Virginia Mandates How VA Disability Benefits Are To Be Spent

on Memorial Day Weekend Eve the state of Virginia definitely puts the smackdown on gold star family members and veterans in Virginia that are 90% or 100% pnt this is passed done it's a said deal the state of Virginia is mandating chapter 35 which oh by the way is a federal benefit the state is mandating how you spend that not just that okay not just that portion it's for veteran education goldar family member education in the entire State as a whole it is essentially gone Yanke so who are you and what led you to where you're at right now my name is Kayla Owen I am the spouse of 100% disabled veteran in the state of Virginia I have two small children one is 13 one is four and I am the co-founder of an organization called vep friends mhm so vep friends came about because at the end of March the general assembly tried to put language in that basically decimated the Virginia Military survivors education dependent program which provides eight semesters of Education to Veterans or gold gold star families that are 90% totally and permanently disabled or more um and that is a service earned benefit in the state of Virginia all right so how does this Bill affect you personally so it it affects me personally because it has basically cut my own ability to go back to school so there's that component to it but it really just absolutely guts a program that's been in place for 26 years so this started back in 1996 was ratified again in 2006 is what which is when it became bstep um in 2019 it was expanded so that it included non-combat veterans so prior to 2019 it was combat 90% tnp or above included gold star families in in in 2019 that was expanded when it was expanded the program did grow but the point we're at now is basically the state Council for higher education and the universities are crying poor because it is a tuition waiver program and they are blaming the cost of tuition increase in the state of Virginia on a very very small percent of the population so we know that 1% of higher education students in the state of Virginia received this program so less than 1% we know that veterans are 7% of the entire population in the state of Virginia we know that veterans own 12% of small businesses in the state of Virginia so we certainly contribute economically as a population um but basically this program got massacred and it got massacred by legislating through the budget uh and legislating through the budget they basically snuck language in the back uh ironically on page 641 both times so house bill uh 30 they snuck it in on page 641 um the governor came back and put in two amendments in place those amendments were not accepted uh he intended for this to go to a study to be looked at for the long-term sustainability of the program claiming that there were Financial issues um the financial issues which were defined by Chev um stated the program would cost $180 million over two years we absolutely refute that it is not consistent with any data that we have seen it is not consistent with data provided by the Department of Veteran Services it is not consistent with dat data provided by the universities themselves so what exactly are the changes that the state passed so in Senate Bill House Bill 601 on page 641 without mention of the name of the program whatsoever um the new changes specifically are that you are required to fill out a FAFSA not an issue it is limited to your first bachelor's degree only so that basically excludes a lot of spouses by the time that your husband or your spouse gets to a point in their career that they are injured or become disabled most times people have already completed a first bachelor's degree and depending on the disability that your spouse has you may need to change careers or you may need a career that is more income generating based on your family's financial situation one thing that's interesting that we found is that most of the people that are using this for higher education currently are using it in areas that are defined by the state of Virginia as being areas of critical need so these are things that are being recruited outside of the state of Virginia the state is paying money to bring in people in the areas of Healthcare in the areas of education and in the areas of stem and those were the three most prominent areas that we found for spouses that are using this for higher education anyway so it's like you can give it to veteran spouses that are already here that qualify for this benefit or you can pay money to bring in people from outside it would seem to me that it would be better for that money to be allocated here all right oh the two more changes sorry they become um the state becomes last payer so as we talked about before that requires you your expected family contribution has to be paid first any federal grants have to be paid first and you're required to use your 38 USC chapter 35 benefits prior to the VMS step paying a dollar and then the final detail which is also a problem is the grandfather deadline was May 15 of this year so the budget was signed the evening of the 13th and the on the 15th that is the last day that you had to commit to a school for the fall so again people that are on weight list people that were not aware of this we know that colleges and universities based on Chev have P bumped back acceptance deadlines and deadlines for people to make a determination because their fafsas haven't come back and there have been all kinds of issues with FAFSA because they've redone that this year so rather than granting people in this program the grace that everyone else in the state is being afforded to to make their college decisions people in this program are tagged to the 15th and that's something that we were very disappointed that the governor did not extend in his executive directive number seven because he absolutely had the authority to do that and chose not to do so so has this has it passed it's it's a said deal it's done it's passed if you are 90% or 100% pnt or Gold Star Family your education in V your education and benefits uh in Virginia have have been cut so they have well the program technically still is is in place however last Monday we were in Richmond and we actually even had the opportunity to speak with a number of legislators so we spoke with people in the house we spoke with people in the Senate imploring them that the language that was uh disseminated on