NOVEMBER 20, 2008 VCU WEBCAST >> LUCY MILLER: Hello, everybody. I'm so glad you could join us for today's Webcast. Let me tell you a little about what you can expect for the next 45 or 50 minutes. You are going to get a Readers Digest condensed version of the benefits that are available to veterans with disabilities. In your packet you had a detailed paper that will cover everything that I talk about today in significant detail. There are going to be some places where I'm going to show you slides, and say, these are the benefits that are listed, and refer back to your paper. So kind of use the presentation that I give you today as an introduction to that paper, and that 10,000 foot view of the various benefits available to veterans with disabilities. Without further ado, let's get started. What are we going to cover today? If you haven't spent a lot of time working with veterans, you may not know the types of benefits and the plethora of benefits available is extensive. Today we will focus on benefits that are available only to veterans who are considered disabled by either the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, which from this point forward we are going to refer to as the VA, and/or the U.S. Department of Defense, which you will see referred to as the DoD. This is a small corner of the veterans benefits that are available. What we are not going to talk about today are the huge body of benefits available to any veteran, things like the G.I. Bill, where you can get educational benefits, all sorts of retirement benefits, that are available to you as veterans. We are not going to cover that today. We are only going to cover those benefits that are available based on disability. Let's take a brief detour, because most of you who are out there who know me know that I spend a lot of my time training on Social Security disability benefits. I have found that there is a lot of misunderstanding. People think that if you get a VA disability benefit, that somehow you can't also collect Social Security disability benefits. And that's absolutely not true. These benefit programs are not mutually exclusive. While the disability criteria for the Social Security programs are very different, and much more stringent than those used by the VA or the Department of Defense, there will be veterans that you encounter who qualify for both. If there is any doubt, you need to refer an individual on to the Social Security to begin that lengthy application process. We are seeing more and more of today's veterans with insured status with SSA, because when you think about it, a lot of the fellows and ladies that have gone to Afghanistan or to Iraq have come out of the reserves, or they are part-time military. So they have regular jobs in the civilian community. And they have been paying into that FICA. They have established insured status. It's very important that you remember that VA is not the only place to go to look for benefits, particularly for those individuals with really significant injuries or disabilities that they have incurred. Always have folks apply both with the VA and with Social Security, if there is any doubt. Not only do we have to remember about Social Security and the benefits available through the VA, but there are multiple types of benefits available just through the veterans system. The first type is probably for those of you working with homeless veterans, the least common, but it is out there, which is military retirement that is due to disability. This is just basic military retirement, for the ladies and gentlemen that have been serving a substantial period of time who retire. And you can retire based on disability, not just because you have put your time in. With that comes a lot of benefits that we will talk about in a minute. Next to that, or in addition to that, are the benefits available through the Veterans Administration, the VA benefits. It's not even simple on that score. Two different types of benefits that you can collect through the VA, you've got disability compensation, which is one thing, and the VA disability pension, and boy, those two benefits are completely different. You also have access to the VA healthcare system. This presentation is not going to cover the VA healthcare system at all. The paper that you have in your packet gives a fairly detailed explanation of how that system works, and who is allowed to access that system, and things like the out-of- pocket expenses that you might have to pay for the various services. We are not going to cover that on the slides today at all. But you do have a resource there in your packet, and if you have questions about the healthcare system, that is the place to start. Let's begin with the benefits package you are least likely to see if you are serving homeless veterans, and this is military retirement benefits. These are administered by the Department of Defense, not the Veterans Administration. To make it even more complicated, you all know there is various branches of the service. It isn't just one Department of Defense. You have the Air Force, Army, Marines, Navy. Each of those service branches has its own little bells and whistles that apply to the way retirement works. Military retirement is available to individuals who have 20 or more years of active service in the military. And you can actually retire as disabled, regardless of how severe your disability is found to be by the military. You will find out later they talk about this in terms of a rating. And this is used in the percentages, from 0 up to 100. We will cover that in a minute. But if you are found unfit by reason of any physical disability, you can retire based on disability, if you have sufficient years of service. If you have less than 20 years of service, at