Clarification Of Va Laws/regulations?

[Vync]

In my state, I can send a letter to the Attorney General's office and request an clarification on how existing state laws should be applied.

Is it possible to request clarification of VA laws/regulations, other than by pursuing appeals through the BVA or CAVC?

[Berta]

"Berta may have better info on the regional counsel, as, I believe, she has had some dealings w/them."

Many , as recently as last year- and I even asked Jeff (the VA RC up here in NY) to be guest on a SVR show 2 years ago ago but he didn't feel he should do that. I promised I would do the interview and be nice to him and no one would give him a hard time.

The RC contact info for all RCs is here at hadit somewhere.

Also a few years ago when the accreditation regs came out in the Fed Reg I called up Mike Daugherty- VA Central- the lawyer from OGC who wrote these regs and we talked for a considerable period of time as I had some questions regarding those regs.

I believe if you call your RC who has jurisdiction in your RO area or the OGC itself they will gladly refer you to a lawyer who would willing discuss specific regs.They might prefer however to do it by mail.

When I called Mike- he was very receptive to me -I think because he said he was surprised an advocate from NY was actually reading his stuff in the Fed Register.I told him VA case law and regs are what I live for!

As Philip mentioned=the VBM is the top source for explaining the VA claims process and how the regs work.

I have bought the VBM annually since 1991 and would have never won my FTCA case without it.

I also access M21-1MR as Carlie mentioned and cant live without that either.

VA Case law interpretations and applications of 38 USC, 38 CFR are found in all BVA decisions and CAVC cases.(not always correct but most of the time they are)

Also ,when the VA proposes to amend a reg or change a reg etc- they give public notice in the Federal Register.

I recently commented on a proposed Notice there and the contact info for the lawyer who posted it from VACO is also there too.

I did have a situation after my last award which-at first it looked as though the VA was going to force me to appeal something.No way Jose on that.

My award had taken 6 years to that point and they were not going to string me out again.

It took me many more long months to force them to read a specific regulation which they refused to do so I went over the heads to the RC and then since I didn't like what Jeff said I went over his head to the OGC.

Finally some top OGC lawyer sent the RO the exact same regs I had been sending them and my money was in my mailbox 3 weeks later.

(They had sent me a letter to take to my bank as this would be wired in as it was a high figure award.

Then I found the check had been mailed instead and was under a pile of snow in my mailbox that had blown open due to a storm.Geeez.

So I had avoided a long NOD,SOC,blah blah blah situation but it still took many months to correct the problem.

Also asking them to CUE themselves got me faster results a few times too.

These are steps one can take that can stave off a long ardeous appellate process but the situations that make these moves arise are very few and far between.

The regs control us but they also control the VA.

If they committed a CUE in a decision and you can prove it- that could potentially stave off a long appeal.

If they violated your VCAA rights (which GUARANTEES a long appeal process and then a BVA remand in most cases, but if you fight the violation right from the git go- then you also can shave off some appeal time).

The VCAA violation must be a legal violation so severe that it compromises your rights under 38 USC.

I hope the lawyers out there who are representing vets do what the BVA does and check the VCAA letters right away.

I also hope they are aggressive and knowledgable enough to fight over anything in a decision that could be combatted without the appellate route but those challenges rely solely on challenges of VA case law that was broken in a decision.