2002 Agenda:
Health Care, Concurrent Receipt, SBP Fixes, Pay Comparability Top List
TROA's legislative goals for the second session of the 107th Congress are designed to promote readiness and equity while fulfilling commitments made to servicemembers in return for their extended and arduous service careers.
Preparing the list of goals for 2002 proved more challenging than usual, since House and Senate negotiators still had not completed their work on potential compensation and benefit changes in the fy 2002 Defense Authorization Act at the time this column went to press.
Active duty, Guard, and Reserve personnel are certain to realize some significant gains in the new act, because both the House and Senate versions called for pay raises of 5 percent to 10 percent or more, depending on grade and years of service. This would further reduce the overall cumulative military pay shortfall (relative to private-sector pay) to 7.5 percent.
But the outcome on many other pending legislative issues - notably the proposal to eliminate the dollar-for-dollar veterans' disability compensation offset to military retired pay - was still undetermined at press time.
The lack of timely resolution of such important initiatives is frustrating, and it's possible that one or more of the goals on the following pages may have been brought to fruition in the fy 2002 Authorization Act by the time this reaches your mailbox. As soon as the final legislation becomes available, we'll summarize the key outcomes in "Washington Scene."
The military community has achieved compensation and benefit gains in recent years in part because TROA members and others exerted significant grassroots pressure on Congress. But many legislative challenges still remain. In some cases, we must build upon past successes to promote further progress. In others, we must take on new initiatives to correct additional inequities.
Many of the specific goals outlined below will not apply to you individually, but your help is needed to bring them to reality. If all members of the military community pull together to support each other's issues, we'll have a much better chance of winning across the board. If we each support only the specific issues that pertain to us personally, we fragment our collective clout and reduce our chance of winning anything at all.
So read this column, and call and write your legislators. Please get involved personally and urge others to do the same. Your help will, indeed, make a difference.
Health Care Issues
Preserving and enhancing health care coverage remains a top priority for TROA. Military beneficiaries marked two historic occasions in 2001 with the implementation of tsrx (the tricare Senior Pharmacy program) in April and tricare For Life (TFL) on Oct. 1. These upgrades are now saving military Medicare-eligible families thousands of dollars a year - a huge stride toward fulfilling the lifetime health care commitment. The challenge for 2002 is to complete final implementation and monitor the growth of TFL into a mature and responsive program.
With TFL now under way, our next major challenge is to improve tricare and other health coverage for all beneficiaries, in pursuit of more consistent, reliable, and equitable coverage, regardless of beneficiary age or geographic location. TROA will seek to preserve and expand beneficiary choices and will resist any initiatives that would seek to curtail those options for purposes of budgetary or administrative convenience.
Health program funding: Seek full funding for the Defense Health Program, working with Congress and the Department of Defense (DoD) to ensure both military readiness and beneficiaries' needs are met, regardless of their age, status, or location. This includes supporting realistic budget assumptions and working to ensure Congress fully funds any unanticipated contingency or other requirements that otherwise would overtax existing programs and budgets.
TRICARE For Life follow-up initiatives: Continue to monitor TFL implementation issues, including:
monitoring the automated claims-processing system and expanding that system to include disabled Medicare-eligibles under age 65 in early 2002;
working with DoD and Congress to implement the DoD Medicare-Eligible Retiree Health Care Fund in October; and
monitoring progress of the tricare Plus programs covering enrollment of Medicare-eligibles at military medical facilities.
TRICARE enhancements for beneficiaries under 65: Over the past several years, Congress has enacted significant health care improvements across the board, with particular emphasis on the needs of Medicare-eligible beneficiaries and active duty families. But much work remains to be done. In the second session of the 107th Congress, TROA will work to improve benefit consistency for all beneficiary groups, concentrating on the following improvements:
Seek ways to expedite claims reimbursement processing, and provide incentives for health care providers to participate in tricare. TROA believes some TFL provider credentialing and electronic claims practices can help expedite claims processing for younger beneficiaries and help overcome past provider resistance to participation in tricare. TROA strongly supports exercise of the secretary of defense's authority to increase tricare reimbursement levels where necessary to attract quality health care providers.
Eliminate the 115 percent billing limit when tricare Standard (champus) is second payer to other health insurance. Currently, the 115 percent limit is often less than other insurers pay, so tricare pays nothing. Just as TFL is a true second payer to Medicare, tricare should be a true second payer to other insurance.
Extend tricare Prime Remote coverage to retirees under 65 who do not have access to tricare Prime, based on the coverage enacted for active duty families assigned to locations without Prime access.
Eliminate tricare Prime copayments for retirees under 65 and their families, as has been done for other Prime enrollees.
