Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:

Thank you for inviting the Disabled American Veterans (DAV), an organization of 1.3 million service-disabled veterans, to testify at this important hearing to discuss disability rehabilitation thru sports.  We appreciate the opportunity to offer our views and experience with the National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic.

Known as the “Miracles on a Mountainside,” the Winter Sports Clinic is the world leader in promoting rehabilitation by instructing veterans with disabilities in adaptive skiing, and introducing them to a number of other adaptive recreational activities and sports.  The clinic is co-sponsored by the DAV and Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), as well as a number of generous corporate and individual donors. 

As the largest annual disabled learn-to-ski clinic in the world, the Winter Sports Clinic is an annual rehabilitation program open to active duty service-members and veterans with spinal cord injuries, orthopedic amputations, visual impairments, traumatic brain injuries, certain neurological problems and other disabilities who receive care at a VA or military medical facilities.  It provides the extrinsic motivation of excitement and camaraderie, but more importantly, it fosters the intrinsic motivation in each participant to find their strength of purpose and achieve what can only be described as miracles on a mountainside.

This event evolved from the pioneering efforts of the VA in rehabilitation and adaptive sports.  Mr. Sandy Trombetta, founder and director of the Winter Sports Clinic, began bringing VA patients to a nearby mountain resort to participate in disabled ski programs in the early 1980s.  As a recreation therapist at the VA Medical Center in Grand Junction, Colorado, he recognized the physical and mental healing that skiing and other winter sports can provide to veterans with disabilities.  Just a few years after the first Winter Sports Clinic held in 1987 with 20 staff members and about 90 veterans, it became apparent more support was needed due to the therapeutic benefits and popularity of the Clinic.  The DAV answered that call and has become a co-sponsor of the event since 1991.

The Clinic has grown tremendously over the past 20 years.  Last year, more than 360 participants, including 82 injured OEF/OIF service-members and veterans, attended from across the country along with 200 certified disabled ski instructors and several members of the U.S. Disabled Ski Team.  The Clinic holds a race training and development program to help veterans develop their skiing abilities to an elite level, with an ultimate goal of qualifying for U.S. Paralympic Team participation.  Several participants who learned to ski at the Clinic are now members of the U.S. team. 

Adaptive ski equipment are updated and modified for each Midwinter Sports Clinic, and skiing is integrated with other exploratory activities.  In addition to learning Alpine and Nordic skiing, participants are introduced to a variety of other activities and sports such as rock climbing, scuba diving, trap shooting, horseback riding, snowmobiling and sled hockey.  The U.S. Secret Service also teaches a self-defense course to participants who are in wheelchairs or are visually impaired.

It is expected there will be more than 450 disabled veterans, including nearly 120 recently injured OEF/OIF service-members and veterans, who will ski the Rocky Mountains at the 22nd National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic in Snowmass Village, Colorado from March 30 – April 4, 2008.

It is well established that recreation therapy plays a key role in the rehabilitation of disabled veterans in VA medical centers throughout the country.  Correspondingly, this Clinic enhances the physical, social, and emotional well-being of the veterans who participate in this life changing event. 

Some of these veterans have never skied before.  Most have spent months in hospitals, convinced their lives are over.  A great many have been told they would never walk again.  Yet there on the majestic high Alpine terrain of the Colorado Rockies, they learn otherwise and are proof positive that empowerment allows them to determine their own fate.  Known for inspiring "Miracles on a Mountainside," the Clinic shows that the lives of disabled veterans can be changed forever when they discover the challenges they can overcome.  I invite you to view the 2007 National Disabled Veterans Winter Sport Clinic DVD to get a sense of the profound impact this event has on the participants and the volunteers.  It is an intense week that touches everyone involved.

The rehabilitation of disabled veterans through the annual Winter Sports Clinic drives our commitment to the event as it truly reflects DAV’s mission of building better lives for our nation’s disabled veterans and their families.  In 1992 we instituted the DAV Freedom Award at the National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic.  It is given each year to the veteran who makes the most progress during the week, showing outstanding courage and accomplishments in taking a giant step forward in his or her rehabilitation process. 

The award's inscription reads: "Their accomplishments during the National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic have proven to the world that physical disability does not bar the doors to freedom. We salute your desire to excel so that others may follow.”

Last year’s recipient, Jason Poole, hails from Cupertino, California.  He is a Marine infantryman who was injured by a massive improvised explosive device (IED) more than two years ago while on patrol near the Syrian border in Iraq.  After two months in a coma, Jason woke up to find his world shattered.  Blind in his left eye, deaf in his left ear, facing facial reconstruction and suffering from a brain injury that left him unable to speak, read and walk, Jason started out on the arduous road to recovery at the Poly Trauma Center at Palo Alto, California.

With courage, humility and the strength of a Marine, Corporal Poole has hunkered down to do battle with the long-term effects suffered by the thousands of service members who have been injured by IED blasts in our current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Those who have spoken with Jason noticed not only his upbeat attitude, but also his British accent.  Jason moved from England in his teens and still carries a love for his native land.  In fact, Jason was not sworn in as a U.S. citizen until he was in recovery from his injuries at Palo Alto.  If you want to know anything about this young man’s character, know this: Jason Poole was walking point and placing himself in harm’s way for our nation before he was fully vested as a U.S. citizen.  

Jason had progressed enough in his recovery to attend his first Winter Sports Clinic, where he faced the intense challenge of the mountain on his snowboard.  He then took the sense of renewed possibility and spirit of adventure bolstered by the Clinic, and went back to Palo Alto to encourage his friends there to come with him when he returned this year.

Everything Jason did at the 2007 National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic was accomplished with buoyancy, enthusiasm, and determination.  He and other recipients before him serve as an example to all participants by displaying diligence in pursuit of rehabilitation.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my statement, and I will be pleased to respond to any questions you or any Member of the Subcommittee may wish to ask.

[The video presentation entitled, "2007 National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic DVD," is being retained in the Committee files.]