Saturday the 11th as the new budget so this is hbsb 601 and the language in that budget is the most restrictive language that we've seen to date it requires um families that are applying to submit a FAFSA the submission of the FAFSA isn't necessarily the problem what the problem is is that they are requiring you to pay your entire expected family contribution they are requiring you to pay your chapter 35 so if you're 100% tnp or Gold Star Family you're eligible for chapter 35 benefits they're requiring that to be imputed prior to this program paying a penny so they effectively become last dollar and if you know anything about the new FAFSA it's been an Absol absolute disaster there was a video where shev themselves were talking about extending deadlines for colleges and universities based on the fact that they knew that this new fafo was a total disaster yet the grandfathering deadline for qualifying under the old conditions of this program was two days after the bill was signed on May 15 so there there's been no announcement people have no idea that this has happened our Facebook group has grown from 300 to 1,200 people in a week because a lot of people got caught by surprise and even to this day if you pull up the bmsd web page if you pull up the state Council for higher education web page there is no notification or no information that has been provided to people that are either eligible for this program or even those that are currently using the program yeah so let's I want to roll back because you said something that is to me seems very very weird that the state is mandating the use of a federal benefit is that even I'm not a lawyer is that legal and Virginia say hey chapter 35 which is a stien yes right right now it's 1488 that's what a a uh beneficiary would receive correct to go to higher education how can the state say hey that 1488 that $1,488 it's mine how how what's the language from the state to the federal government on how how federal taxpayers dollars should be spent so I don't I I'm I'm not an attorney so I'll just make that clear I'm not an attorney um we are very concerned and we spoke to the VA yesterday when we called them and they said that they will never pay chapter 35 money to the state that it will always be paid to individuals that's the way that it was set up um the way that this program has now been changed also basically puts it in the hands of the state Council for higher education so if you look at that from a federal level that's basically the equivalent of moving the GI bill from the Department of Veterans Affairs to the Department of higher education who or the Department of Education who knows more about veterans yeah I mean it's very clear that the Department of Veteran Services should be running the show on this but by adding the FAFSA that allows Chev to get their hand in the pot and that's where we are but to answer your question absolutely I I I don't know that they that is legal for them to do that and I think that's certainly a question that the people at the governor's office should be asking themselves as to whether or not there's any legal ground here are there any legal actions that could be taken and if so by who against this bill so I'm not an attorney I don't know um what I do know is that Virginia very proudly called itself the first state um to consider military spouses and military military dependence as a protected class so we are considered a protected class in the state of Virginia we also know that there was no dual notice provided to anyone before these changes nor were they actually legislated they were legislated through the budget there was no public hearing there was no opportunity for people to speak out there was no opportunity for people to engage in legislators with legislators um the other thing that's interesting here is that the state Council for higher education in their uh strategic plan mentions the word Equity 56 times in 14 pages which is great and we totally support that but the percentage of disabled veterans that are minorities and need to be supported by that Equity is far greater than the regular population so by cutting this benefit to the populations that they are actually saying that they're intending to serve 56 times really seems very disingenuous that's probably my number one question just from I have four kids myself and that 1488 per child per month is going to be not just lifechanging to them but that's also money not out of my pocket to spend on whatever it is kids are doing right right so if you were face to face with the governor of Virginia right now what would you say you made a big mistake you need to own it you made a big mistake signing this we were outside of the press room before you went to sign the bill we asked you specifically are you aware that you were signing the largest roll back of veterans benefits in the history of the state of Virginia and we were told that you would make this right your executive directive number seven not only did not make it right it made it even more restrictive than the budgetary language that was already there you've promised to create a task force that was representative of the populations being impacted by this but that task force only intends to look at the unintended consequences of the budgetary language it doesn't intend to look at the program sustainability overall it doesn't allow to look at the Chev numbers that we know are not accurate true or realistic that that's the information that legislators were handed when they were asked to make this decision they were basically told this is how much this is going to cost this program is going to be $180 million and there's no way that the colleges and universities can afford it now there are this program constitutes only 5% of tuition waivers in the state of Virginia so this is the only waiver program that was attacked this year this is the only waiver program that has been required to submit a FAFSA this is the only waiver program that is basically is basically being looked at so if we are as the state in a year where we have a two billion dollar Surplus if we are as a state looking at waiver programs why is it that veterans and gold star families the most vulnerable of our population who have genuinely given parts of themselves to this country if not their entire life why are these families being attacked and impacted yes that's that is such a solid question and can you explain just what a gold