From the Washington Post:

Veterans group are urging Congress to overhaul Department of Veterans Affairs procedures for handling cases as the backlog of unresolved disability claims nears the one million mark.

The American Legion and the National Veteran’s Foundation are both criticizing the VA for delaying veterans’ benefits, but the VA argues that the 1 million figure is misleading and that it is incorrect to refer to it as backlog.

Critics accuse the VA of resorting to semantics. “It seems like they’re looking at ways to minimize the significance of it,” said Steve Smithson, deputy director of veterans affairs and rehabilitation at the American Legion.

“At the end of the day, these are still individual veterans waiting for benefits they were promised,” said Meaghan Smith, a spokeswoman for [House Veterans' Affairs subcommittee Rep. John Hall (D-N.Y.)]. “If you asked the veteran waiting, he or she would call it a backlog.”

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 27th, 2009 at 9:34 am and is filed under veterans, waiting list/waivers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.