Top 10 Veterans Stories in Today’s News

From the VA:

Top 10 Veterans Stories in Today’s News

1.      Contract Reveals VA Knew About Prudential’s Death Benefit Account. In continuing coverage, the CBS Evening News (9/14, story 4, 3:00, Couric, 6.1M) said “earlier this summer,” revelations that Prudential, the “country’s second-largest life insurer,” was “profiting from the death benefits of fallen soldiers was news to almost everyone.” Now, however, a “major development” in the story points out that “this was not the case at the US Department of Veterans Affairs,” which in “September of last year,” amended “its contract with Prudential, ratifying what had been a ten-year-long verbal agreement to allow the insurance company to retain lump-sum death benefits of soldiers and deposit that money into its own account.” On Tuesday, VA “announced a list of reforms to its group life insurance programs, vowing to ‘provide better clarity of payment options’ to the families of fallen soldiers.”
     CBS News (9/14, Couric) also covered this story on its website. Similar coverage is offered by the New York Daily News (9/15, Shahid, 527K) and Dow Jones Newswires (9/14). Numerous local TV stations in various parts of the country, including WFMY-TV Greensboro, NC (9/14, 11:14 p.m. ET) and KOAT-TV Albuquerque, NM (9/14, 5:10 p.m. MT), also aired reports on this story.
     Bloomberg Rewind (9/14, 6:16 p.m. ET), meanwhile, broadcast, “Bloomberg Markets magazine has learned of a secret deal” in 1999 between Prudential and VA. At that time, VA’s “insurance director e-mailed another VA official, saying the ‘plan could backfire’ and asking, ‘Who is responsible’ if the benefit account set up by Prudential without backing from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation ‘goes belly up?'” After noting that VA, “New York State, Georgia, and a House committee” have launched separate investigations of Prudential and the survivors’ accounts, Bloomberg added, “Prudential…says it is in compliance with its contract with Veterans Affairs.” Other Bloomberg TV programs aired similar reports earlier in the day. On its website, meanwhile,
     VA Announces Life Insurance Policy Reforms. Bloomberg (9/15, Plungis, Evans, 100K) also notes that on Tuesday, VA “said Prudential…will now send beneficiaries of VA life-insurance policies a check when they ask for a lump-sum benefit payment rather than keeping the money and mailing a checkbook. The veterans agency will continue to offer a money-market type account that lets the insurer withhold payments of benefits for survivors of fallen service members, while making clear the funds aren’t insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the accounts aren’t endorsed by the government, the VA said…in a statement on its website.” While the “nonprofit advocacy group,” Veterans for Common Sense, “called the government’s action a positive first step,” Paul Sullivan, the group’s executive director, who said VA “reforms need to go further” so that, among others things, “Prudential repays families” who lost out on interest-earning opportunities while Prudential held their money.
     The CNN (9/14, Rizzo) website quotes both Peter Gaytan, “executive director of the American Legion in Washington,” who said his group is “very supportive of the…changes” made by VA, and US Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-HI), a World War II veteran who chairs of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee. Akaka told CNN that he is “writing to (Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki) to get more information on the decision-making process behind these insurance benefits payments.”

2.      Shinseki Praises Man For Whom VA Clinic Was Renamed. In continuing coverage, the Alexandria (MN) Echo Press (9/15, Edenloff, 9K) reports, “It was a solemn but exciting day” for the approximately “400 veterans and their families” who gathered at the Alexandria Veterans Affair Clinic on Saturday, where they saw the facility be “renamed to honor a former Alexandrian who was hailed as an American hero and a staunch supporter for veterans medical care – Max J. Beilke.” Veterans Affairs Secretary, who praised Beilke when delivering the “keynote address at Saturday’s ceremony,” met “with the Beilke family and presented Beilke’s wife, Lisa, with a book, Remembrance, which honors those who have made sacrifices for their country. Shinseki included a note, saying” Beilke is missed “always will” be.

3.      VA Hospital Offers Assistance To Homeless. The Savanna (GA) Morning News (9/15, Curl) notes that on Tuesday, almost “600…homeless individuals took advantage” of a “collaborative effort between” the Carl Vinson Veterans Affairs Medical Center and “various Savannah-based organizations,” which offered “assistance regarding housing options, job sources, substance abuse treatment, veterans’ benefits, legal counseling and health care.” After noting that the “Stand Down for Homelessness is an annual event intended to serve homeless veterans,” although it is “open to all homeless or near homeless individuals and families,” the Morning News added, “US Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki made it a commitment to end homelessness among veterans, said Michael Bland, of the Carl Vinson center,” who stated that Tuesday’s Stand Down is “just one part of that overall plan.”

