hill. This information has a role to play in shaping policy, doesn't it?
Oh, 100 percent. And not just from, let's give you the information, but in two-fold.
One in the efforts that our government and community relations team does in working with members of Congress to develop legislation based on the data, based on information that we've got from the VA,
but then also just the opportunities for our women warriors to go to Capitol Hill and talk about what they're experiencing and then show the data behind that.
When we released this report back in September, we brought 50 women warriors together and we had them go to Capitol Hill and talk with the representatives and talk with the staff members there and share their experiences,
but also share the report to make sure that it's not just me talking about myself, it's me talking for women nationwide.
One of the other, and that's so important, and one of the other findings that was in your key areas dealt with financial wellness, which I think is worth exploring some, because people don't really talk about it.
They talk about transition, how hard that is, and it may take years to find the job you really want to be doing. But financial wellness is such a change.
When I'm in the military, that paycheck shows up every time. My expenses are kind of covered. There's not the same sort of market driven financial pressures.
So talk to us about how that manifested itself to become a key area.
So we have found that women warriors have a higher education rate. They pursue college, they pursue advanced degrees at a higher rate than their male peers, but they have higher unemployment rates as well.
This report specifically identified 10% of women warriors were unemployed by 6.3%. And the reason for this for many of them was that childcare and family responsibilities are the top barrier to their employment.
Another fact that was really saddening for me was that nearly half report living paycheck to paycheck, and two out of five lack the confidence to cover a $1,000 emergency.
And as you mentioned, these are women who had these support systems and had financial assistance and had paychecks coming in every month.
And so we think a couple things can help. One, there needs to be a little more research into why this is so.
Focus specifically on women's career planning and employment, and not at the point of transition that I mentioned earlier.
Early on, early on, financial management.
Prior to launching oneself into being a civilian, we should be thinking about things like this.
Yeah, I think that was a, you know, that sort of popped out as an issue where like, people don't really talk about that, but it's, you hear about it kind of quietly, sort of buried in the transition problem, but it's really maybe a financial problem.
One of the things that we've talked about here on Veterans Radio, and we're talking to Tracy Ferrell, who's the VP at the Wounded Warrior Project.
We're talking specifically about a recently released women warriors report.
Tracy, one of the things we find is that on Veterans Radio, when we talk to folks is, when you're in the military, you have a network.
You've moved from base to base, you know people from this here and there, but when you transition out, you don't have maybe that network, and you have to create a new network.
Is that the social health issue that you report found as a key area?
Yeah, absolutely. So let's just do the numbers real quick.
So right now, 10% of the population are women veterans, right, or 10% of the veteran population are women. Excuse me, I misquoted that.
But, and then less than 1% actually serve these days.
And so while we find that there will be a growing population, and it's going to be up to 18% by 2040, our veterans are women,
we don't find that women veterans wear their status on their sleeve as much as male veterans do.
And part of that is because they don't feel that society acknowledges their service, right?
A personal story. I actually went somewhere that was military oriented and showed a card that said veterans were to get in at a degrees rate or a free rate by myself, and I was asked where my husband was.
Where the veteran was, right? We have to stop that question from coming out of people's mouths.
We have to acknowledge that both men and women serve in the military now and are proud of their service and should stand up for being a veteran and connecting with other veterans through opportunities that are offered within our communities.
And some groups are better at that, like Women's Marine Association, WMA, is really a pretty robust group because they're a pretty small, hearty group.
But I don't think our VSOs in general are that well at welcoming folks, but you can just see how that network needs to be there, but you've got to be able to know where the other people in the network are.
And you have to know how to look for them, right? And that was another one of our recommendations, was actually through the transition process to have a women focused leg of it to tell what health system VA offers you, where you might find other women in your communities that are veterans if you wish to reach out,
and what specific issues and solutions women veterans have come across during their time.
We have to do that because we need to recruit more women, we need to recruit more men, and there's a big recruiting problem in the country as a whole.
I guess it comes and goes right after 9-11, all kinds of people join up after a 20-year war, people are the voluntary, military's having a tough time, every branch hitting the recruiting numbers.