the time that your service is terminated, or you are removed from the military by reason of your physical disability, these folks are not really considered to be retired. The military makes a distinction, and these folks are considered to be separated. Your benefits, when you get the military retirement due to disability, can be dispensed as either a monthly check, that comes when you actually retire, with your 20-plus years, or you can get a lump sum severance payment, similar to the way a private employer would offer a disability benefit, or worker's compensation program. But this goes when you are separated as opposed to being retired, which means again that you have less years of active service. What are the advantages of this type of benefit? First of all, when you get military retirement based on disability, your disability rating is never subject to a review. That is kind of a double-edged sword. For example, let's say that you are separated and the military has determined that your disability rating is 40 percent. That's good, in that you are never going to be subject to a review that might decrease that. The reason your disability rating is important is that that rating is tied to the amount of the benefit that you are paid. The higher your rating, the more money you can get. So, the bad news on this score is that if your disability gets worse over time, and that does happen, you are not going to be allowed to go back to the Department of Defense and say, will you please review my disability? Because I think I should be getting a higher percentage, which would then translate into more money. The good news is, if you go to work or you improve, or something happens, you are not going to be subjected to a review that might decrease your rating. You will see in a minute that in the VA system, that can happen. Another advantage to military retirement is that when you retire, based on disability or any other reason, you get the same benefits as all military retirees. And they are extensive. You get access to those commissaries, exchanges, you can access a military hospital, and you can continue to use tri care insurance for yourself and family members, your dependents. There is a whole range of things that comes with that 20-plus years of service when you retire. The other wonderful thing is that military retirement, even when it's based on disability, is not affected by paid employment in any way. So you put in your time in the military, and you retire, even if it's based on disability, you can start a second career. You can rest assured that that income that you generate, that whole second career, is never going to change the amount of money that you are allowed to get through your military retirement. When you are working with veterans, make sure you find out, what are you getting? Is your benefit that you are getting military retirement? Or is it coming from the VA? To make matters more complicated, you can collect both in some instances. Let's take a peek at those VA disabilities benefits, because remember, that's completely separate from that retirement. When you incur an injury, when you are in the military, you have to apply for VA benefits, and most vets apply for these when they are first separated from the military, due to being unfit for active duty. Of course, that unfitness is related to your disability. Vets can actually apply at any time for the veterans benefits, and this does happen on occasion, when perhaps the disability isn't recognized when you first are separated from the military or it manifests itself perhaps at some later point. There is no statute of limitations on that. If you find that a disability occurs, manifests itself later in life, as long as you meet the eligibility criterion for the VA disability system, you can apply at any point later on. There is a lengthy form, as I'm sure you can imagine. You can see on your slides the VA form 21526, the veterans application for compensation or pension. And we haven't talked about both those programs yet, but it's the same form to apply for both and it's a lengthy process. You can begin this process on-line. We have given you a link here. It's also in the material, the written material we have provided for you. And there is a help center. As you can imagine, a lot of veterans have questions about how to complete this process, and how do I answer this question, and what do I need to say here? There is a wonderful toll-free number here, and I encourage veterans to use this number. And there are even places where you can go for help as a veteran, and we will give you contact information on that. The vet service centers, veterans service centers, which are run by the VA, they are all over the place. We have contact information about your vet service centers at the end of this presentation. Those are good places to go to get help as well. You can also get help often through the VA hospital systems, or through the healthcare systems. Employees in the system are very well-versed on these benefits, and how you apply, what the process is, and they can point vets in the right direction. Let's begin looking at the disability evaluation system under the VA. Those of us who come from a background in helping people with Social Security disability, this system is very unusual. In the disability system for Social Security, you are either totally disabled, or you are not disabled at all. You are either eligible for benefits or not. But within the VA system, there is an incremental percentage that they use to assess the level of an individual's disability. And it actually, oddly enough, starts at 0. You will find some veterans who qualify for a disability benefit with a rating of 0 percentage -- very unusual -- all the way up to 100 percent, which