Senator GLENN. Thank you. Ms. Hickey? STATEMENT OF MS. SYDNEY T. HICKEY, NATIONAL MILITARY FAMILY ASSOCIATION, CHAIRMAN, MILITARY PERSONNEL AND COMPENSATION COMMITTEE MS. HICKEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, The Military Coalition believes implementation of the transition benefits offered by this subcommittee are falling far short of their Congressional mandate. Course, content, and length of the preseparation counseling programs vary by service and installation. Overcrowded classrooms sometimes have 200 participants. Spouses are not being encouraged to attend these sessions with the service member. The better programs have no openings for months. Commanders at some installations are reluctant to make the service member available for the classes within the timeframe prescribed by law. The mandated credentialing of skills is not in place. The Coalition recommends DOD would be directed to immediately provide the full scale of transition benefits to all members before they are separated. The contract to administer the preexisting medical condition benefit has just been signed. The same company that offers the regular health insurance plan, Mutual of Omaha, which has a preexisting clause was awarded that contract. Service members who become employed and can be covered by their employer's medical insurance plans are not eligible under current law to have preexisting conditions covered. The Coalition recommends comprehensive physical examinations be administered to all beneficiaries eligible for a preexisting coverage, prior to enrollment in Mutual of Omaha's plan. We also recommend that current law be modified to provide one year of adequate coverage for preexisting conditions for those who joined in employer-sponsored health plans. DOD's own intent to accelerate the number of separating service members before all transition programs are fully in place is an invitation for previous disaster drawdowns. The Coalition recommends separation of service members not be increased above the end strengths agreed to in Public Law 102-190. We believe the law requiring forfeiture of involuntary and voluntary separation pay in amounts equal to veterans' disability compensation creates an inequity. Involuntary and voluntary separation pays were designed to compensate service members for lost military career opportunities, and to facilitate readjustment to civilian life. They are totally unrelated to any disability a member may have incurred while in service. The Coalition recommends repeal of the sections of the public law, requiring an offset of involuntary and voluntary separation pays by the amount of compensation received as veterans' disability pay. Service members offered involuntary separation initiatives are taking the lump sum bonus in unexpected numbers. The Coalition, who has heard from them, is disturbed to hear their reasons. They feel they need enough money to see them through a year or more of unemployment. They no longer trust their parent service and wonder if the VSI will be cut or deleted in future years. They are afraid the country will not have the money to pay the VSI for 16 or 20 years. The Coalition recommends expert financial counseling be mandatory for service members before they apply for the voluntary separation bonus. The Coalition is intrigued with the concept of a temporary 15year retirement program. Asking a service member with 15 years or more years of service to depart with only the current voluntary separation incentives is patently unfair. A 15-year retirement program with a finite expiration date, administered by the service secretary, would appear to provide the additional tools necessary to achieve an equitable drawdown. COMPENSATION Compensation and benefits for the active duty and reserve force must be competitive and attractive to recruit and retain a high-caliber force. Pay rates over 11 percent behind comparability, housing allowances requiring service members to absorb over 20 percent of their costs, assignments to high cost of living areas, and temporary lodging and other permanent change of station expenses, $1,000 to $3,000 above reimbursement, are neither competitive nor attractive. The Coalition recommends annual military pay raises of at least 1.5 percent above the ECI, until the comparability is reached. Housing allowances that at least consistently cover 85 percent of cost as is mandated by law. A cost of living allowance CONUS for service members assigned to areas where nonhousing cost of living exceeds 105 percent of the national average, an extension of the temporary lodging expense entitlement from the current 4 to 10 days. RETIREMENT Current law allows officers to voluntarily remain on active duty to qualify for retirement if they have 18, but less than 20 years of active duty and have not been selected for promotion, have performance of duty that is honorable, but they cannot meet quality standards. No such authority exists for enlisted personnel. The Coalition recommends authorizing the same safety-net provision for enlisted members. To discourage early retirement by experienced officers and NCO leaders, the existing pay table does not have a 24year longevity increase for certain retirement-eligible grades. Such a longevity pay increase would facilitate the voluntary retirements by personnel at an earlier point, and provide more equitable compensation for those who had planned on longer careers. The Coalition recommends a 24-year longevity increase for grades E-7 through E-9, W-4 and O-6. Some military impacted school districts anticipate the influx of 3,000 to 7,000 additional military children within the next year, because of the drawdown of forces in Europe. SCHOOLS While firmly supporting the administration and funding of the impact aid program within the Department of Education, the Coalition believes such unexpected and dramatic increases and decreases in enrollment cannot be expected to be absorbed in regular appropriations. The Coalition recommends support for appropriations within the DOD budget to assist military impacted schools in emergency situations. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator GLENN. Thank you. Chief Adams? STATEMENT OF MASTER CHIEF PETTY OFFICER JOHN ADAMS, USA (RETIRED), THE RETIRED ENLISTED ASSOCIATION, CHAIRMAN, MILITARY RETIRED PAY COMMITTEE Chief ADAMS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Coalition has asked me to address two issues this morning, the first of which is COLA equity. COLA's for military and civilian retirees and others are again at risk in the President's budget, and I would like to spell out the others so they do not get lost in the grass, that is the annuitants of the military survivor's benefit program if the retirees do not get a COLA. The threat to COLA's emanates from a seemingly innocuous provision buried on page 410 of the fiscal year 1993 budget, entitled, Technical Improvements in the Budget Enforcement Act. That would eliminate or limit most exemptions from sequestration, while preserving the exemption for social security. I might add, social security COLA's have never been sequestered. The Military Coalition recommends a sense of Congress provision to be included in the defense authorization act to guarantee military retirees the same COLA's social security annuitants receive. There would be