In This Issue:
1. House Passes Advanced Appropriations
2. Senate Subcommittee Approves Advanced Appropriations
3. VA Committee Mark-Ups
4. U.S.-Russia Joint Commission
1. House Passes Advanced Appropriations: In a Friday afternoon vote, the
House passed by a vote of 414-3 language that would fund VA medical
accounts two-years in advance. Advanced appropriations is a top
priority goal for VFW. "This is a huge step forward for disabled
veterans, and the historic funding increases the House provides will
dramatically improve the healthcare programs our nation delivers to her
defenders," said Glen M. Gardner Jr., VFW Commander-in-Chief.
Yesterday, the Senate passed their bill out of their Appropriations
Subcommittee on Military Construction and VA (see story below). It now
moves to the full Senate for consideration. The VFW is asking for you
to contact your senators and urge them to vote for advanced
appropriations as part of their Military Construction/Veterans Affairs
funding package (S. 1402).
To contact a member of the U.S. Senate, go to:
http://capwiz.com/vfw/dbq/officials/To read the VFW press release on the House passage, go to:
http://www.vfw.org/ 2. Senate Committee Approves Advanced Appropriations: Yesterday, Senate
Appropriations' Subcommittee on Military Construction and Veterans
Affairs approved their funding package for FY 2010. Included in the
$133.9 billion bill is the house-matched provision that would provide
Advanced Appropriations for VA medical services. The subcommittee
approved $48.2 billion, the same amount provided in the House bill for
VA medical care in FY 2011. We expect the full Senate to take it up
before the end of the session. Other VFW-supported items in the bill
include:
* $23.2 billion for military construction and family housing
* $3.2 billion for health care and support services for homeless
programs
* $1.3 billion for VA to address critical maintenance and
construction projects
* $533 million to expand eligibility for priority 8 veterans
* $440 million for care in rural and highly rural areas
* $183 million for women veterans
* $50 million to establish CBOCs in rural areas underserved by
VA
* And funding to allow VA to hire 1,200 new claims processors
for FY 2010.
To read the Senate subcommittee press release, go to:
http://appropriations.senate.gov/military.cfm 3. House VA Subcommittee Mark-ups: On Thursday, the Health Subcommittee
cleared several VFW-supported bills they include:
* HR 1197 would give Medal of Honor recipients equal priority
status as Purple Heart recipients for VA hospital care and medical
services.
* HR 1293 would increase the amount veterans receive for
improvements and structural alterations. Veterans with service-connected
disabilities would receive $6,800 and those with nonservice-connected
disabilities would receive $2,000.
* HR 1302 would create a Director of Physician Assistant
Services position inside the office of the VA Under Secretary of Health.
* HR 1546 would establish the Committee on Care of Veterans with
Traumatic Brain Injury to assess and make recommendations on VHA's
ability to treat and rehabilitate veterans with TBI.
* HR 1335 would prohibit catastrophically-disabled veterans from
having to pay copayments or other fees for critical medical services
delivered outside a hospital or nursing home.
* HR 2926 would direct VA to provide, without expiration,
hospital care, medical services, and nursing home care for Vietnam-era
and Persian Gulf War veterans exposed to herbicides.
Also on Thursday, the Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial
Affairs passed several bills to include:
* HR 2379, The Veterans Group Life Insurance Act, would allow
veterans insured under VGLI to increase their coverage amount once a
year within a five year period.
* HR 2774, The Families of Veterans Financial Security Act,
would permanently extend SGLI coverage for totally disabled veterans.
* HR 2968 would eliminate the deduction in accelerated death
payments to terminally-ill veterans and service members under SGLI and
VGLI.
For more on the bills, visit the House VA website at:
http://veterans.house.gov/, or type the bill number into the search box
at:
http://thomas.loc.gov/.
4. U.S.-Russia Joint Commission: The VFW hopes Monday's exchange of
diplomatic notes will revitalize a joint commission to help determine
the fates of missing American personnel from past wars. The U.S.-Russia
Joint POW/MIA Commission was key to accessing Russian military archives
for information on some of the 88,000 missing Americans from World War
II through the end of the Cold War; however, American researchers have
been barred from the archives since October 2006. Since first learning
of the problem, VFW worked with Russian veterans' organizations to open
up a communications channel to the Russian government that was outside
normal diplomatic arenas. The new access enabled VFW Commander-in-Chief
Glen Gardner to address their Federation Council Committee on Defense
and Security last October (similar our Senate Armed Services and
Homeland Security Committees), to impress upon them - from a veteran's
viewpoint - just how important the return of fallen soldiers is to the
families of both nations. "I am very proud of the VFW's lead role in
helping to breathe new life into the U.S.-Russia Joint Commission," he
said in a press release, which can be read online at:
http://www.vfw.org/index.cfm?fa=news.newsDtl&did=5120.
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