is considered total disability. That is where the VA refers to that, where you have a rating of 100 percent, it's called total. And you see everything in between. The importance of the rating system is that the higher an individual's rating is, the higher the monthly disability benefit will be. The percentage ratings were originally intended to represent the degree to which a vet's earning capacity would be diminished by the disability. I guess we can argue all day as to how accurate a reflection that might be in today's economy. But that is really what they were intended to represent. An individual who has a rating of 30 percent is supposed to be diminished, earnings capacity is supposedly diminished by 30 percent based on the disability they incur. The determinations are based on the VA schedule for rating disability, something they called the VASRD, which is a huge manual. There are people that this is their job. They are rating, disability rating adjudicators, and they assess disability for veterans and assign ratings. The VA considers all service connected disabilities, and the totality of the changes in a person's medical condition that's occurred during medical service. Interestingly enough, for those people who come out of the Department of Defense on retirement based on disability, the Department of Defense only considers physical disabilities; not mental illness, or emotional kinds of disorders that an individual might have incurred. But the VA looks at everything. They look at the mental health issues. They will look at physical disabilities as well. Unlike the Department of Defense which we mentioned earlier, the VA process permits reevaluation of your service connected disability if a condition either gets worse or gets better. There is a possibility for your rating to change in the VA system. When you look at their rules system, it talks about rating reviews being done when indicators are presented that might tip off the VA, or even the veteran himself or herself can ask for a rating review, if they feel their disability has gotten better or worse. To make it even more complicated, the Department of Defense and the VA use different ratings systems. It's not uncommon to find an individual come out of the Department of Defense with a 20 percent rating on retirement, getting retirement based on disability, and then have a different rating within the VA system. And remember that I said it is possible to get that retirement from Department of Defense and a VA benefit as well, with different ratings. The systems are different. Let's look at these ratings designations, because this really is some impactful, these determinations are very impactful. Total disability is based on having a rating of 100 percent, for whatever the disability is that you have, or combination of disabilities. Now, here is an odd concept. The second bullet down, you can actually get a rating of perhaps a 40 percent, but you can have that rating increased or considered to be 100 percent or total disability, under a concept the VA refers to as individual un-employability. This means that you have factors in your life that have created tremendous barriers to employment. While your rating would actually be, say, 40 percent, which should only indicate a 40 percent reduction in your earnings capacity, you have this combination of issues in your life, that have made employment extremely difficult. So you can get an increased rating, up to 100 percent, that total rating, based on this problem that you had in either obtaining or maintaining employment. This is going to be really important later. We will bring this issue back up again, because gentlemen and ladies with this designation who work can have some change in their ratings. The third button here, you can also be rated as permanent and total. This means you have 100 percent rating, and the VA has gone one step further and said, your disability is never going to improve. We consider this to be permanent. You are 100 percent, and it's permanent. Now, these designations may seem like splitting hairs, like who cares? But they are really important, because if you have these various designations, they can allow not only higher benefits to be paid, more money, but if you get higher percentages, you can get additional benefits for your dependents. You can also qualify for additional bells and whistles that are described in this paper, other benefits. We will cover those briefly. But that is why the rating designation is so critically important. Not only does it give you additional money, but it can open the door to additional benefits for you and your dependents. Let's change gears and start looking at the two programs. Remember in the VA system, you have the two programs known as compensation and pension. To qualify for disability compensation, the disability has to be service connected, which means that it is incurred or possibly aggravated during active military service. Separation or discharge from the military also has to be under conditions other than dishonorable. The VA compensation is an entitlement program. It isn't means tested in any way. That means it doesn't matter how much money you have in the bank. It doesn't matter how many cars you have or how many houses you have. This is really a way for our Federal Government to compensate a veteran for becoming disabled in the service of his country. This is an entitlement program. So, it doesn't matter what else you may happen to have. If you are disabled, this is compensation that our Federal Government provides to veterans. Now, you can get Department of Defense retirement, in addition to the VA compensation. But you are being, your compensation may be offset or reduced if that military retirement or that disability