So making things better for women veterans is really making things better for women to enter the military, and actually that's a national security issue.
Things have changed a lot since you went in, and I think it was 1994.
But there's a lot more to do, and you mentioned, and I don't want to pass over, military sexual trauma, exposure to taxons and other problems that are in the news today.
What do you report, find about those sorts of things and how they're impacting women veterans?
There's quite a bit of attention on military sexual trauma and ensuring that when anyone who has experienced military sexual trauma transitions from the military to the VA,
that they don't want that they have a smooth transition, whether it be through a peer leader helping them through that process, or in the sharing of the information between DOD and the VA.
What we hear most of the times right now is that as women in transition between their providers, whether it be a mental health provider or a medical provider or some other sort of primary care provider,
they're repeating their story over and over and over again.
And retraumatization is a big thing, and so we need to find a way so that women and men don't have to do that.
They don't have to keep on reliving or repeating their story that is captured somewhere and shared across that, and that they're escorted through the process of benefits and healthcare.
Yeah, and I think this is where the VA would step in and say, hey, we hear these stories, we know how to handle them, we don't want you to have to repeat them, but maybe you're a private practitioner, this is all brand new to them.
So there's an interesting issue of where you'll be most comfortable getting your medical care and receive the best medical care. So those are challenges as well that are kind of floating through your key findings.
There are, and the VA and Congress is very interested in that topic and has proposed legislation and solutions, and so my hope is that we will see movement in that in the next one to two years for sure.
We're talking to Lieutenant Colonel Tracy Ferrell, US Army retired, who's vice president with Wounded Warrior Project about the women warriors report that was just issued.
And what's great about the report is that it not only does this great big data collection and identifies issues, but then makes these recommendations that we've been talking about.
But one of the things that I want to highlight is how women warriors reacted to the idea of would you recommend, and I always ask this question, would you recommend to a family member or friend that joined up?
And that's really the question you guys were kind of getting asking folks and their responses are interesting. Can you talk about them?
Yeah, I think it's so when we have to remember that the women who are part of Women Warrior Project or Wounded Warrior Project sorry too many W's. Let me just say that right off the bat.
Wounded Warrior Project are those who have been injured as part of their service, right? And so their perception may be a little different. But many of them actually said yes, I would still recommend service because of what it taught me, what we talked about at the top of this.
Right, this ties right back into your experiences.
Yeah, right back into the person that the military made me, even despite the injuries that I have experienced or the trauma that I am still living through.
I believe that this was a good organization for me at that time of my life. And I'm always heartened to hear that.
Right, I think for me, especially having been a battalion commander, I really wanted to make sure that the men and the women who joined my organization felt welcomed and that they had the ability to grow in the direction that they chose.
And with military police, many of them decided FBI or their local community policing or some other sort of investigative careers after they left the military.
And I just, I'm happy to hear that many of the women who served during the same time I did felt that within their units as well.
Well, it's interesting because the reason for recommendations are really pretty, it's a long list. It's not only the benefits package and the equal pay, but things like the GI bill that gets you more education, which certainly you get to take a part of while you're in service,
but even more importantly for some is after, which you're developing all these skills that you've talked about in terms of leadership.
We've talked about the travel that goes with it. So there are a lot of very positive aspects of military service beyond being part of something bigger than yourself and serving your country, aren't there?
Yeah, and I think a lot of times we focus on the leadership aspect, but there's some skill sets that are learned as well.
That's Tracy Ferrell, who's VP of the Wounded Warrior Project, talking about the survey they recently did.
So a great interview, interesting information that you're not going to find anywhere else but here on Veterans Radio.
We really do appreciate you listening in and checking us out on Facebook. I'm Jim Fossone, today's host. Dale Throneberry will be back next week.
You can find us on veteransradio.org and help us out by donating there if you're interested or becoming a corporate sponsor. We'd love to have you or if you've got some ideas for future programming, let us know.
And I hope that you did enjoy both the conversation with our Coast Guard officer who's now a marijuana grower and with Tracy regarding women warriors and their thinking and the fact that they would still recommend and continue to recommend service in the military.
And until next time on Veterans Radio, you are dismissed.
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