Perseverance and persuasion are just two of the key elements that Kathy Prout embraced after her husband, Rear Admiral James G. (Jay) Prout III, the Commander of the USS Carl Vinson battle group, was killed in a military F/AC 18 plane crash in 1995.
The family had moved 26 times in Jay’s 29-year Naval career. Through the years, they were stationed many times in Coronado, where they were living when he died. As a Navy widow, she encountered many hurdles, including being told by her Casualty Assistance Officer that the VA Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) offset the Department of Defense Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP). The result was that her survivor benefit would be 78 percent less than active duty pay, which was fiscally and emotionally devastating.
“No one tells you what happens after they hand you the folded flag,” she says, and references “widow brain” clouding the ability to think clearly and navigate a complicated system that is difficult to grasp. She started her “agitation,” as she calls it, later that year and reached out to the Department of Defense (DOD) and various admirals and generals to ask that they do something to fix this problem. Kathy learned that this was not an easily remedied policy change but that the law needed to be changed. This meant that she had to figure out how to get legislation passed. She reached out to her congresswoman, other military widows, and veteran service organizations to obtain support for the issue and get a bill introduced.
Through the years she’s met many other military surviving spouses who were impacted, as she worked to educate Congressional staffers, organizations such as the VFW, the Military Officers Association of America (MOAA) and Silver Strand Chapter of MOAA, San Diego Board of Supervisors, SD Veterans Coalition, and more. It was an uphill battle, with everyone sympathetic to the predicament but not willing to affect change. She refused to give up and went to Washington, DC more than 100 times, sometimes alone and other times with two or three other widows, to meet with legislators and their staff.
Her advocacy gained traction in 2013, when she took to social media and created a private Facebook group for surviving spouses to find each other and work on the issue together. The group grew from six members to more than 2200 by 2019. 2016 was a pivotal year, when she started a petition on Change.org called “Stop denying earned survivor benefits to military widows” that garnered more than 100,000 signatures and was sent to President Trump, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, and other key leaders at the time. She drew on her teaching skills and created sample letters and talking points so supporters could personalize their message.
In December 2019, the Military Widows Equity Act (bill numbers HR 553 and S.622, which can be searched at www.congress.gov) was passed into law and included the National Defense Authorization Act. These bills had the most co-sponsors of any bills in Congress, through grass roots advocacy and the tenacity of military surviving spouses, with the most important assistance by MOAA, TAPS, and the VFW. When S.622 went to the floor of the Senate for a vote, it got 94 “yays” out of 100. The repeal was not retroactive back to the date of death, but just moving forward from the date of passage. The offset took another four years, with a three-year phase in, beginning in February 2021 through February 2023, when remaining surviving spouses started receiving full compensation. This repeal improved the lives of more than 66,000 military surviving spouses in 2019, and more since.
Kathy points out that there are still surviving spouses who don’t know about this significant change. Her Facebook group, Military Widows: SBP-DIC Offset/DIC Improvement, which now has more than 2600 members, provides information on how to apply for reinstatement, and information on the Caring for Survivors Act of 2025.
Last month, Kathy received a proclamation from the Coronado City Council designating January 20, 2026 as “Kathy Prout Day” in recognition of recently being named a 2025 MOAA Changemaker for Community Impact. She earned this honor because of her decades of dedicated work advocating for military surviving spouses and as a founder and board member of Gold Star Spouses of America, Inc. (GSSA). GSSA is a non-profit organization supporting both longstanding and newly bereaved surviving spouses of veterans and active duty service members who either died in the line of duty on active duty or of a military service caused illness or injury.
Kathy’s fight is not over. She emphasized that she does this to honor her husband’s service and sacrifice, and give his tragic death meaning. In April, she will once again travel to Washington, DC, this time for “The Caring for Survivor’s Act,” for improvements in Dependency and Indemnity Compensation, and the “Love Lives On Act,” which would allow military widows to remarry at any age, not only after 55, and keep their benefits.
She highlights that Representatives Scott Peters, Mike Levin, and Juan Vargas, have been supportive and sponsored bills to help military survivors and veterans. She is currently working with Vargas on language to amend the “HART Act.” which would change the IRA time frame from the current one year to three years for active-duty surviving spouses to convert SGLI (the military life insurance) into a Roth IRA. Many miss the opportunity due to lack of knowledge and/or “widow brain” fog.
While serving on the Board of the CA Council of Chapters of MOAA (CALMOAA), they took the initiative to eliminate California income tax on military retired pay and SBP. Kathy rallied as many as possible of the 27,000 surviving spouses to contact California legislators and the governor to garner support for AB 53. California did pass a $20,000 partial reduction in state taxes, with income limits, meaning it is no longer the only state in the country to not offer any reduction in military retired pay. She says this is a good start and they will continue to work for the complete elimination of taxes on military retired pay and SBP.
Kathy is also on the board of the local Silver Strand Chapter of MOAA, where she asked the board to be a sponsor for Wreaths Across America. She took the lead on the project, resulting in the donation of 600 wreaths for Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. Additionally, she orchestrated a food drive that garnered over 125 pounds of nonperishable foods to be donated to the ASYMCA for distribution to needy military families.
As Jr. Vice President of the Coronado VFW Auxiliary, with 15 core members and 181 in total, Kathy was busy as the “salmon chef” last June and July for the VFW Steak and Salmon dinners during the Sunday Concerts in the Park. She is pleased that the VFW Auxiliary recently gave over $11,000 to a variety of worthy non-profit organizations that support multiple organizations that help veterans. Support is needed for their upcoming March 26-28 rummage sale to help raise additional funds. Community members can start gathering household and clothing items in good condition to donate; furniture and large appliances are not accepted.
It’s undeniable that Kathy — as a Gold Star wife, mother of three, and grandmother of five — has made a positive impact in the community and on the lives of military families. When she’s not involved in military family advocacy, she enjoys going to lunch with friends, gardening, baking, and tootling around the Village in the golf cart with her grandchildren, who love Fuzziwig’s Candy Factory, snacks and slushies at the Shell station store, and slices from High Tide Pizza, Village Pizza, and Garage Buona Forchetta.
