These rates would currently be the maximum of $4,082 a month, and the minimum, $637 a month. I would suggest from this that those military employees that receive the pay equal to the GS-15 and are totally disabled should receive the same or similar compensation, which is 663 percent of their monthly pay. The military veteran employee would receive $1,213, or less than half as much. This single comparison of the total disability rating between veterans and civilians is sufficient for the committee to task the administration to develop a comparison for all percentages of disability ratings.

I maintain that should the military employee be an aviator, a nuclear engineer, or a medical officer, that such specialized skills and other educational accomplishments should be considered when making compensation determinations.

On concurrent receipt, Mr. Chairman, there exists one group of veterans that are not adequately compensated for service-connected disabilities. The group which I refer to are those veterans who have served 20 or more years and who have become retirement eligible for years of service. If they should become disabled on active duty, these veterans would receive the greater of the disability retired pay or retired pay based on years of service. The length of service retiree who is also disabled must, in effect, pay for his own disability compensation.

On the dependency and indemnity compensation, Mr. Chairman, I will address that program briefly. This program provides benefits to the survivors of members or former members whose death occurs on active duty, or as a result of a service-connected disability. The monthly rates paid to a surviving spouse are based on the pay grade of the service members at the time of death or release from military service. I recommend that the benefit schedule be truly increased, as necessary, to reasonably insure the maintenance of the survivors' standard of living existing at the time of death of the service member. Our Nation has a long outstanding record in providing benefits to the survivors of those whose husbands and fathers gave their lives in the service of their country, for which this, our Nation and this committee, can be especially proud.

To establish the income levels existing at the time of death, however, the current basic pay schedule should be replaced by the amount of basic military compensation or BMC. This is defined in the United States Code, title 10. This more accurately reflects true income and is comparable to civilian employees salary. The recommended amount of dependency and indemnity compensation should be 50 percent of BMC, and 50 percent of the salary is an accepted replacement level for Federal civilian employees who suffer a jobrelated death. The compensation for the dependent of military service members should not be less.

On the termination of DIC benefits upon remarriage, under other Federal programs-Social Security and the Federal Employees Compensation Program-benefits are payable until death, or remarriage if the beneficiary is under age 60. The civil service surviving widow can receive the benefit until death or until she remarries before reaching age 60. I recommend that the Congress authorize surviving widows who are receiving benefits under the DIC

program to continue to receive these benefits if they should remarry after age 60. Other Federal programs do so, and it is only proper that these widows be afforded the similar minimum consideration. I want to thank the committee for allowing me to provide the views of the Retired Officers Association on these important matters, and I would be glad to provide any answers to any further questions you may have.

[The statement of John F. Wanamaker appears on p. 54.]

Mr. APPLEGATE. Thank you very much, Commander. We appreciate your input.

Mr. Charles Jackson.

Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. Chairman, if I may, I am Dick Johnson, the director of legislative affairs for the Non Commissioned Officers Association. I would like to introduce Mr. Jackson to the commit

tee.

Mr. APPLEGATE. Fine.

Mr. JOHNSON. He joined the association 5 years ago, after 25 years in the U.S. Navy, a career which culminated in his assignment as a force master chief of a Navy recruiting command. After coming to work for the association, he organized our National Service Program and he brought NCOA on line as an accredited national service organization by the Veterans' Administration. We are now the fourth largest such organization on the VA rolls.

Mr. Jackson is currently serving as a member of the international board of directors of the Non Commissioned Officers Association and is the international secretary to the Association. He is also our National Director of veterans services. He represents truly the professional excellence of the noncommissioned and petty officer corps and, hopefully, the Non Commissioned Officers Association.

It is my pleasure to introduce Mr. Jackson to the committee this morning to make our statement on compensation programs.

Mr. APPLEGATE. Mr. Jackson, let me just welcome you to the subcommittee. It's nice to have you here. And thank you, Dick.

STATEMENT OF CHARLES R. JACKSON

Mr. JACKSON. Mr. Chairman, we thank you for this opportunity to appear on behalf of the more than 250,000 associated members of the Non Commissioned Officers Association.

Mr. Chairman, my prepared statement addresses in detail a number of issues of concern to NCOA. For several years, NCOA representatives have criticized inadequacies of the DIC program. I will not consume the committee's time this morning to further discuss the problems of the program, but the Association does believe that this is the most important issue facing the committee today. It is our belief that some action should be taken soon to provide for a more equitable distribution of DIC survivors' benefits.

