Veterans' Issues
Our nation has a fundamental obligation to make good on the promises it has made over the years to the men and women who have served in the Armed Forces and sacrificed so much to protect our freedom. Fulfilling those promises – not only to veterans of past conflicts, but to those now returning from Iraq and Afghanistan – requires that we be willing to allocate the necessary resources. For that reason, I have supported substantial increases in funding, including $37.2 billion this year alone for veterans’ health care. That is up nearly ten percent over last year, and is 150 percent more than what was spent in 2001.
The number of veterans in Arizona continues to grow. According to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), there are 555,000 veterans in Arizona, nearly 10 percent of our civilian adult population. And with Arizona being the second-fastest growing state in the nation, that number will only continue to climb in the years ahead as veterans move to our state from other parts of the country.
For many years, the federal formula for allocating veterans health funding among the states failed to account for such dramatic shifts in the veterans’ population. Recognizing that the formula needed to be changed to ensure that veterans in Arizona receive the care they’ve earned, I worked with Senator McCain to craft a new framework for allocating federal funds: the Veterans' Equitable Resource Allocation (VERA) system. Adopted in 1997, our initiative established a new funding formula to ensure that veterans in rapidly growing states like ours have access to VA medical care, just as veterans in other parts of the country do.
VERA ensures that funding is distributed based on the actual population of eligible veterans in a state and region, rather than on historical funding patterns that fail to reflect the movement of veterans from one part of the country to another. As a result of this new system, the VA administrative unit that serves Arizona has seen its funding increase by 81.7 percent.
Acting on a bipartisan basis, the Senate recently approved a range of bills of interest to our nation’s veterans, among them:
- The FY2008 defense authorization bill. This legislation, which I supported and which is now law, implements new wounded warrior initiatives that make a number of improvements to the care, management, and transition of service members recovering from illness or injury received during war, and enhance health care and benefits for their families. It extends GI Bill educational benefits to reservists; accelerates paid-up status under the Survivor Benefit Plan; requires the VA to develop individualized health plans for veterans with traumatic brain injuries; establishes a new VA research and education program for traumatic brain injury; and expands combat-related special compensation eligibility for retirees.
- The FY2007 emergency supplemental appropriations bill. This legislation, which I supported and which became law, provided an additional $1.8 billion to ensure that veterans returning from Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom receive care for traumatic brain injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder. The bill also provided an additional $1.3 billion for the Veterans Health Administration.
- The Defenders of Freedom Tax Relief Act. This measure, which passed the Senate unanimously on December 12, 2007 and is now awaiting further action in the House of Representatives, would provide a tax credit for small businesses that continue paying a salary to members of the National Guard or military reservists when they are called to active duty. The bill would also simplify the income reporting rules for larger companies that continue paying salaries, and provide an extension of time for those veterans who have refunds relating to disability determinations by the Department of Veterans Affairs.
- The Dignified Treatment of Wounded Warriors Act. This bill, which passed the Senate with my support as a part of the defense authorization bill and is now law, will ease the transition of wounded soldiers from the military’s health-care system to the VA medical system.
- The FY2008 omnibus appropriations bill. This legislation, which I supported and which the President signed into law on December 26, 2007, provides $85.5 billion for the VA, including substantial increases for the Veterans Benefits Administration and the Veterans Health Administration. The bill also provides $3.7 billion in emergency funds for VA health care, including medical and prosthetic research, medical services, and the construction of new medical facilities.
- Military Reservist and Veteran Small Business Reauthorization and Opportunity Act. This bill, which I supported and the President signed into law on February 14, 2008, will permit the government to spend up to $4.4 million on Veterans Business Outreach Centers and allow the Small Business Administration to offer loans of up to $50,000 without collateral to reservists and veterans. The bill will also lengthen the time available to reservists to apply for disaster loans and raise the maximum small business loan amount.
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