Congress needs history lesson on Veterans' Claims

Congress needs history lesson on Veterans' Claims
Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
March 4, 2014

We told veterans that compensation from the VA for their wounds due to their service, was something they already paid for the day they joined prepared to risk their lives. What we didn't tell them was that Congress wouldn't see any of it as their responsibility. Their duty to make sure that all our veterans were honored and respected more than twice a year. That their service was worth all this nation could do for them in return.

Members of congress think they are pulling the wool over our eyes pretending all the issues with the VA are new. After all, they have been able to do just that for years. They love to forget how long all of this has been going on because they would have to actually be held accountable if the American public had been aware. So here is a little history lesson for them. Ok, not for them but for us because of them.

NPR reported on this in January of 2008, yes you read that right, 2008.

Army officials in upstate New York instructed representatives from the Department of Veterans Affairs not to help disabled soldiers at Fort Drum Army base with their military disability paperwork last year. That paperwork can be crucial because it helps determine whether soldiers will get annual disability payments and health care after they're discharged.

How do I know this? Because it was posted on Wounded Times as well as over 21,000 other articles. Wounded Times remembers what was reported and the archive does not forget.

After NPR ran the story, they did a followup with this,

Morning Edition, February 7, 2008 · A document from the Department of Veterans Affairs contradicts an assertion made by the Army surgeon general that his office did not tell VA officials to stop helping injured soldiers with their military disability paperwork at a New York Army post.

The paperwork can help determine health care and disability benefits for wounded soldiers.

Last week, NPR first described a meeting last March between an Army team from Washington and VA officials at Fort Drum Army base in upstate New York. NPR reported that Army representatives told the VA not to review the narrative summaries of soldiers' injuries, and that the VA complied with the Army's request.

The day the NPR story aired, Army Surgeon General Eric B. Schoomaker denied parts of the report. Rep. John McHugh (R-NY), who represents the Fort Drum area, told North Country Public Radio, that "The Surgeon General of the Army told me very flatly that it was not the Army that told the VA to stop this help."

Now, NPR has obtained a four-page VA document that contradicts the surgeon general's statement to McHugh. It was written by one of the VA officials at Fort Drum on March 31, the day after the meeting. The document says Col. Becky Baker of the Army Surgeon General's office told the VA to discontinue counseling soldiers on the appropriateness of Defense Department ratings because "there exists a conflict of interest."

On February 13, this came out causing my jaw to drop. "VA claim backlog at 816,211 but IT cut back? WTF"

Vets' groups urge IT budget boost for benefits processing
By Bob Brewin bbrewin@govexec.com
February 13, 2008

Veterans' services organizations have urged Congress to provide a sharp increase in the information technology budget of the agency that handles their compensation and pension claims. The fiscal 2009 IT budget request for the Veterans Benefits Administration is about 18 percent less than the fiscal 2008 proposal. The overall IT budget for the Veterans Affairs Department, VBA's parent agency, jumped 18 percent in President Bush's latest request.

VBA's pending compensation and claims backlog stood at 816,211 as of January 2008, up 188,781 since 2004, said Kerry Baker, associate legislative director of the Disabled Veterans of America, during a Wednesday hearing of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense.

Baker said VBA must have the funds necessary to upgrade its IT infrastructure to handle the backlog and a growing caseload. Anything short of an increase is "a recipe for failure," he added.

Carl Blake, national legislative director for the Paralyzed Veterans of America, said VBA needed $121 million in its fiscal 2009 budget for its information technology. According to VA budget documents, VBA requested an IT budget of $109.6 million for its compensation and benefits programs, down $23.8 million from $133.4 million in 2008. VA requested an overall 2009 IT budget of $2.53 billion in 2009, up from $2.15 billion in fiscal 2008, with the largest portion earmarked for the Veterans Health Administration.

By October Bob Filner, Chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee was upset over the report that claims were being shredded. "VA’s order Thursday to its 57 regional offices to stop shredding documents after veterans’ claims materials were found in piles of paper waiting to be destroyed." A month later there were new rules to prevent a repeat." And before shredding any document, two VA employees, including a supervisor, would have to sign off, according to a draft of the policy obtained by the St. Petersburg Times on Friday. The policy comes after the discovery last month of nearly 500 veterans' claims documents improperly set aside for shredding in 41 VA benefits offices."

As bad as all that is, Congress needs to be reminded of this

Veterans Still Burned Over 35 Year Old Fire
For more than 30 years many a veteran has been faced with the chilling reality of discovering that their military service records had gone up in smoke in a St. Louis fire.

Since that time countless numbers of veterans have been fired up by responses to inquiries and benefits applications that include the now infamous "Your records were burned…" statement.

To this day among many veterans the standard wisecrack upon being told that a service or VA document of theirs has been misplaced or is temporarily unavailable is- "Must have had another fire in St. Louis." More skeptical vets feel that the fire offered a convenient opportunity for covering up long standing mismanagement of important records and offered the system yet another means of dodging the benefits bullet.

What about the fire? And what was burned? The only answer is the official one and official answers tend to serve only as confirmation to the believers and fuel for fire for the skeptics. Nonetheless, here it is:

"On July 12, 1973, a disastrous fire at National Personnel Records Center, Military Personnel Records (NPRC-MPR) in St. Louis destroyed approximately 16-18 million Official Military Personnel Files."The National Archives

Just as important an issue is- Which records went up in smoke? Once again, the official word from The National Archives:
"Army records: Personnel discharged November 1, 1912, to January 1, 1960. 80% estimated loss.Air Force records: Personnel discharged, September 25, 1947, to January 1, 1964 (with names alphabetically after Hubbard, James E.). 75% estimated loss."