What's New
| VA Secretary Pressed by Senator on High Percentage of Wrongly Denied Benefit Claims |
March 16, 2010, Washington, DC (CQ Politics) - A leading Republican senator on Tuesday asked Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki to explain why so many veterans’ benefit claims are wrongly denied, resulting in a high rate of reversal on appeal. |
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| Profile of New Veterans' Courts in New York Times |
Defendants Fresh From War Find Service Counts in Court - VCS Supports Veterans' Courts March 15, 2010, Charleston, West Virginia (New York Times) — When Judge Robert C. Chambers handed down Timothy Oldani’s federal sentence for selling stolen military equipment on eBay, he gave the former Marine a break. |
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| Presdent Obama Donated $250,000 of Nobel Prize Money to Fisher House |
March 11, 2010, Washington, DC (New York Times) - President Obama made good on his promise to give his $1.4 million Nobel Prize money to charity, releasing the names on Thursday of the organizations that will benefit. |
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| Philanthropist Bobby Willis to Build New $3.3 Billion Hospital for VA in Farmington, NM for Rural and Native American Veterans |
Proposed state-of-the-art Kirtland veterans clinic could provide as many as 8,000 jobs March 14, 2010, Farmington, New Mexico (Farmington Daily Times) — A proposed veterans complex in Kirtland centered around a new hospital, backed by a wealthy entrepreneur and costing an estimated $3.3 billion promises to bring state-of-the-art medicine and other benefits to veterans, as well as 8,000 jobs to the local economy. |
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| Dr. Haley at UTSW Presents Compelling Brain Images Showing Gulf War Illness |
VCS Asks VA: Since UTSW Research Remains Vital to Understanding Gulf War Illness, Then Why Did a Handful of VA Staff in Washington Impede UTSW Contract and Then End Funding for UTSW? March 9, 2010, Salt Lake City, Utah (Science News) - Nearly two decades after vets began returning from the Middle East complaining of Gulf War Syndrome, the federal government has yet to formally accept that their vague jumble of symptoms constitutes a legitimate illness. Here, at the Society of Toxicology annual meeting, yesterday, researchers rolled out a host of brain images – various types of magnetic-resonance scans and brain-wave measurements – that they say graphically and unambiguously depict Gulf War Syndrome. |
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VCS Praises Secretary Shinseki as He Takes Charge and Fixes Post-9/11 GI Bill Fiasco
Written by Bob Brewin
Friday, 02 October 2009 16:38
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Student Vets Get Pay -- and Pizza NextGov, October 2, 2009 - Here's a real "Hooah" for the top leadership at the Veterans Affairs Department, who decided early on Friday to keep all 57 of the department's 57 regional offices open until every veteran waiting in line picked up an emergency GI bill check valued at up to $3,000. Based on reports I have received from individual veterans and veterans groups, the Washington D.C. office on 1722 I Street N.W. was nearly overwhelmed by a crowd of 300 vets waiting for payment at about noon on Friday. VA spokeswoman Katie Roberts told me that to speed processing on I street, VA dispatched more computers and staff to handle the crowd. And since it was lunch time, they ordered pizza for one and all, she said. VA likely was able to quickly assess the situation at the Washington regional office because Roberts told me Deputy Secretary W. Scott Gould and Assistant Secretary of Public and Intergovernmental Affairs Tammy Duckworth were hanging out there to greet veterans. Also in the crowd at the I Street office was Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., chairman of the House VA Committee, who showed up to say hello and also eyeball the emergency payment process. Lines in other areas of the country were smaller, Roberts said, a fact confirmed by Ryan Gallucci, a spokesman for AmVets, a veterans service organization like the VFW or the American Legion. Gallucci said AmVets staffers at VA offices in Oakland, Calif.; Phoenix, Ariz.; Atlanta, and Winston-Salem, N.C., reported long lines early in the morning, but had disappeared by the end of the day. As of 3 p.m. on Friday, VA had made 6,619 emergency payments to veterans at regional offices and another 6,752 had requested emergency payments online, Roberts said. Paul Sullivan, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, gives VA high marks for the emergency payment program and described the decision to keep the office open until everyone gets paid "unprecedented."
Graph from Houston Chronicle Story from NextGov |