star family member is do you know someone who's been affected by this because Memorial Day is this weekend right right around the corner yeah so gold star families are families who have had a a a member of their family die in the line of service so die defending our country um and there are many gold star families who have joined us um in in this process of trying to rectify this mistake that has been made by the state of Virginia um one family in particular there is a girl that her father died when she was 28 days old so does not have any memory of her father grew up without a father um is an outstanding member of her community she's won numerous academic and community service Awards this young woman found out on her 18th birthday that her VMS step benefits May no no longer be there MH I mean talk about the ultimate I mean they they you you're you're impacted in such a way for your entire existence but you've been promised this service earned benefit that you know we know your dad's not there we're going to make sure that your higher education is taken care of and now it's pulled out from under your feet does this make Virginia one of the worst states to live in as a veteran so for instance I left the Marine Corps at aquano and I stayed here for jobs and for Virginia's veteran benefits that was a huge decision that I had to make but there are tons of other states that have similar benefits to Virginia but now with the VMS de gone I um you know where does Virginia stand as far as best states for veterans and gold star family members so one VMS step is not gone completely um I would argue that it's unusable um um so basically that we know that so if you're retired cw2 and you have retirement pay that retirement pay would impute a $112,000 expected family contribution so if your tuition is $14,500 your retirement pay imputes a $122,000 EFC on top of that you then have to contribute all of your chapter 35 money so it doesn't even get to a single dollar that VMS step is going to pay so Virginia actually goes from being the my chart out um Virginia actually goes from being one of the best states for this program to one of the worst and the most ironic piece about this is that Virginia governor yunan ran on the premise that he was going to promise to make Virginia one of the most better and friendly states of the nation not only did he run on that Virginia has a compact with its with its military it is literally in statute that it is to prot protect military family members veterans themselves but there is literally a statutory requirement to protect veterans yet this population was the population that was most impacted by this and and it it it's it makes no sense to me whatsoever so basically it's still called VMS debt but it's absolutely not because VMS Deb is free education for not 90% Plus or goals for our families this is something entirely different and I really want to want to ask you should veterans and gold star family members consider moving out of Virginia I I think that's definitely something that people need to put into their financial equation I mean for my family in particular we did not we chose to forego our final move to stay in Virginia to use this benefit so in that instance you know we actually lost out financially because we had counted on this we had expected to use this benefit um I think people need to look at some of the costing that's coming out right now we have a chart that's available to show what you're going to actually pay out of pocket compared to what you would have paid out of pocket previously and in some instances I'm sure that it is absolutely Financial financially advantageous for people to leave the state of Virginia based on this benefit being modified what role does the state Council for higher education have in this whole thing that's an interesting question so Chev um as they're called uh has a council and on their Council onethird of their council members are currently sitting members of board of visitors on state universities so the interesting thing about that is that that means they're wearing two hat so in one hand they're supposed to be looking out for the interest of the state Council for higher education but while simultaneously sitting on that board of visitors they're also looking out for the interest of the board of visitors so it's kind of difficult to understand who's wearing what hat what we do know is that one third of the members of the currently current Chev Council are sitting board members for the University that have been the most vocal about cutting this program so we do find that to be very ironic um there was a Chev meeting that took place just after the budget vote last Monday um I believe that General jumper who is a retired Air Force General specifically mentioned in that video um what is this veterans issue that is on fire right now um I'm sure you can link that but there is also some information that he talks about on there about well if they just have to fill out a FAFSA then we can just send people to the high schools to help them do that that's not the remedy the numbers are not you know just filling out a fasta isn't the problem it's the expected Financial contribution with no notice to families that is the problem if that's not the remedy then what is the remedy they need to go back so so the governor needs to call a special session and in that legislation they need to repeal all of the language that was put in in hbsb 601 they need to start from scratch and they need to make decisions based on actually audited correct and accurate numbers we believe that this decision was made in haste we believe the decision was made with the knowledge that there were inaccurate numbers between DBS Chev and the universities themselves for example William and Mary if you go on to the Chev website right now and you look at the number of students that are receiving waivers from the state of Virginia it states that that number is somewhere around 117 if you go and you look how many students students are using VMS step waivers it states that that number is 187 that's simply not possible if it's a total of 117 people that are using waivers in their entirety and getting down to the last questions here what are some other ways that this impacts veterans and ghost our family members outside of like education benefits how H how are how are people how are veterans being affected right now I I think a lot of people are spiraling um I think