P-J file photo The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, outpatient health clinic, in Jamestown, located at 321 Hazeltine Ave. has not only been spared from the brunt of President Donald Trump’s federal employee layoffs, but is still hiring, according to Chautauqua County Director of Veteran Affairs Executive Greg Carlson.

JAMESTOWN — There haven’t been any cuts yet to a Veterans Administration clinic in Jamestown, according to a county official.

The Trump administration said last week it wants to slash $2 billion worth of VA contracts, which could affect services ranging from cancer care to the ability to assess toxic exposure. According to the Associated Press, cuts were paused after concerns were raised about the impact on critical health services. More than 1,000 VA employees who served for less than two years were dismissed in February, which Sen.Patty Murray, D-Wash. told the AP included researchers working on cancer treatment, opioid addiction, prosthetics and burn pit exposure.

S”We’ve fought for so long to expand mental health care, and to get the rights and benefits we (veterans) are owed, does that mean that any new counselor or medical staff hired will get the ‘heave ho,’ ” asked United States Navy Veteran John Vogel of Jamestown.

So far, at least for the Jamestown VA clinic at 321 Hazeltine Ave., the answer is no. According to Chautauqua County Director of Veteran Affairs Executive Greg Carlson, while some of Vogel’s fears are not completely unfounded, the V.A is on sound footing. Carlson added that not only are essential positions within the department secure, but the department is still actively hiring for critically needed positions.

“No impact to our local services,” Carlson said. “The VA has made involuntary cuts, but not to mission-critical personnel. Mission-critical employees are still being recruited/hired. However, there have been some in mission-critical positions who’ve opted for early retirement (so it wasn’t involuntary). Personally, the people I know of who took early retirement were at a point in their careers where they were up in the food chain.”

The Erie Veterans Affairs Medical Center, which treats some Chautauqua County veterans, hasn’t been so lucky. According to the Erie Times-News, a “small number” of the center’s staff were among the 1,000 Department of Veterans Affairs employees dismissed nationwide Feb. 13, though officials with the Erie hospital didn’t say how many workers were laid off or what jobs they held. The Erie VAMC is Erie County’s largest federal employer, with 928 employees as of Feb. 6.

“This decision will have no negative effect on veteran health care, benefits or other services, and will allow VA to focus more effectively on its core mission of serving Veterans, families, caregivers and survivors,” Erie VAMC officials said in a statement, according to the Times-News. “We cannot discuss specific personnel matters due to privacy concerns.”

There are no reports yet on cuts to VA clinics in Buffalo.

The Associated Press reported Wednesday that more cuts are likely coming to the Department of Veterans Affairs according to an internal memo discussing a reorganization that includes cutting over 80,000 jobs from the VA. The VA’s chief of staff, Christopher Syrek, told top-level officials at the agency that it had an objective to cut enough employees to return to 2019 staffing levels of just under 400,000. That would require terminating tens of thousands of employees after the VA expanded during the Biden administration, as well as to cover veterans impacted by burn pits under the 2022 PACT Act.

The memo, according to the AP, instructs top-level staff to prepare for an agency-wide reorganization in August to “resize and tailor the workforce to the mission and revised structure.” It also calls for agency officials to work with the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency to “move out aggressively, while taking a pragmatic and disciplined approach” to the Trump administration’s goals. The Government Executive first reported on the internal memo, according to the AP.