FORT BLISS, Texas - More than 50 veterans gathered to hear Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki speak about his goals to improve the quality of life for veterans at the El Paso VA Health Care System facility.

Shinseki, who is a member of President Obama's cabinet, was hosted by three local members of Congress, including Rep. Silvestre Reyes, Rep. Ciro Rodriguez and Rep. Harry Teague.

During Shinseki's visit, he toured the VA facility and the Fort Bliss National Cemetery, and he participated in a veterans roundtable before addressing the public on the purpose of his visit.

In his speech, he addressed three specific goals targeting programs affecting the nation's veterans: reducing the growing backlog of claims, improving the quality of VA healthcare facilities and reducing homelessness among all veterans.

Teague agreed that "there is a definite culture change happening within the area of veterans affairs."

Regarding the backlog, Shinseki has established four pilot projects: one in Pittsburgh; others in Little Rock, Ark.; Providence, R.I.; and Baltimore that will help the department identify how to simplify claims and minimize obstacles that keep veterans from registering with the VA.

As for the second goal, he shared that the 2011 budget, while under review, includes a financial increase for the Veterans Benefits Administration, which will allow for more medical personnel and better facilities.

Even though more than 131,000 veterans are homeless, Shinseki stressed he won't be able to take them all off of the street; rather, he spoke of the importance of opening up jobs and enhancing education for veterans, using new programming and funding, such as the GI Bill.

Shinseki said the Obama administration is planning to increase the Veteran Affairs budget by 15 percent in 2010, which is the largest increase in more than 20 years.

As for Shinseki's goals, Teague and the other congressmen said they have absolute confidence in his leadership and that he will accomplish all he can during his term.

"He openly addresses the hurdles we face in the VA," Teague said. "He's not trying to sweep them under the carpet."

The Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS) recently launched their latest tool to help wounded warriors, those who are medically retired due to disabilities, understand how their retirement pay, Department of Veterans Administration compensation, and Combat Related Special Compensation (CRSC) are determined. Called the “Medical Disability Retired Pay Income Estimator,” the tool coupled with a detailed online PowerPoint tutorial can help wounded warriors estimate their combined Military and Department of Veterans Affairs post-retirement income and better understand the retired pay and compensation they are currently receiving.

Work on the “estimator” began in earnest after a group of Army Ombudsmen pointed out the need to help educate wounded warriors, family members, and local counselors on how retirement and disability pays work together and how the complicated rules and offsets affect their monthly payments. The confusion caused by these rules often leads to added frustration for the wounded warriors and their families.

Service members often find that the actual amount they receive is less than they expected. Being able to help manage their expectations earlier in the process helps avoid frustration and enables members to better plan their budget and future income needs.

To get an estimate of their future pay, users input their personalized data such as disability ratings, CRSC ratings, years of service, pay, and dependent information. In addition users who want a more in-depth explanation of the how the offsets work can take the online tutorial found at the DFAS website.

Developed by Wounded Warrior Pay Management team members Danielle Trumpey and Ryan Lindner, the tool is the latest step taken by the team in their ongoing work to ensure wounded service members receive the pay they deserve and fully understand the processes involved.

The team's work dates back to 2004 when it was dicovered that wounded Soldiers had been overpaid and were facing recoupment for indebtedness because their combat related pay was not stopped while they were being treated for their injuries at stateside military treatment facilities. The overpayments were the result of a lack of communication between the Soldier’s units and the pay center, which was not getting word that the wounded Soldiers had been medically evacuated out of the combat theater.DFAS responded by forming the Wounded Warrior Pay Management Office and establishing a Wounded Warrior database. In 2005 the team began working directly with the Army in to ensure wounded Soldiers would no longer get lost in the system.
In 2006 DFAS began supplementing Army Finance with civilian personnel. DFAS team members meet each wounded warrior as they arrive at Landstuhl Germany to explain the process and enter their pertinent information into the DFAS Wounded Warrior database. This face-to-face support doesn't end until they reach their home station. Wounded Warrior Pay Program Manager, Jerry Christensen said, “In the end, no matter the pay system, there will always be a need for the critical human dimension to provide world class, accurate and real-time financial support to the individual Wounded Warrior and their family members.” The end result is that each wounded warrior’s progress is now closely tracked as they transition through each part of their medical treatment and eventual retirement process.

In addition to the personalized service, through use of new streamlined debt management procedures, DFAS remitted, canceled, or waived debts for over 14,000 wounded warrior accounts totaling approximately $13 million. 

DFAS will be the first to tell you that their work is far from over, “we are actively engaged in continually improving Wounded Warrior pay support through customer based solutions,” Christensen added.

The Veterans Administration is pushing for expanded rural health care for veterans, increased funding and attention to female veterans' health needs and ending veterans' homelessness as part of a $125 billion budget proposed by the White House for fiscal 2011. The budget also includes funds to be used for speeding up the processing of disability compensation claims and completing the automation of GI Bill applications.

"Our budget proposal provides the resources necessary to continue our aggressive pursuit of President Obama's two over-arching goals for veterans," Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki said yesterday in a statement. "First, the requested budget will help transform VA into a 21st century organization. And second it will ensure that we approach veterans' care as a lifetime initiative, from the day they take their oaths until the day they are laid to rest."

To speed up disability claims, the White House is proposing boosting processors by more than 4,000. The VA received 1,014,000 claims in 2009 and anticipates 1,319,000 in 2011, in part because of the agency's expansion of the number of diseases now automatically attributed to exposure to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War, according to the VA.

The budget, an $11 billion increase over the current year's, includes $60.3 billion in discretionary spending, mostly health care, and $64.7 billion for entitlements, largely disability compensation and pension, the VA said.


Also included in the budget is $44 million to complete an automated system for processing applications for the Post-9/11 GI Bill. Spokeswoman Katie Roberts told Military.com Monday that the project is on target to be finished by December.

One of the biggest items in the budget is $4.2 billion to eliminate and help reduce homelessness among veterans. The figure includes $3.4 billion for core medical services and $799 million for specific homeless programs and expanded medical care, according to the VA, which says that 131,000 vets are homeless on a typical night.

In addition, the proposed 2011 budget includes $5.2 billion for mental health care and suicide prevention, a $410 million increase over the current year's appropriation that would be used to expand inpatient, residential and outpatient mental health services. The plan also calls for making mental health services part of primary care and specialty care. The VA said in a statement that the money will permit the continued expansion of programs for post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury, and for diagnosing and treating mental health problems and preventing suicides.

Among veterans eyed for expanded care under the 2011 budget are those living in rural America and women.
The budget includes $250 million to beef up health care access to an estimated 3.2 million vets living in rural areas. Some of the money will go toward expanded use of home-based primary care and mental health services, but it will also include an additional $42 million for the VA's "telehealth" program, which permits health care providers to monitor patients daily via phone and telephone-based data transmission. Currently the VA has 35,000 vets in the telehealth program.

With the number of female veterans growing rapidly and many turning to the VA for health care, the agency intends to appropriate $217.6 million to meet the medical needs of women. This is $18.6 million more than is currently being spent on women-specific health programs.

The U.S. Senate voted 98-0 to pass the Caregivers and Veterans Omnibus Health Services Act of 2009, a sweeping reform bill sponsored by Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee Chairman Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii) for wounded warriors and the families who care for them. S. 1963 merges two veterans' health bills which passed the Committee with unanimous bipartisan support this summer, only to be blocked from a floor vote by a single Senator until today.

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