Restructure tricare managed-care contracts to deliver a uniform health care benefit across all tricare regions. Currently, contractors have wide latitude to interpret the benefit, so policies vary widely for different regions.
Continue to reduce and ultimately eliminate requirements for nonavailability statements and prior authorizations.
Pretax health premium payments: Authorize the purchase of health care benefits with pretax dollars, to include tricare Prime enrollment fees and premiums for tricare supplemental, long-term care, and dental insurance premiums. Pretax premium payment already is a standard part of many private-sector and federal benefits packages, and military beneficiaries should have the same option.
Pharmacy issues: Work with DoD and Congress to develop and maintain a comprehensive uniform pharmacy benefit for all beneficiaries, with a robust formulary that preserves beneficiary options to obtain specific pharmaceuticals determined necessary by their doctors. Seek improved documentation and education products (both print and electronic) from DoD to ensure beneficiaries and providers better understand the various tricare pharmacy benefits and how they work. Support portability of pharmacy benefits between tricare regions.
VA-DoD issues: Preserve uniformed services retirees' lifetime health care entitlement, both from DoD (earned by a career in uniform) and from the Department of Veterans Affairs (va) (earned by veteran status and any disabilities incurred as a result of service). TROA supports improving coordination between DoD and va health care systems and enhancing retirees' access to both. But DoD and va care have different missions and provide distinctly different services. TROA opposes the administration's initiative to force retirees to choose one or the other for budgetary and program planning reasons. If programming inefficiencies currently exist, DoD and va planners must take responsibility for improving their coordination and budgeting practices rather than seeking to curtail beneficiary entitlements for the government's administrative convenience.
FEHBP option: Seek legislation authorizing retired servicemembers and their families to elect optional coverage under the Federal Employees' Health Benefits Program (FEHBP). Support grandfathering current demonstration program enrollees by authorizing indefinite continuation of any current FEHBP-65 enrollees who may wish to remain in FEHBP.
Medicare Part B penalties: Seek legislation to ease Medicare Part B late-enrollment penalties or waive the Part B enrollment requirement for TFL eligibility. Many older beneficiaries didn't enroll in Part B when first eligible because they believed they would always have access to military or va care. There is a particular inequity for retirees in foreign countries, where Medicare does not provide coverage. Until Part B enrollment became a prerequisite for TFL participation, these retirees never had a reason to sign up for Part B. Part B enrollment should be waived, or late-enrollment penalties should be waived or capped, at least for overseas beneficiaries.
Guard/Reserve health coverage: National Guard and Reserve servicemembers should have seamless health coverage during periods of extended activation. TROA supports tricare wraparound coverage as an option for reservists on a fee basis prior to activation and tricare benefits for up to one year after deactivation. The tricare Prime Remote authority should be amended to cover all family members of reserve sponsors activated for more than 179 days.
Long term care insurance: "Gray area" reserve retirees and members of the Individual Ready Reserve should have the option of purchasing government-sponsored long term care insurance when it becomes available. Current legislative authority covers active duty members, active Guard and Reserve personnel, and retirees drawing retired pay, but not gray area reserve retirees who aren't eligible for retired pay because they have not yet attained age 60.
Retired Pay and Survivor Issues
Concurrent receipt: Continue working to secure legislation authorizing concurrent receipt of military retired pay and Department of Veterans Affairs (va) disability compensation. Currently, military retired pay is reduced one dollar for each dollar received in veterans' disability compensation. Changes in the fy 2000 and fy 2001 defense authorization acts authorized payment of special compensation ($100 to $300 a month) to retirees who: (a) served at least 20 years of full-time active duty and (b) received a disability rating of 70 percent or higher from their parent service or from the va within four years after leaving service.
The FY 2002 Defense Authorization Act will contain language supporting elimination of the disability offset, but it was uncertain at press time whether it would contain the actual authority needed to make this happen. The Senate version would do so as of Oct. 1, 2002. The House version would do so only if the administration proposes legislation and funding in its fy 2003 budget submission - an unlikely possibility because the administration has formally opposed any concurrent receipt legislation. TROA is committed to winning concurrent receipt, and this will be a top goal in 2002 if it is not accomplished in the fy 2002 Defense Authorization Act. (Check this column next month for an update.)
SBP age-62 annuity: Raise the minimum age-62 Survivor Benefit Plan (sbp) survivor annuity. Many sbp participants weren't informed of the reduced survivor benefit after age 62 until long after they made their sbp participation decisions. In other cases, spouses whose Social Security benefits are based on their own work history (rather than the retired servicemember's) still incur the sbp Social Security offset after age 62. TROA supports legislation to raise the minimum age-62 annuity incrementally to 55 percent (vs. the current 35 percent minimum) of sbp-covered retired pay.