no cost since the President's budget assumes military retirees would receive a 3 percent COLA in fiscal year 1993. RETIREMENT EQUITY The second area I would like to address is concurrent receipt. The only class citizen in this country that literally pays for their own VA compensation is the military retiree. The only exception to this rule is when a military retiree chooses to combine military service with Federal civilian service to receive a single Federal annuity. By forfeiting the entitlement to military retired pay, their Federal annuity is no longer offset, even though much of it is based on their 20 or more years of active military service. In our opinion, this long-standing policy has invalidated the, quote, "same period of service," end quote, principle. What is at issue is equity and to fairly compensate for lost earning power that so many disabled military retirees incur. We support the principles in S. 1381. Its concept, though not entirely removing the offset with the exception of when the disability is rated at 100 percent, it is long overdue and deserves to become law. DISABILITY S. 1381 recognizes today's budget environment by its inverse ratios, such as 100 percent disabled, no offset. Ninety percent disabled, only a 10 percent offset. Eighty percent disabled, a 20 percent offset, and so on and so forth, thereby providing a reasonable opportunity for compromise between the proponents of full current receipt, and those who believe the current discriminatory practice of full offset should continue. S. 1381, by offering the greater bene fit to those individuals with the greatest disability, also recognizes recipients as individuals. Many individuals receiving the highest disability ratings are unemployable as a direct result of their service-connected disabilities. Many military retirees in this situation believe their country has turned their back on them. They believe they have earned their military retirement, as indicated by their long, honorable and faithful service to their country. They had no idea that, should they incur a service-connected disability, they would have to pay for it themselves. Only Congress can repeal this long-standing inequity within the law. In the past, funding has been the big issue rather than is it the right thing to do. The Coalition believes it is time to put military people first by earmarking a portion of any peace dividend to correct this inequity. The Coalition recommends the subcommittee adopt language in the fiscal year 1993 National Defense Authorization Act to authorize concurrent receipt of military retired pay and VA disability compensation as is provided in S. 1381. That concludes my testimony, Mr. Chairman. Senator GLENN. Thank you. Colonel Partridge? STATEMENT OF COL. CHARLES C. PARTRIDGE, USA (RETIRED), NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR UNIFORMED SERVICES, MEMBER, BASE CLOSURE COMMITTEE Colonel PARTRIDGE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. CLOSURE OF BASE FACILITIES I will address the management of the base closure process briefly, sir. The Military Coalition understands that as a result of our winning the Cold War, military bases and facilities will be closed. We support the need to do so when savings to the Department of Defense and the American taxpayer will result. However, we also believe there are sound reasons for leaving certain base facilities open. Unfortunately in some cases, decisions to close base facilities are being made without adequate analysis and, as a result, mistakes are being made. The facilities we are talking about are commissaries, exchanges, and medical treatment facilities, and I will address each briefly. In a memorandum by the Assistant Secretary for Defense for Production and Logistics, the policy was stated that if a base closes or is retained as a Reserve component training facility, then commissaries and exchanges will be closed, unless a significant active-duty force remains. Well, we believe that in the case of exchanges, whether or not an exchange should remain open to service the remaining retirees, reserve, and National Guard personnel should be a business decision based by the operator. There are no appropriated funds that go into that. These exchanges are supported by the patrons, the shoppers, and to close all these exchanges, particularly where it serves a large retiree base is going to reduce the amount of nonappropriated funds that go to provide soldier support activities, morale, welfare, and recreation support. COMMISSARIES Commissaries are a little different case. They ought to be looked at differently. Appropriated funds are used there to pay for the people who work in the commissary, so a different type of analysis needs to take place, but analysis should be done and we believe it ought to be done on a case-by-case basis. We are not suggesting that stand-alone commissaries and PXs be left. In most of the cases we are talking about, cantonment areas are being left. Reserve and National Guard elements are taking over these bases, or parts of the bases are becoming an annex to other active-duty bases, so there is space there, and there are people there. MEDICAL FACILITIES As regards medical facilities, we are very concerned about that. When a military base closes, the decision is that the medical facility will close. In some cases, this does not make economic sense from the viewpoint of the taxpayer, because when that military treatment facility closes, people are forced to higher cost CHAMPUS, and military retirees eligible for Medicare are forced back on to Medicare. When the analysis is made regarding the cost of medical care as a result of these closures, the only portion that is considered is the CHAMPUS cost. DOD does not consider the cost to the Medicare system because that is not in their budget. We believe that cost ought to be considered as well. Mr. Chairman, our recommendations are to consider the decision for closing or continuing to operate an exchange as a business decision by the operating agency. Let them make the decision. COMMISSARIES Base the decision to close or continue to operate the commissary on a case-by-case analysis of remaining active and Reserve component forces in the area, and DODS responsibility to them and to the retired community. The analysis should include both cost and benefits with options for reducing costs, short of closure, and prohibit the closure or reduction of medical capability, until DOD has an equitable managed-care system in place for all beneficiaries, including CHAMPUS eligibles and Medicare eligibles. We think there are two more rounds of base closures coming up in 1993 and 1995. We would like to see those policies in place for that. We would also like to see a moratorium placed on closing exchanges, commissaries, and medical facilities on bases currently selected for closure until these above actions are taken. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator GLENN. Thank you. Sergeant Major McKinney? STATEMENT OF SGT. MAJ. C.A. MACK MCKINNEY, USMC (RETIRED), NON-COMMISSIONED OFFICERS ASSOCIATION, COCHAIRMAN, MILITARY COALITION Sergeant Major MCKINNEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Some 12 to 10 years ago, this very subcommittee, but I might add, under a different membership, produced two pieces of legislation that I |