Immediate Action Required: Ask your representative to support H.R. 1770

More Information: Please urge your representative to support and cosponsor H.R. 1770 introduced by Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah. The bill would correct inequalities in the calculation of Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP) annuities for family members of reserve-component members who die from an injury or illness during inactive duty training (IDT).

Under current law, the surviving spouse of a reserve-component member who dies from an IDT injury will likely receive a small fraction of the annuity paid to the surviving spouse of an active-component member.

Surviving spouses of reserve-component members receive an annuity based on the complicated reserve retirement formula applied to the deceased member's retirement points at the date of death. This will invariably be substantially less than the annuity paid to family members of active-component members whose annuity is calculated at the total disability retirement rate.

H.R. 1770 would provide the survivors of reserve-component members with SBP annuity benefits calculated on the same criteria as those for survivors of active-component members.

Under H.R. 1770, the annuity for survivors of a reserve-component member would be computed as if the deceased member had been retired with a total disability and a survivor indemnity allowance. It would also allow the possibility of paying the annuity to dependent children instead of the surviving spouse.

NGAUS Point of Contact
Pete Duffy, Acting Legislative Director
202-454-5307
pete.duffy@ngaus.org

Take Action:  Click here.

Background:
Recently, the White House and Pentagon have been telling the military TRICARE fees must increase due to skyrocketing costs. But it was just discovered that the Department of Defense issued a major request to reprogram $708 million from the Defense Health Program. These funds are labeled as “under-executed” TRICARE funds and are “available because of a significant downward spike in the private sector care cost growth rates” and “are excess to Defense Health Program requirements and can be used for higher priority items with no impact to the program.”

Last year, the Pentagon and Congress transferred $500 million from the TRICARE Account in a similar reprogramming move. Even when the DoD is shifting money out of the Defense Health Program they have continued to repeat the claim that defense health care is devastating the DoD. Instead, it seems TRICARE has been enabling DoD pay other bills by being efficient and spending less…even as the White House and DoD are claiming Tricare spending is escalating.

TRICARE Prime enrollment fees are set to increase by 17% for most enrollees on October 1, 2012. How can President Obama and Pentagon leadership honestly say that this increase is necessary when they are raiding our TRICARE accounts to pay for other programs and initiatives?

Take Action:
Please contact your Members of Congress and ask them to fight to protect your TRICARE health benefits by not allowing DoD to use the funds to pay for other programs.

By using the "Write to Congress" feature on the EANGUS Web site at www.eangus.org, you can IMMEDIATELY write or e-mail your elected officials. A sample letter is included in our "Write to Congress" feature. You can e-mail the pre-written message or edit the sample letter as you desire. This is the quickest and most effective method of expressing your views to Congress. Also, contact your friends and family and urge them to "Write to Congress" as well. For more in-depth information and background visit our web site at www.eangus.org.

The QRMC also proposes to cut National Guard drill pay in half, which is completely unacceptable. The QRMC suggests this cut as a way to equate drill compensation with active duty compensation. This cut in drill pay would also reduce the number of retirement points from 4 per drill weekend to only 2 per weekend.

The QRMC fails to show the whole picture of current National Guard compensation in that it already attempts to compensate drilling Guardsmen through the current pay structure. Nor does the QRMC acknowledge the significant differences between the Reserve Component and the Active Component. National Guard soldiers and airmen shoulder the expenses for travel to drills, physical training, medical readiness care, family care, and ensuring that many National Guard administrative issues are completed.

EANGUS agrees that there is room to improve the current Guard and Reserve compensation systems and will continue discussing the compensation system with DoD Officials, Members of Congress, and the White House. However, EANGUS will never agree to any recommendation that suggests cutting drill pay by 50% and will continue to fighting to ensure that our Soldiers and Airmen are taken care of.

Take Action:
Please contact your Members of Congress to fight any proposal that would gut National Guard drill pay or any recommendation that would drastically hinder Guard recruitment and retention efforts.

