http://miva.jacksonsun.com/miva/cgi-bin/miva?NEWS/news_storyV2005.mv+link=200504127117575Veterans' nursing homes could see drastic funding cuts.
WASHINGTON - Veterans' nursing homes run by states and the federal Veterans Affairs Department - havens for more than 40,000 former service members - are under fire in this year's budget battles.
President Bush's proposed 2006 budget would drastically cut financial support for up to 80 percent of the veterans in the nation's 129 state-run homes - including Tennessee's two facilities in Humboldt and Murfreesboro - and allow the VA to reduce the number of its nursing home beds from the 13,391 now required by law.
However, the Republican-dominated House and Senate adopted budget plans that do not include the Bush proposal to cut support to the state veterans' homes - and among those chiming in is West Tennessee Congressman John Tanner.
''Proposed veterans' care cuts like these are an indication of the misfocused priorities in the budget President Bush proposed to Congress,'' Tanner, D-Union City, said in a statement released through his office in Washington. ''The president's budget would require that we borrow billions of dollars more from foreign investors and still fails to fund the programs that Tennesseans depend on.
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