severance pay due to separation is received. Remember I said you can get both, and you can. But it may cause a reduction in your VA benefits. Let's look at other things. Here is where you are going to see where the weighting comes in. If you attain a rating of 30 percent or higher, you are eligible for additional allowances, meaning for money for your dependents; that means dependent spouse or dependent children or both. Veterans with certain types of disabilities, and this gets complicated, loss of limb or you can't use various organs, you can be eligible for an additional payment called special monthly compensation, that comes on top of whatever compensation you already get based on your rating. Now you can see all the strange bells and whistles that come into play. This is one of them. Each of these special programs affords a veteran additional benefits or additional money or both. If you have 100 percent rating where you are considered totally disabled, and you are, quote, "house-bound" or "bedridden," and I'm sorry for this terribly antiquated language -- those of us who work in disability services, we would never use these terms anymore. But these are the terms that come out of the VA disability system. If you are house- bound or bedridden, you can get an additional special monthly compensation, there is the SMC, known as aid and attendance and house-bound allowance. If you have various needs, you have personal care needs you can get additional monthly payment to compensate you for the expense you incur by having a personal care need, which is really nice. Now, let's take a look at the pension program, because this is completely different. In the homeless community, you are going to find some of the ladies and gentlemen getting the pension. This is a benefit that is available to veterans with nonservice connected disabilities. You think about the way that the VA goes about determining disabilities. Not only do they have to look at the physical and mental impact of that disability, assign a numerical rating, a percentage rating, they have to figure out, did this disability, was it caused or was it aggravated by military service? That is something that in the Social Security system, you never have to worry about. But that additional issue really slows down the disability evaluation process for the VA. And the compensation, the disability compensation is only afforded to individuals who acquire their disability through service. It was based on your service. It was a service connected disability. Well, the pension is the only benefit the VA offers that is available to veterans who have disability that were not related to their military service. There are some requirements. You have to have at least 90 days of active military service, and you have to have at least one day that was served during the period of war. And oh, my goodness, the regulations that describe when are we in a period of war and when are we not in a period of war, go on and on and on. But some vets have to actually serve more than that, depending when they served and how many days of military service they saw. These determinations get rather complicated. They are not for you all to have to worry about. This is a referral to VA. They know the rules. They are very complicated and they will make these determinations. Now, to get a pension, this is not for somebody with a moderate or mild disability. A pension is only afforded to an individual who is assessed as being not only totally disabled, meaning you got a 100 percent rating, but permanent, and total. So this is really for the men and women who incurred significant disabilities. And remember that this package is only available to individuals with the nonservice related disabilities. Now, again, your separation or discharge from the military has to be under conditions other than dishonorable, and not due to willful misconduct. That is something to remember. The VA pension is not really intended to give a veteran enough money to live a real secure life on. It really is intended as a supplement. It's intended to bring the veteran's total income up to a minimum level established by congress. And this program is very strictly means tested. And even the SSI program, in the Social Security system, and that is a stringent program, has very strict income and asset guidelines. We can spend several hours just talking about the income and asset guidelines for this program. Your paper gives you a slight overview of those. But again, this is one of those things you need to apply, you need to let the reviewers at VA determine when someone is income eligible or not. Payments are reduced by the amount of countable income a veteran may bring to the table, including that veteran's spouse and dependent children. So, you can see that this is a benefit that really is impacted by a number of things. How do you know how much you are supposed to get? This changes every year. I've kind of learned my lesson when I write papers, because this becomes outdated so quickly. At this point we don't post these. We post a link. You can go on-line, go to that VA Website, and you will find more information than you would ever want to know about how much money an individual can earn when they have 20 percent disability, on the compensation, or what are the pension rates like, and that's all on line. You can look it up. It even shows you how much you get for the special monthly compensation, if you have auxiliaries, or dependents, that are also collecting through disability compensation; you can find all those percentages there. Here is the place to go. Every January these are going to change. What you are seeing this year is going to be the '08 figures. And then the '09 figures will pop up in January. There are additional