by Bradley Hood
In Military Education Contributor
The Veteran Affairs’ claims backlog has been the center of significant attention over the past year, and rightfully so. Despite some progress generated by increased attention on the issue and mandatory overtime at the VA, the government shutdown could not have come at a worse time – while the VA remained open due to forward funded appropriations, overtime was discontinued and regional offices were closed by the last few days of the shut down. Like the rest of the government, the VA is now and running again, at the very least until the next potential crisis in early 2014. But what does this mean today for veterans who rely on VA benefits? Through the duration of the shutdown, many claims were unable to be processed, and it seems certain that the existing backlog was exacerbated. So far, statistics have not been released in the aftermath, but as a sense of relative normalcy returns to the government, it should only be a matter of time.
Fortunately, however worse the claims log has become, the VA released a statement on October 17th concurrent with the end of the shutdown stating that overtime has been resumed – claims processors are now working their mandatory 20 hours of overtime once again, although it should be noted that this is the same amount of overtime allotted before the shutdown, so there is not yet any indication of extra measures taken to undo the damage done during that time. Thankfully, VA benefits already being paid, while being stretched to the limit, remain uninterrupted. November 1st benefits will go out as scheduled, claims are being processed, and regional offices are once again operational. The VA still hopes to meet their goal of eliminating the disability claims log by 2015, and GI bill recipients will not have to put their education on hold for lack of funding, especially important given that service TA benefits were interrupted. It can only be hoped that a more permanent solution will be found in Congress for future issues, and a budget determined without future threat to the our nation’s veterans.
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