Paid-up SBP equity: Advance to 2003 the current 2008 effective date for 30-year paid-up sbp coverage. Under current law, those who entered the program earliest and paid the highest premiums relative to their expected benefits will have to wait up to 36 years to attain paid-up sbp status, vs. 30 years for those who retired after 1978. The effective date must be changed as a matter of equity to provide fair consideration for the participants with the longest sbp standing.
Paid-up RCSBP: Limit Reserve Component sbp (rcsbp) premium payments to a cumulative 30 years for rcsbp retirees and survivors (e.g., if the Reserve retiree dies at age 70 after paying premiums for 10 years, limit the period of the survivor's rcsbp premium payments - experienced as a reduction in the monthly sbp annuity - to an additional 20 years).
USFSPA equity: Overturn the unfair provisions of the Uniformed Services Former Spouse Protection Act (USFSPA). Division of retired pay should cease upon remarriage of the former spouse, and divisible retired pay should be based upon the member's grade and years of service at the time of the divorce rather than at the time of the member's retirement from service. Additional safeguards are needed to bar state courts from dividing a disabled member's disability compensation with a former spouse. Now that the long-overdue Pentagon report to Congress on USFSPA finally has been released, TROA will urge a congressional hearing to address this long-neglected issue.
COLA commitments: Work to ensure continued fulfillment of congressional intent concerning retired pay cost-of-living adjustments (colas). Protect against cola caps, such as those proposed as part of some Social Security reform proposals. Congressional intent, as expressed in the House Armed Services Committee Print of Title 37, usc, is "to provide every military retired member the same purchasing power of the retired pay to which he was entitled at the time of retirement [and ensure it is] not, at any time in the future ... eroded by subsequent increases in consumer prices."
DIC continuation: Seek authority to continue dependency and indemnity compensation (dic) for widows of members who died of service-connected causes, who remarry at age 55 or older. Such continuation is authorized for all other federal survivor programs, including sbp. dic widows deserve equal treatment.
Budget vigilance: Monitor action on Budget Resolution, Omnibus Budget Reconciliation, Social Security reform initiatives, and other proposals to guard against further discriminatory treatment of members of the uniformed services community.
Active and Reserve Force Issues
Operations tempo and manpower: Improve alignment of service force structures with service missions to ease deployment rates and improve quality of life, retention, and readiness. Even before Sept. 11, our military forces were significantly overstressed due to inadequate numbers of people to meet mission requirements. Since embarking on a multiyear war on terrorism, current operating tempos are even more excessive and will have significant adverse consequences over the longer term for both service families and the nation. TROA believes force strengths have been reduced too far to sustain current operations levels and must be increased immediately. Sufficient recruiting and retention resources must be allocated to enable the services to achieve required personnel strengths.
Reserve utilization: Support Department of Defense (DoD) and congressional review of operations tempo for reserve units and personnel and the long-term implications for reserve force readiness. The role of the Guard and Reserve has evolved considerably over the past decade, to the point where these forces now carry a significant part of the everyday operational workload. Deployments routinely require reserve call-ups far beyond the extent envisioned by most Americans. Increased call-ups, often entailing repeated activation of the same units and people, pose particular difficulties for reserve members, families, and employers. TROA believes this is a potentially significant problem for the nation that merits a full review of options to ease rising stresses on reserve forces and employers, including a reassessment of active duty vs. reserve force requirements, incentives for employers of reservists, and active duty vs. reserve force retention dynamics.
Pay-raise comparability: Accelerate recent progress in reducing - and eventually eliminate - the 7.5 percent military pay raise shortfall that still will persist as of January 2002 as a result of capping past raises below private-sector increases in most years since 1982. Congress has worked to reduce the gap since it peaked at 13.5 percent in 1999, but three years of effort have closed less than half the original gap to date. The fy 2002 Defense Authorization Act will provide the most significant step yet, with raises ranging from 5 percent to 10 percent or more depending on grade and years of service. But continued progress is needed to restore full comparability with private-sector pay. TROA believes the gap should be erased within four years or less.
Housing allowance increases: Until recently, active duty housing allowances fell nearly 20 percent short of covering average housing costs by grade. Two years ago, Congress embarked on a plan to raise allowances to fully reimburse average housing expenses by 2005. TROA supports accelerating that schedule to more adequately compensate our overstressed forces, particularly younger families placed at risk by frequent relocations and deployments that disrupt family income.
PCS reimbursements: Continue pursuing adjustment of permanent change-of-station (pcs) reimbursements to more adequately offset expenses servicemembers incur in conjunction with government-ordered relocations. The fy 2002 Defense Authorization Act hopefully will provide the first update to some of these allowances since 1986, including en route per diem and the maximum daily temporary lodging expense allowance. Surveys indicate servicemember families are reimbursed only about two-thirds of the expenses they incur in complying with military relocation orders. More needs to be done to restore the principle that it's the government's responsibility, not the servicemember's, to pay the cost of military-directed moves.