benefits for veterans that aren't money at all. They are services, or special loans. There is life insurance. There is all kinds of additional things. This can get complicated. The one that I really want to point out is that the VA does offer specialized rehabilitation and employment services. That is your first bullet here. The paper that you got in your packet provides a detailed explanation of what these services are, how you establish eligibility for them, and what exactly you can get from these. I want to refer you to that paper to learn about that, because any veteran who shows up at your door wanting services, this is a wonderful place to start with referrals. Did you know about the VA, VR&E program, and have you been referred there, and do you have a voc rehab counselor assigned to you through the VA? These are wonderful services. You need to know that they are there and refer veterans for help. There are some grants that are available to certain veterans who meet certain criteria to help with adapting a house. If you have a physical disability, let's say you have mobility limitations, it gets expensive to adapt your house to your physical disability. Here is financial aid. Again, only certain vets are going to qualify. The eligibility criteria are specific and they are in your paper. It is something that you need to know is out there, so that you will check. There is special life insurance that you can purchase, if you are a service disabled veteran. How about this fourth bullet down, you can get assistance adapting your vehicle, your car. Your state rehab agency, your state vocational rehabilitation agency also is a source of help for adapting an automobile. But this is a place to go as well. And, certain veterans, particularly those who are very severely disabled and are on the pension program, can get additional money for a clothing allowance. Something to know about. This is all different from what you would encounter in the Social Security system. None of these special benefits would be there. Let's talk about what happens when veterans who are getting these benefits go to work. And there is good news and there is bad news. Again, these are very different changes, the way that these benefits are affected, very different from the way that Social Security looks at the benefits, at their benefits. First of all, remember that if you are serving a veteran getting military retirement due to disability, those ladies and gentlemen can knock themselves out. They can establish a second career. They can earn as much as they want to. They don't need to tell the Department of Defense. They don't need to do anything. Their benefit is never affected by employment. That is wonderful. VA disability compensation, remember, that is due to Veterans Administration and this is the one for vets with service connected disabilities. These benefits are not really affected by employment, the way that we would think, like you don't get less money. If you have a paycheck, it is not like it's going to offset your compensation. However, in some circumstances, and it's possible that work could cause a reduction in your disability rating. It's not common. But that is an eventual circumstance that could occur. People ask me, what is the likelihood that this is going to happen? I wish I had a crystal ball. I wish I had a way to help you predict this. I don't. In most instances, what happens is that the veterans themselves ask for a disability review, because they feel their disability has gotten worse. If that veteran is working and working at a substantial level, when that review takes place, you have opened it up to the possibility that your rating could not just go up because you think your disability is worse, but could go down, because remember, what is the rating all about? It's about the percent of, the impact to your earnings capacity that this disability is creating for you. If you are showing a significant earnings capacity, it is possible that your rating could be reduced. Again, it isn't something that the VA is knocking on veterans' doors, are you working, have you reported? It's not like Social Security in that regard. But, in most instances, the reviews that are done are initiated by the vets themselves. The veteran asks for a review. And it's something to warn people about. If you are working, and you ask for a review and you get one, it's possible that your rating could actually be decreased, not increased. What does that mean? It means less money. Now, pension is pretty ugly when it comes to work. Remember that the disability pension is afforded to individuals with nonservice connected disabilities, total and permanent disability, okay; can't get this if you have just a lower percentage. And it's a program that is strictly means tested. If you go to work and you get a paycheck, your veterans pension will be reduced dollar for dollar by gross income, gross. It's not even as good as the SSI program, where your check is reduced $1 for every 2 that you earn. This is a dollar for dollar reduction. These ladies and gentlemen on pension can be affected if they go back to work. Now, let's take a closer look at how employment affects the ratings. This gets complicated. Now, your employment is not going to cause a reduction of the disability ratings for individuals who meet certain criterion. For example, if you are elderly, which they define as 69 or older, you are not going to have a review. You can work as much as you want, and the military is not or VA is not going to review you. You are also not going to be reviewed, even if you work, if you are designated as being totally disabled. Remember that is 100 percent schedule rating or if you are designated as having that permanent and total disability. If you have that