Legion helps stave off elimination of the Individual Unemployability program

By James Oxford, Legislative Commission chairman

In testimony before the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee on June 14, VA Secretary David Shulkin announced that the proposed elimination of the program benefitting 100 percent disabled individually unemployable (IU) veterans has been removed from VA’s fiscal year 2018 budget. After the hearing, Shulkin termed the IU elimination proposal dead.

Previously, Shulkin vigorously defended the proposal which had been part of President Trump’s FY 2018 VA budget. However, a number of veterans service organizations – including The American Legion – had expressed opposition to the plan. Elimination of the IU would have affected an estimated 225,000 veterans, 7,000 of them 80 years of age or older, with up to $22,000 disappearing from their VA disability compensation payments.

VA accountability legislation now law

On June 23, Trump signed into law Public Law (P.L.) 115-41, the VA Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act of 2017. This legislation will:

  • Create a new streamlined and efficient process to remove, demote or suspend (for longer than 14 days) any VA employee for poor performance or misconduct with a concrete shortened timeline, while still protecting employees’ due process rights, and would provide them with the right to appeal the action;
  • Provide expanded protections for whistleblowers and specifically bar VA from using this removal authority if the employee has an open whistleblower complaint/case with the Office of Special Counsel;
  • Provide the VA Secretary with the authority to: (1) reduce an employee’s federal pension if they are convicted of a felony that influenced their job at VA; (2) recoup a bonus provided to an employee who engaged in misconduct or poor performance prior to receiving the bonus; and (3) allow the Secretary to recoup any relocation expenses that were authorized for a VA employee only through the employee’s ill means, such as fraud, waste or malfeasance; and,
  • Authorize the Secretary to directly appoint individuals to the positions of Medical Center Director and Director of Veterans Integrated Service Network if they have a demonstrated ability in the medical profession, health care administration or health care fiscal management. T

VA opens emergency rooms to OTH vets 

On June 27, VA officials announced that veterans with other-than-honorable discharges will be able to access VA emergency rooms for urgent mental health care as of July 5. The new initiative mandates that the estimated 300,000 veterans with other-than-honorable paperwork may receive care for “a mental health emergency” for up to 90 days. That may include inpatient services, residential care or outpatient options.

 

Tags: Digital Dispatch