By using the "Write to Congress" feature on the EANGUS Web site at www.eangus.org, you can IMMEDIATELY write or e-mail your elected officials. A sample letter is included in our "Write to Congress" feature. You can e-mail the pre-written message or edit the sample letter as you desire. This is the quickest and most effective method of expressing your views to Congress. Also, contact your friends and family and urge them to "Write to Congress" as well. For more in-depth information and background visit our web site at www.eangus.org.

Immediate Action Required: Contact your senators and representative and ask them to oppose the recommendation of the 11th Quadrennial Review of Military Compensation to cut National Guard and Reserve drill pay in half.

NGAUS welcomes the recommendations from the QRMC that would reduce from 30 to six the authorities for calling members of the Guard and Reserve to duty and would allow our members to receive their retired pay upon their 30th anniversary of service after having attained 20 qualifying years of service.

However, the QRMC is totally off base with its recommendation to cut drill pay in half in order to equate a drill day with one day of “regular military compensation,” which the QRMC claims would “ensure equitable pay for similar service” with the active component. This reduction of pay would also reduce the number of retirement points from four to two for a drill weekend and the potential retirement pay arising from that service.

Although the QRMC discusses the possibility of incentive pay options to bolster its recommended reduction in drill pay, it makes no clear recommendation and provides no illustrative pay charts for easy understanding. The current drill pay structure is fair and much simpler in comparison.

The QRMC reflects no understanding that the MUTA four-drill weekend pay already attempts to equitably compensate most drilling members who work a 12-day “work week” with the drill weekend sandwiched between full-time 40-hour-plus work weeks. In most states, this would trigger overtime compensation, even double time in California on the seventh straight day of work.

There is also no recognition in the QRMC of the vast difference in service between the reserve components and the actives. Unlike the active forces, the National Guard member bears the expense in time and money for travel to drills, physical training, medical readiness care, family care and attending to many unit administrative responsibilities. Our members do so while observing the minuteman ethos of being always ready to be called from family, civilian employment or school to state or overseas duty as the situation may warrant.

In assessing equitable pay for similar service, there was also no mention of the fact that active duty forces in stateside assignments commonly do not work on weekends, but receive full pay and allowances for four nonduty weekends as well as 2 ½ days of leave per month. This translates to the active forces receiving pay for more than one third of a month for down time. Our drilling members, of course, are not similarly paid for their off-duty weekends

A just and more comprehensive recommendation from the QRMC would not only justify the current drill pay structure, but drive a recommendation to increase benefits to “ensure equitable pay for similar service.”

We need to speak out strongly against the recommendation that promises to gut our recruitment and retention efforts throughout the reserve components.

TAKE THE FOLLOWING ACTION:
By using the Write to Congress feature on the NGAUS website at www.ngaus.org, you can email your elected representatives. A sample letter is included. You can email the prewritten message or edit the sample letter as you desire. This is the quickest and most effective method of expressing your views to Congress. Also, contact your friends and family and urge them to use Write to Congress. For further information and background, visit our website at www.ngaus.org. Please direct any questions concerning this issue to Pete Duffy, NGAUS acting legislative director, at 202-454-5307 or via email at pete.duffy@ngaus.org.

Immediate Action Required: Contact your representative and senators and ask them to co-sponsor House Concurrent Resolution 129 and Senate Concurrent Resolution 48 honoring the National Guard’s 375 years of service and affirming congressional support for a permanent operational reserve as a component of the Armed Forces.

NGAUS needs you to contact your senators and representative to urge them to co-sponsor House Concurrent Resolution 129 (H.Con.Res.129) and Senate Concurrent Resolution 48 (S.Con.Res.48), honoring the National Guard’s 375 years of service and affirming congressional support for a permanent operational reserve as a component of the Armed Forces.

Earlier this year, the United States Air Force presented Congress with a budget that reduces defense spending through disproportional cuts to the Air National Guard (ANG). Thus far, members of the House of Representatives and the Senate Armed Services Committee have put forward legislative proposals to halt these cuts, acknowledging that the ANG provides 35 percent of the capability for 6 percent of the budget. By supporting this resolution, members of Congress will take an important step in reaffirming the National Guard as a mission-focused and cost-effective force, driven by the spirit of volunteerism that is at the heart of our modern day U.S. military.

