Appropriations Bill Passes In The House With The Webb Amendment

[Donna]

Aid to Congressman Boren told me the bill passed the house last night with the Webb amendment included. It now goes back to the Senate for final approval then to Obama to sign. I understand this has to be done in July. Webb can withdraw his amendment or it can be passed with his language in it. It will not stop the funding, the funding has already been passed. It delays the dispursement of money to the Vets for 60 days during the review. My question is when does the 60 day time clock start ticking? I am thinking after the bill is signed by Obama. Which would make the delay August and September. His hearing is called for September 23rd, that would make the time period very short to gain opposition to the passage of the rule. Any thoughts?

[Berta]

If the regulations go through formally for the 3 new presumptives- I wonder if the Nehmer lawyers will raise cane on this 60 day delay-

I feel the Nehmer COurt Order with override any attempt to withhold any retro money at all.Even if it is awarded and will be paid eventually on a Nehmer AO award-this is a definite attempt to withhold benefits which in most cases are certainly going to be awarded.

The Nehmer Court Order and Stipulation never anticipated something like this.

You raised a good question Donna -when does the clock start ticking on all this- I have no idea and hate to even guess-

All I know is that the clock is ticking for our disabled vets with these presumptives and Webb sees to have forgotten all about that.

If he wants to act like he is saving the taxpayers money and being overly cautious that VA doesn't waste their money- all he has to do is go to VA Watchdog.com to find out how much waste of taxpayers money the VA is perpetuating.

[SgtAFMOB]

For What It's Worth:

The best explaination I have found is a post on www.VeteransBenifitsNetwork Agent Orange section, Topic "September Agent Orange Hearing Set, page 3, Post #43 by Omega. This post preceeded the House passage of the bill. however, deals with the process and possibilities involved. There are other similar topics with conjecture and situational stories regarding need. I followed this regulation also and in December 2009 it was sitting in OMB, prior to the Proposed Rule being published in March 2010. The NVLSP suggested lawsuit seemed to move it out of OMB. Seems to me this is a second go round at OMB. Hope Omega's explaination of the process will be helpful.

[Donna]

I asked the aid to Congressman Boren's office when the time clocks starts ticking of the 60 day review. He did not even know. He said he would have to call me back. The 60 day thing does not even make sense. They will have to pay back to the date of the claim so they are not saving anything. If he (Senator Webb) had a problem with this issue, why was it not brought up at the beginning of this procedure? The 13 billion has already been funded through passage of this bil for retroactive claims just in 2010. He claims he just noticed the 13 billion dollar figure in the bill and that peaked his interest. I call this grandstanding. Need to snail mail Senator Webb's office, email will not work if you are not residing in his state.

[Chuck75]

I would assume that the delay would start when the review starts.

The whole thing is messy to say the least.

The VA secretary, by law has and has exercised the authority to make a ruling. The NIH study mandated by congress has results that justify the secretary's decision.

The VA has yet to publish "final rules", and supposedly has suspended processing of IHD claims, and others until the "Final Rules" are in effect.

What Webb may want to do, perhaps as an under the table request from the VA, is ultimately nullify/reduce the Nehmer requirements for retroactive payment as much as possible.

Presently, for claims filed after a certain date 1985?, or is it later? retro must be paid for IHD back to the denied claim date, even if the claim was not filed as an A.O. related claim.

The VA has fought Tooth and Nail over this, and ended up back in court several times. There is an internal VA directive that cautions ROs to avoid making decisions that would result in not complying with the court's directives.

Aid to Congressman Boren told me the bill passed the house last night with the Webb amendment included. It now goes back to the Senate for final approval then to Obama to sign. I understand this has to be done in July. Webb can withdraw his amendment or it can be passed with his language in it. It will not stop the funding, the funding has already been passed. It delays the dispursement of money to the Vets for 60 days during the review. My question is when does the 60 day time clock start ticking? I am thinking after the bill is signed by Obama. Which would make the delay August and September. His hearing is called for September 23rd, that would make the time period very short to gain opposition to the passage of the rule. Any thoughts?

[Donna]

When Obama signs this bill into law, 13.4 billion is allocated to the VA for retro claims for fiscal year 2010 is what I understand. The 13.4 billion is what caught the eye of Sen Webb, sorry he did not READ the bill before that, but should we be surprised? The 60 day review stops the VA from paying the claims but does not stop them from developing the claims to be ready to pay after the review. Could Webb after the bill is signed say " ok I want the review to start in October?" The bill has to be signed by the end of July is what I was told. His hearing is the 23rd of September. If the review is all of August and September, then his time is up in October. Speculating, I know. We need to snail mail Webbs office. Dump tons of letters to his office right now. He is the same Senator that pushed through legislation for 52 Billion in benefits for the post 911 Vets and now trying to sabatage the Nam Vets. Write him a letter.

[stillhere]

He Is another one of the twerps in congress that served and then want to stick it to the vets he left behind. This is truly sad and does nothing again to bring together the Vietnam vets. I am totally disgusted with hime and his attitude toward vets and VA. If he wants to run the damn VA he should resign and put in for the job.

I got kicked off another VA loving board because I went off on webb so will not let it get the best of me here. But I live in Virginia and you all can rest assured I will be working for whoever runs against him in 2012! To bad he is not up this year. Not sure how much good it will do because of the thousands of military and vets that live in the state and work the Vietnam vet group is small.

He is like any other politians and goes with the group that can give hime the most votes. On Nov. 2 of this year the people will be voting on giving retired disabled veterans state benefits that many states already offer, like tax exemptions and other stuff will be interesting to see how that goes.

Anyhow sorry to be so long but I don't care for anyone who ties to stick it to a vet and exspecially a Vietnam vet to another.

Happy 4th!!