As the Senate Foreign Relations Committee meets today, the Legion will be in attendance. The committee is discussing the status of al Qaeda, the Taliban and other extremist groups. Al Qaeda’s future as it relates to U.S. interests is also being considered by the House Foreign Affairs Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade subcommittee. The Legion is monitoring that meeting as well.
The Legion is attending a session of the House Appropriations Committee as the military construction budget bill for the next fiscal year is being put into its final form.
Legion staff is making final travel arrangements for the 30 junior athletes who will be competing in this year’s American Legion Junior Shooting Sports National Championships at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs on August 2-7.
Mailing state, regional and national championship medals to the Junior Shooting Sports National Tournament individual and team champions. The individual national champions will be determined at the 21st American Legion Junior Shooting Sports National Championships on August 2-7, 2011, in Colorado Springs, Colo.
Legion staff is attending a meeting of the Department of Defense Task Force on the Care, Management, and Transition of Recovering Wounded, Ill, and Injured Members of the Armed Forces. Past National Commander David Rehbein is a member of the 14-person task force, while staffer Brian Buckler, the Legion's Medical Evaluation Board/Physical Evaluation Board representative, is speaking at the session.
The Senate Veterans Affairs Committee is conducting a hearing concerning the return of service members to the civilian world. The “Seamless Transition – Improving Interagency Collaboration” is being monitored by the Legion’s Legislative Division.
Representatives of the Legion’s Legislative Division are attending a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing titled “Strategic Implications of Pakistan and the Region.” In light of recently intensified tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan over the Osama bin Laden operation, former National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones Jr. will testify.
Verna Jones, director of the Legion’s Veterans Affairs & Rehabilitation division, is in Madison, Wis., for the National Association of State Women's Veterans Coordinators’ Annual Training Conference.
The American Legion Child Welfare Foundation (CWF) is accepting grant applications for 2012. CWF grants provide nonprofit organizations with a means to educate the public about the needs of children across this nation.
Legion Legislative staff is meeting with representatives of fellow service organizations and other officials to explore a Government Accountability Office report on the implementation and effectiveness of advance appropriations. An advance appropriation is one made to become available one year or more ahead of the year for which an appropriations act (budget) is passed. The Legion fought for years for the institution of this practice with regard to the Department of Veterans Affairs.