part of the problem is that people were not told again to this state there is no information available on the vmsd website there is no information on the Department of Veteran services website there is no information on the state Council for higher education's website nobody has been contacted nobody has been notified you have a bunch of people that have high school seniors some of whom committed prior to the May 15th deadline some of them did not because they didn't know there are people that are still on wait lists that were not capable of committing by the May 15th deadline so you have a lot of veterans who potentially have PTS D or other mental health conditions that are spiraling we know specifically in our group which is 13 12 or 1300 people right now that there are three people that have had to go back to the doctor in the last week that were weaned off of Psych medications that have had to go back on them as a result of the personal financial stress that has come from this situation and not knowing how they are going to provide for their family they have made long-term family plans based on this I I I think it cannot be underestimated the stress impact that this has had on this entire population and we know that this is a population that is vulnerable we know that this is a population that going into Memorial Day Memorial Day itself can be very triggering for veterans what about there there are plenty of people that well I came home but the person that replaced me when when my wife was pregnant didn't so I'm going to be calling that family and I'm calling that that Gold Star Family to reach out at the same time well I'm not knowing if I'm going to be able to pay for my child to go to school in the fall so when we initially started our Facebook group we did a little survey just because I'm a I'm a numbers geek and that's my thing um but we did a survey and the survey specifically looked at a couple of indicators and so the indicators that were important to me were how many people had made fin major financial decisions based on the expectation of using this program so at the time our group was about 200 people 125 people completed the survey 93% St Ed that they had made major financial decisions for their family based on the expectation of using this program 91% said that they wanted DBS to administer this they did not want the state Council for higher education to be administering a veterans benefit and then 76% of the people stated that they would not seek out this higher education program if this program were not available to them so when the higher education institutions say oh this is making us poor because if this person wasn't here it would be supplemented by somebody who was paying in full that's not actually a true statement 75% of students that seek higher education in the state of Virginia received some kind of Aid so even if it was not a full payer you most of the people that have access to this benefit wouldn't use it so it's not lost dollars for them the other piece that's interesting with shev is it appears that they have been calculating the numbers based on an imputed full-time student cost they're also charging the state a retail cost for higher education so the marginal cost for a student is what it actually costs to educate them versus the price tag that's on the education so we have yet to get access to those numbers we don't know what they actually are we also know that they are showing full-time student cost for people that are only taking three hours a semester because they count it as a full-time student whether you're taking three hours or whether you're taking 25 hours um we would really love to get some accurate data and I think that that's what we are hoping that the Governor's amendments and asking for the comprehensive study would do the current study in the scope from his executive directive number seven does not afford that it affords a very small scope looking only at the unintended consequences of the budget bill that massacred this it does not afford the ability to look beyond that so I definitely want to thank you for coming out today especially when my house is flooded I want to give you the floor any last words you want to say look in that camera and speak to the people speak to the governor say whatever it is you want to say I I think that one of the the most important piece of this is that there were decisions made in haste without accurate or representative data that impact thousands of families in the state of Virginia 70% of the people in our group have stated that they stayed in Virginia with the intention of using this benefit um this really pulls the rug out from under people right going into Memorial Day this is a very sensitive time of the year for some families that you have kids graduating and going off to college that should be a happy time people should be focused on Prom they should be focused on graduation instead they're focused on the fact I promised my kid that they could go to school next year because the state of Virginia made a promise that the state is not keeping the state of Virginia is not upholding its veterans compact it is not upholding the promises made to veterans in the state of Virginia and not only is it not going to be the most veteran friendly state in the nation as Governor yunan ran on for his tagline it is going to turn into one of the worst and I think the concern that a lot of veterans have in the state right now is if this benefit can be cut by legislating through the budget with no notice to anyone else what is going to happen to every other benefit for veterans in this state and I think finally you can you know to Governor yunan you can delegate tasks to other people but you cannot delegate accountability and responsibility and ultimately sir This falls in your hands

Channel: TheCivDiv

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Keywords: 38 cfr, cck live, va claims insider, combat craig, claim denied, claims process, how to file va claim, how to win my va claim, intent to file, SMC, BDD, supplemental claims, transitioning to civilian, va appeal, va claims, va healthcare, veterans disability, medical evidence, va injury, buddy statement, 100 va disability, va disability lawyer, va pension, va medical records, secondary service connection, ptsd, mental health, SSA, how long will my va claim take, va rating

Id: J-xL4ppwIYM

Length: 25min 24sec (1524 seconds)

Published: Thu May 23 2024