C.W. Bill Young Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center

Floor Speech

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Ms. CASTOR of Florida. I thank my colleague from Florida for yielding the time and for her dedication to the Nation's veterans as well.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of designating the Bay Pines VA Medical Center in Pinellas County, Florida, the Congressman C.W. Bill Young VA Medical Center. I am very proud to cosponsor this bill, and I would like to thank Chairman Miller of Florida, Congresswoman Brown, and all of our colleagues for honoring Bill Young with such a designation.

I have been fortunate to serve alongside Bill Young for the 7 years that I have been here. Seven out of the 43 years that Mr. Young served in the Congress, we represented St. Petersburg and the Tampa Bay area together. And I know I speak for my predecessors, Jim Davis and Sam Gibbons, who also passed last year, when I say that Congressman Bill Young was a gentleman and an outstanding partner for the interests of the Tampa Bay area and the State of Florida.

It is very appropriate that we honor Bill Young by naming the Bay Pines VA Medical Center after him. He was a fixture at the Bay Pines Veterans Day and Memorial Day ceremonies every year. But more importantly, he was a fixture when there was no ceremony, when he would visit wounded soldiers in the hospital or at their homes, when there was no fanfare, and he just determined that it was just his desire to ensure that the servicemembers and their families received the care that they deserved and that they had earned.

Many facilities at the MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa are state of the art due to Mr. Young's extra attention. I am very grateful for the help he provided to me when MacDill and the soldiers and civilians who worked there were in need. For example, in the past year, he boosted our efforts in ``MacDill Means Mobility'' when we tried to expand the mission at the base. When I brought to his attention that the Department of Defense was not assisting former servicemembers and their families who qualified for Medicaid health services, he helped cut through the red tape.

Many also will point to his expansive earmarks and great legacy in the Tampa Bay area in a variety of ways: our drinking water reservoir is the Bill Young Reservoir; medical research initiatives at the University of South Florida; programs at St. Petersburg College; programs at Eckerd College. We are so proud that Mr. Young initiated the national bone marrow donor program at All Children's Hospital in St. Petersburg.

It was decades ago, through Congressman Young's leadership, that the Bay Pines VA Medical Center in St. Petersburg was created. Bay Pines is now the fourth-largest veterans hospital in the country. It serves veterans all across west central Florida and employs many talented caregivers.

So it is a fitting tribute to this remarkable American to name the Bay Pines VA Medical Center in his honor, and I am proud to cosponsor the resolution. Congressman Young was a model statesman. His kindness, sincerity, and dogged advocacy for our Nation's men and women in uniform and veterans will be missed.

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