ANNE ROBINSON
PVA NATIONAL VICE PRESIDENT
Anne Robinson grew up in a small town in South Texas. Her father, a World War II Veteran who participated in the D-Day invasion of Normandy, had a significant influence on her decision to serve in the U.S. Army. He would share stories about his time in the Army, which piqued Robinson’s curiosity and fueled her desire to serve as well.
She joined the Army in April, 1988. In October, 1999, while deploying on a training exercise to Fairbanks, Alaska, she sustained a spinal cord injury as a result of a military vehicle accident. At the time of the accident, she and her husband, Harry had been married for 12 years, and had two children, Justin and Rebecca, who were 8 and 6 years old.
After being stabilized in Anchorage, Robinson was medevacked to San Antonio, Texas where she began rehabilitation at the Audie L Murphy VA Spinal Cord Injury Center. Three days after arriving on the spinal cord unit, Robinson was introduced to PVA through a National Service Officer (NSO) and a peer mentor.
The NSO helped to quickly get Robinson’s benefits started from the VA and handled her retirement from the Army 6 months after her injury, which helped pull Robinson out of a very tough time both financially and emotionally. Her peer partner, Charlie, started the conversation of how to live an adapted life successfully and fully, and he introduced Robinson to the rest of the PVA family in San Antonio.
That wonderful group of people surrounded both Robinson and her family, lifting them up, teaching them, and caring like no other community that she had been involved with. Robinson believes that if they had not had the PVA family, they would have not been near as successful overcoming the challenges of her spinal cord injury and learning how to live life to its fullest as a family.
Robinson joined the PVA Texas Chapter in 2000, and became an advocacy director just 10 months after her injury. Since then, she has served that chapter in many different positions including Satellite Director, Advocacy Director, Vice President, Chapter President and most recently as National Director.
Robinson was re-elected national Vice President of PVA in May 2024 during the organization’s 78th Annual Convention, to begin a new, one-year term on July 1, 2024. She has served on many national PVA committees, including the Judicial Committee, Budget & Finance Committee, Audit Committee, Strategic Planning, as well as serval ad hoc committees.
Robinson also serves on the Anita Bloom Women Veterans Committee (ABWVC), which she, PVA Vice President Tammy Jones and then-PVA President David Zurfluh established in 2016. This is a standing committee that represents the women veterans of PVA, and has allowed many new opportunities to grow the participation of PVA women within the organization, created new leadership opportunities and has given a voice to a very wonderful group of women whose needs from the VA went unheard for quite a while.
The ABWVC Committee members, along with PVA’s Government Relations team, have been very effective on Capitol Hill and within the VA, bringing forward the voices as well as the concerns and needs of PVA’s Women members. Advocating for accessible mammography, VA Women’s Centers, reproductive services, mental health services and women’s health are just a few projects we’ve taken on to ensure that those voices that went unheard for so long receive the care and benefits they earned.