A New Decade, Some New Benefits

BY JOHN ROWAN

2020 begins with new benefits for the Blue Water Navy veterans affected by Agent Orange. This legislation had been held up for several years, but we finally got the new regulations last year. They went into effect on January 1. We will be getting out a pamphlet explaining everything about how to file a claim.

Also, the budget extension act for this year included an important component, eliminating the long reviled SBP/DIC problem—that is, the elimination of the reduction of benefits for military spouses who are also eligible to receive Dependency Indemnity Compensation from the VA. I learned about this abomination when I was first elected VVA President in 2005, and it took all these years to give the spouses their due.

2019 brought us a new Congress with the House now controlled by the Democrats. We have begun working with the new Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chair, Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.), and with Rep. Phil Roe (R-Tenn.), the Ranking Member and former Chair. We are sorry that Dr. Roe, a Vietnam-era veteran, is retiring at the end of the year. We wish him and his family well.

Another change occurred. Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chair Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) retired due to ill health. He is being replaced by Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Ky.), a longtime friend of VVA. We welcome Sen. Moran and thank Sen. Isakson for his support for veterans and their families and wish him well in retirement.

I am proud to announce that I have appointed Rebecca Patterson, as Deputy Director of the Veterans Health Council. Patterson is a Navy veteran, having served as a Farsi linguist and intelligence analyst in the Middle East. She has a master’s degree in environmental sciences and recently received her Certificate in Public Health, a very prestigious designation.

We look forward to using her expertise in developing our efforts to root out toxic exposure issues, such as the fires and gas attacks in the Persian Gulf War, the burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan and, more troubling, extreme pollution on the military bases in the United States, such as Camp Lejeune and many air bases.

From January 2-6, VP Tom Burke and I attended the Student Veterans of America (SVA) NATCON 2020 in Los Angeles. We mingled with more than 2,400 student-veterans from all over the country. Tom and I agree that this was the best convention either of us ever attended.

The SVA is run like one of the many major corporations that sponsor them with a Board of Directors that chooses the President/CEO. This is not surprising since the SVA has done a great job obtaining the support necessary to operate an entity consisting of some 1,600 chapters on campuses across the country and a budding alumni association, which they hope will keep the veterans together after they graduate.

The Convention had 96 breakout sessions, which focused on chapter development and leadership, as well as helping veterans prepare for leadership positions in corporate America. These veterans are very smart and, thanks to the GI Bill’s education benefits, are highly educated. Employers compete to hire them. VVA members can take great pride in the success of our efforts to obtain these education benefits for this generation of veterans, which, unfortunately, were not provided to us.

Rebecca Patterson, who is an SVA alum, participated in the Convention. She is an example of one thing I noticed there: the high participation of women veterans. They are becoming a larger segment of the veteran population and have a higher utilization rate of education benefits than their male peers. They are also significantly represented in the SVA leadership.

The SVA is one of the largest and most organized of the new veterans organizations. I encourage you to reach out to the campuses in your area to see if they have an SVA chapter and, if so, get to know them.

I had an opportunity to chat with SVA’s President/CEO Jared Lyon. I congratulated him on a great job, but while they are doing a great job for student-veterans, I am concerned about disabled vets with physical or mental issues and those unable to attend school for whatever reason. He understood. They seem to be taking more interest in efforts on Capitol Hill.