4.      Committee To Hold Hearing On Personality Disorder Discharges. Near the end of “Today At A Glance,” CQ (9/15) notes that at 10 a.m. in 334 Cannon on Wednesday, the House Veterans Affairs Committee is scheduled to hold a “hearing on veterans’ benefits and discharges of those with personality disorders.”

 5.      Vets Cemetery Dedicated In Missouri. The Waynesville (MO) Daily Guide (9/15, Leroux, 2K) reports, “Hundreds of community members, along with national, state and local representatives, celebrated the dedication of the state’s newest veterans cemetery Monday. The Missouri Veterans Cemetery – Fort Leonard Wood held the official dedication at 1 p.m.” in the afternoon, “with speakers such as US Rep. Ike Skelton and Waynesville Mayor Cliff Hammock.”

6.      VA’s Cost For Treating Sleep Apnea Expected To Increase. KSAN-TV San Angelo, TX (9/14, 10:20 p.m. CT) broadcast, “More veterans are suffering” from sleep apnea. While the “number one risk factor” for sleep apnea is weight, experts are “concerned that exposure to dust and smoke during repeat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan are…contributing” to an increase in the number of service members suffering from the condition. After noting that the Department of Veterans Affairs is “expected to spend about $500 million a year to treat veterans” with sleep apnea, KSAN added, “That cost is expected to rise over the coming years.”

 7.      Two Bodies Buried In Wrong Plots At Arlington National Cemetery. The Washington Post (9/15, Davenport, 605K) reports, “Arlington National Cemetery officials discovered that two people were buried in the wrong plots after exhuming their remains last month, an Army official confirmed Tuesday. It’s the first revelation of bodies being exhumed since the Army released” a June report that “found extensive record-keeping problems at the nation’s premier military cemetery, including more than 100 unmarked graves, scores of grave sites with headstones that are not recorded on cemetery maps, and at least four burial urns that had been unearthed and dumped in an area where excess grave dirt is kept.” On Wednesday, Arlington officials are “scheduled…to disinter the remains of a third person, Marine Pfc. Heath Warner,” an Iraq veteran “whose family members became worried that he was buried in the wrong spot after finding inaccuracies in his burial paperwork.”

8.      VA’s Chief Technology Officer Calls “Blue Button” The First Step Toward Lifetime EHR. Government Health IT (9/13, Mosquera) reported, “The recently installed ‘blue button’ on the Veteran Affairs Department’s MyHealtheVet portal represents a first step toward the type of full access to their personal health records veterans can expect to see when…VA stands up the virtual lifetime electronic record (VLER). That was how Peter Levin,” VA’s chief technology officer, “described the relationship between the blue button project and VLER, the ambitious VA-Defense Department plan to track the health, benefits and administrative records of people from the day they are inducted into the military through the remainder of their lives as veterans.” According to Government Health IT, Levin made his comments during an interview.

9.      Community Benefiting From New VA Patient Account Center. In continuing coverage, the Murfreesboro (TN) Daily News Journal (9/15, Loyal) says that while it “took about two seconds Tuesday to make a snip with some giant scissors at the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Department of Veteran Affairs’ new Mid-South Consolidated Patient Account Center,” the facility is “something the community has been waiting on for quite some time. The VA employs more than 400 people at the Smyrna facility with about 60 more spread out among the 19 VA medical centers it serves, according to Stephanie Mardon, deputy chief business officer for revenue operations,” who “said roughly 100 more people will be hired at Smyrna by March – which comes as great news to a town and a county with unemployment figures that have hovered around 10 percent.” The WSMV-TV Nashville, TN (9/14) website also noted that the center is looking to hire more people.

10.    VA Officials Hear From Angry Vets At Forum In Georgia. WALB-TV Albany, GA (9/14, 11:06 p.m. ET) broadcast, “Some angry Georgia veterans say they often have trouble getting services they’ve been promised from the Veterans Administration.” On Tuesday, those vets “let some VA officials hear about” their problems, during a “forum in Savannah organized” by US Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA). The lawmaker, who “wants to make the VA services forum an annual event to keep the lines of communication open,” is “hoping to educate veterans about the benefits they’re entitled to — from Horses For Heroes, a new therapy program, to the Independent Living Program, which is a is veteran benefit some call…VA’s best kept secret, aimed at helping vets participate in daily living.” WTOC-TV Savannah, GA (9/14, 11:06 p.m. ET) aired a similar report.