Homeowner capital gains tax: Afford servicemember homeowners the same capital-gains tax exemption opportunity as other Americans by ignoring time spent away from the home on military orders in calculating whether the servicemember has met occupancy requirements for exemption from capital-gains tax on sale of a home. Current law allows exemption of up to $500,000 in homeowner capital gains per couple, provided the home was occupied as a principal residence for at least two of the five years preceding the sale. Military members reassigned overseas or otherwise away from their principal residence for three or more years on government orders should not be forced to pay capital-gains taxes for obeying such orders. (At press time, there was still a possibility that Congress might include this initiative in the economic stimulus package in late November. See next month's "Washington Scene" for an update.)
GI Bill benefits: Support legislation tying the level of Montgomery GI Bill (MGIB) education benefits to the average cost of attending a four-year public college. Facilitate adjustments to reserve MGIB programs whenever changes are made to the basic MGIB benefit. Permit reservists called to active duty for more than 12 months to enroll in the active duty MGIB, and extend the benefits usage period for those who satisfactorily complete a reserve service commitment.
Absentee voting: Guard servicemembers' and family members' absentee voting rights in state and local, as well as federal, elections. Currently, federal law only guarantees members' and dependents' absentee voting rights in federal elections. In addition, establish uniform DoD guidelines to ensure servicemembers' absentee ballots, including those submitted from operational or combat locations overseas where no postage is required, are properly recorded and not subjected to arbitrary disqualification.
Commissary benefits: Protect against privatization efforts or reductions in commissary funding support to ensure retention of this important benefit for all service beneficiaries, including active, reserve, and retired members, families, and survivors. Resist consolidation of commissary and exchange facilities (which has the secondary effect of increasing prices on some commissary items) except as necessary to avoid loss of commissary facilities at brac (base realignment and closure) locations.
Reserve compensation system: Examine possible options for retirement and other compensation adjustments that may be appropriate to reflect DoD's policy of a "seamless, integrated total force." Active duty and reserve retirement systems must be properly calibrated to meet their respective manning requirements while providing fair compensation and transition between service statuses. The reserve compensation system must adequately reflect the demands of reserve service without creating disproportional incentives that could undermine active force retention.
Reserve commissary parity: Support extension of full commissary benefits to members of the Ready Reserve, including "gray area" retirees. Tracking reservists' current compliance with the 24-visit annual limit is expensive and counterproductive. Removing the limit will have no discernible effect on commissaries, save millions in administrative costs, and eliminate the perception that these full members of the Total Force have less than first-class patron status in commissaries.
Inactive duty training (IDT) points: Remove the current cap that bars Selected Reserve personnel from crediting more than 90 idt points per year toward retirement, even if they actually earned additional points above the cap. All points earned in a 12-month period should be credited for retirement purposes.
Deduction of non-reimbursable expenses: Restore income tax deductibility of Guard and Reserve members' self-paid travel to training locations, overnight lodging, meals, and uniform expenses. Members receive no reimbursement for such expenses and deserve relief from having to subsidize their own military training.
Additional Issues
Flag amendment: Support congressional passage of a proposed constitutional amendment allowing Congress to prohibit the physical desecration of the flag of the United States so this important matter can be referred to the states, and the people can decide the issue.
1993 Social Security tax: Repeal the legislation that increased from 50 percent to 85 percent the maximum amount of Social Security benefits subject to federal income tax.
Social Security and Medicare reform: Oppose initiatives that impose disproportionate penalties on particular segments of the beneficiary or taxpayer population or fail to protect long-lived beneficiaries' income from the ravages of inflation.
Arlington burial rules: Pass legislation codifying rules for burial in Arlington National Cemetery (anc). The current rules exist only in an Army regulation, and there is considerable confusion over eligibility for interment and inurnment in anc. Congress should remove the controversy over rule waivers by codifying these rules in law.
Veterans' claims: Support vigorous action and added resources to reduce the huge veterans' claims backlog. Despite top-level commitment from the Department of Veterans Affairs (va) and Congress, there are almost 650,000 claims awaiting decision in the va. Much more needs to be done this year in this arena.
Health program funding: Seek full funding for the Defense Health Program, working with Congress and the Department of Defense (DoD) to ensure both military readiness and beneficiaries' needs are met, regardless of their age, status, or location. This includes supporting realistic budget assumptions and working to ensure Congress fully funds any unanticipated contingency or other requirements that otherwise would overtax existing programs and budgets.