By Tom Bannister

Rumors are flying as to why the latest Director of Veterans Services has been placed on leave pending an investigation.

Sources have told us that the recent director Christian Kulikoski was removed because he was not in favor of moving the Veterans Services Department to the newly created Department of Health and Human Services.

Apparently, from what our sources have told us, the Director of the Department of Health and Human Services is not a veteran and cannot sign any documents relating to the department. The only ones who can at present are the mayor or the Veterans Services Director.

The Veterans Service Department, according to Massachusetts General Law, states that the Department must be independent and that the directors have to be veterans.

Every month the Department has to report to the Massachusetts Department of Veterans Services, answer to the mayor and city treasurer, and report to SomerStat.

Other sources told us that the Director of the Department of Health and Human Services was hired with a salary of $110K, which is $25K more than the former director. To justify this jump in salary to the Board of Aldermen, the city proposed that the two separate departments – The Council on Aging and Veterans Services – merge under the newly named Department of Health and Human Services.

The Veterans Services Department cannot effectively do their job in receiving applications and offering benefits to local veterans at this time since it has no director at the moment.

One source has said that the Department is not in a position to assist any veterans right now on Veterans Administration case files.

The Board of Aldermen discussed this and was strongly against the proposed move and wanted to keep it as it is as a separate department with a veteran as the Director. They even passed a resolution to the mayor unanimously.