After 10 years of war and numerous domestic operations, today’s National Guard is a modern, accessible military force that trains and performs to the same standards as its active-duty counterparts. If you ask your representative and senators to support this resolution, we will continue to support our citizen-soldiers of the operational reserve and ensure the men and women of the National Guard continue to play a key role in our military, both at home and abroad, for years to come.

Please contact your senators and representative and urge them to support this resolution.

TAKE THE FOLLOWING ACTION:

By using the Write to Congress feature on the NGAUS website at www.ngaus.org, you can IMMEDIATELY email your elected representatives. A sample letter is included in Write to Congress. You can email the prewritten message or edit the sample letter as you desire. This is the quickest and most effective method of expressing your views to Congress. Also, contact your friends and family members and urge them to use Write to Congress as well. For further information and background visit our website at www.ngaus.org. Please direct any questions concerning this issue to Emily Sass, NGAUS senior legislative affairs manager for air programs, at 202-408-5893 or via email at emily.sass@ngaus.org.

Background: U.S. Representative Tim Walz (D-MN-1), a retired Army National Guard Command Sergeant Major, introduced legislation in 2010 to correct this oversight, but it did not pass that year. Last year , after proactive actions and positive testimony by EANGUS staff, The House of Representatives passed H.R. 1025, the Honor America's Guard-Reserve Retirees Act of 2011, on October 12, 2011. Currently, the Senate companion legislation, S.491, has yet to be acted on. S.491 and H.R. 1025 will amend Title 38, United States Code, to recognize the service in the reserve components of certain persons by honoring them with status as veterans under law.

Take Action:

Please CLICK HERE
[http://capwiz.com/eangus/issues/alert/?alertid=61368936] to contact your U.S. Senators to encourage them to co-sponsor and pass this legislation.

By using the "Write to Congress" feature on the EANGUS Web site www.eangus.com at [htpp:www.eangus.org/], you can IMMEDIATELY write or e-mail your elected officials. A sample letter is included in our "Write to Congress" feature. You can e-mail the pre-written message or edit the sample letter as you desire.

This is the quickest and most effective method of expressing your views to Congress. Also, you are encouraged to forward this message to your friends and family and urge them to "Write to Congress" on this issue. For more in-depth information and background visit our web site at www.eangus.org [htpp://www.eangus.com/].

Senate Champions Offer TRICARE Bill.
Senators Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) joined forces this week to introduce a bi-partisan bill to stop unfair TRICARE fee hikes for military beneficiaries.

Their “Military Health Care Protection Act of 2012” (S. 3203) would:
• Acknowledge that servicemembers pre-pay significant healthcare premiums through decades of service and sacrifice, over and above what they pay in cash
• Limit the annual percentage increase in cash fees (including pharmacy copays, TRICARE Standard deductible, and the cap on annual out-of-pocket expenses) to the percentage increase in military retired pay
• Bar any further increase in the existing TRICARE Standard retiree inpatient copay of $708 per day, recognizing that the current amount is plenty high enough
• Specify that should the Defense Department establish an enrollment system for TRICARE Standard, any eligible beneficiary filing a claim must be automatically enrolled until they opt to dis-enroll. (This is to ensure beneficiaries who fail to get the word about any new Standard enrollment system don’t have their claims rejected for failure to enroll -- e.g., in the event of a serious vehicle accident.)

“We’re grateful for Sen. Lautenberg’s and Sen. Rubio’s leadership in introducing this bill to protect uniformed services beneficiaries from disproportional TRICARE fee increases,” said MOAA President VADM Norb Ryan (USN-Ret).

“Repeated proposals to raise their healthcare fees by up to $2,000 a year have been extremely unsettling to the military community. The Lautenberg-Rubio bill would restore a much-needed sense of stability for this core career retention incentive.”

Because the bill was introduced only yesterday, no electronic link is available yet. Look for an alert in next week’s legislative update to urge your Senators to cosponsor this critical piece of legislation.

For more information go to http://www.moaa.org/.