titleend VETERANS SERVICE AGENCY REPORT
June 6, 2024 - 11:00 AM
Director’s Report
§ Local Activities
o On Saturday, April 27th, I attended the Hospice of Orange and Sullivan Counties Honor Salute. The Honor Salute is a unique program that gives pride and peace to our terminally ill veterans while bringing family and friends together to celebrate their military service. I visited with 96-year-old WWII and Korean war era veteran, SAM KURPIL in Liberty, NY. He was born on April 20, 1928 in Parksville. The ceremony was appreciated by the veteran, his family, and all in attendance.
o On Saturday, May 18th, our Clerk Sheldon Dillon, attended the Healthy Sullivan Health Fair in the Government Center lobby. Sheldon worked with our Divisional partners to provide information regarding eligibility and the resources available within the VA health care system.
o On Monday, May 20th, I attended the ATI Saluting Spouses Program held at the ATI building on Broadway in Monticello. This event gave me the opportunity to provide military spouses with a list of State, County, and Federal benefits and programs available for families with disabled or deployed servicemen and women.
o Completed and distributed the Memorial Day list of events throughout the County.
o Held our annual County Memorial Day Ceremony on Monday, May 27th at the Sullivan County Veterans’ Cemetery on Sunset Lake Road in Liberty.
§ PACT Act Updates
o The PACT ACT continues to increase office traffic. March resulted in 844 phone calls and April 931 with most being PACT related issues.
o Myself and office staff have been working diligently to acquire proper ratings and effective dates of claim for our clients as these two issues comprise the majority of the errors received in a VA rating decision. Inadequate C&P exams and unlawful denials caused by a flawed electronic processing system continue to add to our workload and increase costs to our taxpayers.
o Our annual required Federal Training ran from May 13th - May 17th. During this training, Eagle Law and Bergmann and Moore law firms covered the proper application of effective dates of disability claims due to the Pact Act of August 10th 2022.
o The VA has applied thousands of IMPROPER effective dates shorting veterans hundreds of millions of dollars of retroactive pay creating yet another mountain of work for myself and staff. The good news is that we recovered a $318,000 retro payment for a severely disabled female Sullivan County veteran with an improper effective date. The payment came just in time to head off foreclosure of her home.
o From 2011-2022, VA accounting errors failed to properly report income for low income pensioners creating 40,000 debts due to overpayments.
o Some of our client living on as little as $1,200.00 a month have received VA debts of $65,000.00 dollars or more. As repayment of the debt would create extreme financial hardship, the VA has suspended collection related to the overpayments. We previously filed 75 waiver requests with VA DEBT MANAGEMENT CENTER (DMC). This time-consuming process requires that my staff and I count back over a decade of our client’s income and provide the DMC with detailed income from all sources.
§ The Good News
o We have been granted waivers of debt for many Sullivan County Veterans and Spouses.
o Our office staff continues to pursue VA adjudicative staff to discuss claims processing accuracy.
o On March 5th, the VA enacted SECTION 103, which expand healthcare eligibility for toxic exposed vets. The rules under Section 103 remove income limits and service connected requirements to receive VA healthcare.
VETERANS SERVICE AGENCY REPORT
June 6, 2024 - 11:00 AM
1. Veterans transported to V.A. Medical Centers:
Albany Castle Point Local
March 7 42 41
April 10 53 30
2. Veterans/Dependents buried in Sullivan County Veterans Cemetery through May 17, 2024:
Veterans Buried Alone . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,162
Dependents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Veterans/Spouses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 634
Total Burials in Veterans Cemetery - 1,938 (+24 since Dec. 2023)
3. Contacts:
March 177
April 138
4. Applications:
March 49
April 21
5. Homeless Veterans:
March 7
April 7
6. New Veterans
March 5
April 3