designation, then your employment is not going to affect the amount of check that you get from the compensation program. Now, where you have to watch out, it's the ladies and gentlemen who have that 100 percent schedule or rating based on individual un-employability. If you have had that designation for a period of 20 or more continuous years, you are not going to be reviewed. But, let's say you only had that designation for a year or two. You go back to work. You are earning substantial, earning substantially gainful employment, which is what they call it, you could end up with a rating reduction. Who are the ones at risk? Here they are. It is the opposite of that last line; you turn it upside down. If you are under 69, you have a schedule or rating under 100 percent, then there is some minimal risk that working at a substantial level which create a reduction in your disability rating. Again, remember, they are not knocking at your door, saying, are you working, are you working, are you working? This is a system that is pretty busy. And it's pretty overwhelmed considering that we have so many of our service members coming out with disabilities now. They don't have time to do that. But if you ask for a rating review, that is when some of that risk could be incurred. If you are rated as being totally disabled based on individual un-employability and you are under that 20-year mark, you have had that designation less than 20 years, if you are working in what they call, here is a quote, substantially gainful occupation, you could be at some risk. What do they define that as? Those of us who work in Social Security have to giggle when we see this expression, because it's almost identical to what Social Security uses as a wonderful phrase, substantial gainful employment within their system. It's defined as employment at which a nondisabled individual earns their livelihood with earnings comparable to the particular occupation in the community where the veteran resides. It's a comparable kind of thing. I've listed the citation where that definition comes from. Substantially gainful employment is not something that the VA calls marginal employment, which again those of us who come from disability services and supported employment would never use that phrase. But that is the phrase that is used in the VA system. Marginal employment is when a veteran's earned income would not exceed the current federal poverty guideline. If you want to find those, you can Google federal poverty guideline, and the Department of Health and Human Services, that will pop up, and those change every year as well. Your earnings can go over the federal poverty guideline and still not be considered substantial, if your work occurs under some special circumstances, such as, if you are working in a protected environment or working for your dad or working for a family business, or let's say you are working in a sheltered environment, sheltered workshop, special enclave, or when supported employment services are provided. These are some things to be watching out for. You can reduce that income when the VA is looking at substantial gainful occupations by looking at the circumstances where the work is being occurred. Effective in '85, your total disability rating based on that IU, that is individual un- employability, can't be reduced solely on the basis of you going back to work at a substantially gainful occupation, unless you have been doing that occupation for 12 consecutive months. If you tried it, and it didn't work, you weren't able to maintain that employment, don't worry that they are going to take away your UI designation and reduce your money. You would have to maintain that for 12 consecutive months. And in some cases, there is something to consider here. If you do complete a program of vocational rehabilitation through your state VR agency or through the VA VR&E, it is possible that you could have a reduction in rating, if there is evidence that you have a marked improvement in your disability or potentially recovery, full recovery, which does happen. Now, let's take a look at the state veterans benefits, and some people that are out there watching this are going, state veterans benefits? What the heck is that? You would be utterly amazed at the variety of benefits that are available, not only on the state level, but at a county level, at a city level. This gets very complicated. Most states offer additional benefits to what is available through the VA and the Department of Defense, and these can vary from cash benefits to certain perks. I know in some states, this sounds a little odd, but you can get free licenses, like a fishing license or hunting license. You may not be charged for that. In some counties and cities, if you are a veteran with a disability, you can be excused from paying certain types of property taxes either on your home or on your vehicle. These are wonderful benefits. Nobody knocks on a veteran's door and says, did you realize that you have this state veterans benefit, these county veterans benefits? You have to do your own sleuthing and find these. But there is a Website. I've listed the citation here, the link here, where you can go to find every single state, a link to the Website that talks about the various benefits that individual states offer. And if you latch on to one of those, you will also see links within your state. Say my home state of Kentucky, Jefferson County, Louisville area, there are special property tax incentives available at the county level. It will offer a link to those county benefits as well. So these are things that you really do need to investigate and look up. You have got additional educational assistance, discounts on taxes, fees, home loans, hunting and fishing privileges, lots