Hidden Money Awaits Veterans and Wives of Veterans from Wars
Friday, December 23, 2005
Knight Ridder Newspapers
The Deparment of Veteran Affairs has aproblem. They have + or - 22 billion dollars a year in pensions from the U.S. government that should go to imporverished veterans and veterans' widow. there's only one problem; the Department of Veteran Affairs cannotlocate most of these veterans and widows. Only one in seven of the survivors of our veterans who should get these checks do get them. the DVA says that poor veterans don't know that this program exists.
A VA report in 2004 reccomended that the agency get the word out better.
In 2005, the total number of pensions carried by people fell to 541,00 nationwide.
The VA Commission said that since WWII and the Korean Wars many veterans of wars are dying and falling off the rolls. It is now difficult for the VA to demonstrate the effectiveness of the program. Last year Knight Ridder said that about 572,000 people might be mising a supplement whihc could amount to somewhere between $112 to $2,393 a month to theri income.
Veterans and widows who want to apply must have a veteran in the family who:1. served in a war, 2. is at least 65 years old or disabled.
The phone number is:(800) (827-1000).
The Internet address isthe VA Headquarters:
www.vba.va.gov/bin/21/Milsvc/Doc/Pensoneg.doc
If the person is a widow of a veteran, she goes to thie address to apply:
www.vba.gov/bin/21/mifsvc/Docs/Opening.doc
If you know anyone who might aplly for this, please give them this information. Apparently this fund needs to get more use in order to keep getting funded by teh federal government.
2 comments:
good information, Natalie... as you know, I spent some time perusing your pages here, and you have a fine journal. You ask some very ponderous questions... some I couldn't even answer, and some I tried... I'll be back. I have you on my alert post. Good night!
h
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