Rep. Salazar recommends implementation of Veterans’ Disability Benefits Commission

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congressman John T. Salazar commended today’s testimony of the Veterans’ Disability Benefits Commission (www.vetscommission.org) before the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee and praised their recommendations to Congress.

The Commission’s report, Honoring the Call to Duty: Veterans’ Disability Benefits in the 21st Century, calls for the Departments of Defense (DoD) and Veterans Affairs (VA) to use a consistent and uniform policy for rating disabilities of U.S. veterans.

The Veterans’ Disability Benefits Commission was established in 2004 as part of the National Defense Authorization Act.  Between May 2005 and October 2007, the Commission conducted an in-depth examination of the benefits and services available to veterans, service members, their survivors, and their families to compensate and provide assistance for the effects of disabilities and deaths attributable to military service.

“This Commission has worked tirelessly for three years to find ways to address the obstacles our veterans face when dealing with the VA,” Rep. Salazar said.  “It is essential that both the DoD and the VA enact these recommendations where they’re able, and important that Congress give them the tools to do so.”

The Commission’s report provided 113 recommendations and identified 14 priority recommendations that include:

• Using an updated VA Schedule for Rating Disabilities (VASRD) that would include the evaluation and rating of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other mental disorders and of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in both the DoD and VA and would be revised to account for new diagnostic classifications, medical criteria and medical advances;
• Identifying specific criteria for PTSD rating and establish a holistic approach to PTSD that couples compensation, treatment, and vocational assessment. Re-evaluation should occur every 2-3 years to ensure that treatment is effective;
• Initially increasing compensation rates up to 25 percent to take into account the quality of life and other non-work related effects of severe disabilities on veterans and their families;
• Eliminating the ban on concurrent receipt for all military retirees and for all service members who are separated from the military due to service-connected disabilities, as well as eliminating the SBP/DIC offset for survivors of retirees and in-service deaths, with priority for the more severely disabled veterans;
• Expediting compatible information systems for VA and DoD;
• Realigning the disability evaluation process so that the Military Services determine fitness for duty and service members who are found unfit for duty are referred to VA for disability rating;
• Improving the claims cycle by establishing a simplified and expedited process using best practices and maximizing use of information technology.

(Rep.  John T. Salazar (CO-03) is the only veteran in the Colorado Congressional delegation, and is a member of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee.)