ORLANDO — Roughly 72,000 Veterans Affairs employees will soon be out of a job, causing concerns for some Central Florida veterans.

VA Secretary Doug Collins confirmed the upcoming cuts in a video statement released this week.

The goal is to return the agency to return to 2019 staffing levels of about 400,000, according to officials.

Jose Belen fears that, with as much of a struggle as it is to get services from the VA already, these changes will have a negative impact.

Belen is a proud United States Army Field Artillery combat veteran, who turned to art to help him deal with the traumas of war, including losing his best friend in Iraq. Now he helps others do the same.

The wounds of combat are often hidden and surface when vets return home. Belen faced PTSD and depression that led to suicide attempts.

“We clearly lose men and women in war, but there’s also a war that happens when we come home from service,” said Belen.

Like many, he turned to Veterans Affairs for help.

“But they don’t have the tools and the necessary functions in place to really help make a veteran whole,” said Belen.

However, he is now worried after learning that significant personnel cuts could soon be coming to the VA.

An internal memo from the VA’s Chief of Staff sent this week reads, in part, “VA, in partnership with our DOGE leads, will move out aggressively, while taking a pragmatic and disciplined approach to identify and eliminate waste, reduce management and bureaucracy, reduce footprint and increase workforce efficiency.”

“I know we need to make changes,” said Belen. “I’m an open advocate for you know some changes there. But I see that disruption as something that’s gonna cause, you know, complete and total detriment.”

While the memo doesn’t indicate what staff could be cut, Belen worries it could be those that veterans connect with while their cases are managed — many of whom are veterans themselves — saying those relationships are special.

“Because we don’t necessarily connect with just anybody,” said Belen. “So, if we go to log in on that call and now that person that we spent time building this report that we ... just that person knows what I went through, you know? You can’t replace that.”

While he waits for more answers, he hopes the administration will reconsider and instead let veterans give feedback on the restructuring process.

“Letting us at least contribute to the conversation, let us help you instead of just saying, like, bureaucracy has to run this and red tape and all that because that’s ultimately what’s contributing to the detriment of what veterans are going through today,” he said.