yeah, we can fly $12b in c-notes over to iraq to be tossed out like mardi gras beads but we can't pay the bennies owed to those that made upa sizable portion of the force on the ground. this makes me ill.
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original-in these timesGetting Vets Their Benefits BackBy
Melinda TuhusRick Scavetta lives with his wife and young daughter in a small town near New Haven, Conn. He joined the Army at 18, in part to earn money for college, and served in the regular Army and then the Reserve for a total of 15 years, reaching the rank of Sergeant 1st Class. In 2005, his Reserve unit was called up, and he served a year in Afghanistan.
Scavetta says he made a firm decision to leave the military last February, and planned to use his GI Bill benefits to pursue a master’s degree in political science and to study Arabic at Southern Connecticut State University. But he was told in his exit briefing that if he deactivated—in military terms, “left drill status”—he would not be eligible.
“Imagine if someone told you, ‘We promise you these benefits if you serve your country,’ and you held up your end of the bargain for six years in the Reserve, a year or two deployed overseas,” he says. “It’s frustrating, especially since school can be a very grounding thing for a veteran returning from war.”
Scavetta is just one of the many vets Jack Mordente works with as director of Veterans Affairs (VA) at Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven. Mordente says he learned last May that the Department of Defense was telling war-activated Guard and Reservists that if they left paid drill status they would lose their GI Bill education benefits. “And in fact it’s not true,” he says.
VA representative Keith Wilson backs up Mordente’s interpretation. Providing a bit of history, he says that in 1985 Congress created GI Bill education benefits for members of the Guard and Reserve for the first time. Then, he adds, “During Gulf War I, some individuals in the Guard and Reserve were called up for active duty, which interfered with their ability to pursue their education. So Congress passed a law that allowed the delimiting date (i.e., eligibility deadline) to be extended for a period equal to the time they’re activated plus four months.”
Mordente says if a member of the Guard or Reserve knows he or she is eligible and files for the benefit, the Veterans Administration will pay it.
But the Department of Defense (DoD) interprets the law differently. Lt. Col. Steve Beller of the Army National Guard writes the Guard policies to implement Army regulations. He says that the Department of Defense, unlike the VA, interprets the law to restrict eligibility for benefits to those who remain on drill status.
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