of other strange bells and whistles. So until you go look it up, you don't know what is available. Remember, not only are there these benefits, state, local, city, county, but you have also got a non-disability benefit available to all veterans, educational assistance, home loan assistance, all different kinds of things. Don't just look at the disability benefits. You have to look at everything to make sure that that veteran is getting what they are eligible for. Well, where do you go to get more information? Let me tell you when I was doing the research to write this paper, this was really confusing. There is so much information. And it's spread all over the place. But I did find some wonderful resources that are free, that I want to share with you, and I'm hoping that you will share with veterans. The first, and I loved this, this is the handbook for injured service members and their families. You can find this at the Website we have listed here, the Fallen Heroes Fund. This is a wounded warriors project. This is a rather lengthy handbook, but the explanations they provide here for especially how your disability is evaluated, what rates you can receive, all those special rules, the way that it's explained is wonderful. It's so clear. It's so concise. It's very, a warm and personal style. I really encourage you to download that. It is long. Download that, maybe print out some copies and disseminate that. The Federal Government also offers a manual of federal benefits for veterans and their dependents. The reason I want you to link on to that, because that handbook is not just for disability benefits. That is going to show you everything. The plethora, myriad of benefits that are available to veterans can be overwhelming. You have to plow through this manual to find various things, but it's well worth it because there are so many different things, so many different programs, that veterans can take advantage of. The vets benefits explained, there is a wonderful Website, military.com, which offers really nice sort of down to earth explanations that the common person can understand about all the veterans benefits. And again, these are the VA benefits, more than the military or DoD benefits. But very nice explanations there. The basic VA, the Veterans Administration, offers a very deep Website; lots and lots of individual pages, it can take hours to sort through that. But the amount of information that is available there is significant. We didn't talk about the health benefits available to veterans at all. There is a ton of information at the VA Website about the VA service system, healthcare service system, how you qualify, what are the out-of-pocket expenses, who is priority and who isn't, where you go to get those health benefits. And within each of those pages, there is linkages to show you where the health facilities are, so veterans can find the closest facilities to them. There is a lot of information out there. Here are my final words. I'd like you to read that paper. I know it's long. But I hope that you keep that as a reference, because it does give a very nice overview of the main benefits available to veterans who incur disabilities, whether they are service connected or nonservice connected. Make sure that the individuals that you are serving are aware of all the different things that they can potentially qualify for. And it isn't just one thing. This takes a lot of research on your part, and/or their part, to find all the different things. Now, encourage vets with disabilities to apply for Social Security disability benefits as well. There is an incredible myth out there that you cannot get both a VA disability benefit and a Social Security benefit. That is absolutely false. There is no impact on either benefit. If you are getting a VA benefit and you qualify for a Social Security disability benefit, on your own work record, then neither of those checks are offset by the other. That is more financial security for a veteran. Why wouldn't you encourage them to apply for both? Now, the local sources of assistance and support are many and they are varied. To me, the best place to start, and I can show slide after slide after slide with places that you can go to get help, but the best place to start is your nearest veterans service center; also referred to quickly as a vet center. It's not where you go take your dog or cat to get well. It's where veterans go to get really good information and assistance in community reentry, going back to live that civilian life. And there is a link for you there, to find the closest vet service center in your area. I'm sorry they aren't everywhere. But they are so helpful that it's worth it to drive a little bit to go and meet with a vet service center representative. I've called those centers, as I was doing research to write the paper in your packet. The ladies and gentlemen who answered the phone were extremely helpful. Veterans hospitals also have benefits specialists that work at each of the vets hospitals, and they are wonderful sources of information as well. I know some of you who are dialing in to this or watching this are benefits counselors, and that is all that you are doing is advising people on benefits. And finding a connection with that veterans benefits specialist at the VA hospital, those guys and ladies do the same thing you do. You need to make a connection, and get those folks on speed dial. They need to know who you are too, because you have information about Social Security and Medicaid and Medicare that they won't know. So you can help each other substantially. We are out of slides. That's it for the presentation. We really look forward to getting your questions in the chat room. And thank you so much for joining us today. (End of Webcast) 1