A second area of concern addressed in our prepared statement is the concurrent receipt of retired pay in veterans disability compensation. Under current law, military personnel who are retired for length of service from the Armed Forces must forfeit a portion of their retired pay to receive veterans disability compensation. This forfeiture is required, even though one payment is earned for years of service and the other for some medical condition related to serv

ice. Only military retirees must make such a forfeiture. Other veterans who are compensably disabled by service are not required to make any similar forfeiture, even if they are Federal employees. In fact, no veterans, including those convicted of felonies and residing in prisons, are required to make any forfeiture of disability compensation.

Any living veteran, notwithstanding the source or amount of any income, can receive disability compensation without having to give up anything-that is, unless they have served in the Armed Forces of this Nation more than 20 years.

This situation seems incongruous to the NCOA. Accordingly, we recommend the adoption of one of the many proposals pending before this committee, including the chairman's bill, H.R. 468, which would allow the concurrent receipt of longevity retired pay and disability compensation.

Finally, Mr. Chairman, we know the proposals we have made are likely to be expensive. However, we believe there is an offsetting area of potential cost savings which should be explored. The Association is somewhat disturbed by the ease with which surviving spouses of veterans move on and off the DIC rolls under the reinstated benefits program.

So that NCOA is not misunderstood, let me first say that the Association fully supports the goal and the obligation of providing for the surviving spouse of a veteran who dies from a service-connected disability. However, we believe that this obligation is diminished by the subsequent marriage of a veteran's surviving spouse. Accordingly, NCOA does not believe subsequent reinstatement to the DIC rolls is appropriate.

Nevertheless, we are not unsympathetic to the plight of survivors. Therefore, we believe it would be appropriate to allow for the payment of pensions instead of reinstated DIC to those survivors who qualify under current law. Additionally, we believe such a change in the reinstated DIC benefit should be entirely prospective and no one currently on the rolls should be removed as a result of this change.

Mr. Chairman, that concludes my remarks. I will be most happy and pleased to attempt to answer any questions you or members of the committee may have on NCOA's veterans service program or this statement.

Thank you.

[The statement of Charles R. Jackson appears on p. 64.]

Mr. APPLEGATE. Thank you very much, Mr. Jackson. We appreciate your testimony before the committee. Once again, it will be made a part of the record and it will, of course, prove very beneficial to us in our oversight hearings.

I have no questions at this time. Mr. Burton, do you have anything?

Mr. BURTON. I just have one question, Mr. Chairman, and that is of the Paralyzed Veterans of America.

You said, Bob, that there is a 6- to 9-month delay in receiving service records?

Mr. MORAN. Yes. We have received some information that there is a delay. We have contacted our field units to get a better overall

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picture. But the information we have in some areas is that yes, there is a 6- to 9-month delay.

Mr. BURTON. Is that just recent that that has happened, or has that kind of delay been happening for a long period of time?

Mr. MORAN. I really can't answer that until we get a feedback from our field units. This is just something that we have picked up recently. Being a former county service officer for 10 years, there always has been in certain areas some delays in receiving the necessary military records. As far as I know, maybe the 6- to 9-month delay is something that has just come about recently.

Mr. BURTON. What is a reasonable period of time to expect those records?

Mr. MORAN. That's a good question.

Mr. BURTON. Well 2 months, 3 months?

Mr. MORAN. I don't know. There are people who could probably better address that than me. I found that it all depends on where possibly the veteran is stationed, what kind of claim, and if there is any kind of foul play involved in anything. But usually, maybe 2 to 3 months I would say has been a normal period of time.

Mr. BURTON. I would just say, Mr. Chairman, that with the computer setups that we have now, it just seems inconceivable that they could have that kind of a problem. I would think 30 to 60 days ought to be plenty of time; 6 to 9 months is ridiculous.

Thank you very much, Bob.

Mr. MORAN. Thank you.

Mr. APPLEGATE. Thank you, Mr. Burton.

I would agree with you very strongly on that, because those of us who have an opportunity to work a lot with the veterans officers and with the veterans on their individual cases know what those delays are. It is hard to pinpoint the responsibility. However, apparently it is with the GSA.

We would like to see that cut down, and I think it ought to be cut. Our committee staff has delved into this and is making a study on it for our own benefit, with some recommendations. I think that maybe Mr. Moon may have some comments to make.

Mr. MOON. It seems that this may be a fairly recent development, this trouble in getting records on newly discharged veterans. We do our own oversight activity on a daily basis. That friendly telephone service works pretty good. We get complaints of the difficulty in getting the records out of the General Services' records center in St. Louis. I have received information from several field stations that the MPRC will tell us they have the records on station but they won't be available for another 60 to 90 days.

Now, I will be in touch with DVB personnel in the next few days to discuss this. It appears that the problem may be beyond VA's control, but we do need to build a fire under that other agency to improve the service. I did learn from the VA that the overall average length of time to process initial claims has gone up-not dramatically, but it has increased. Obviously, this difficulty in securing records has something to do with it.

So I do appreciate you bringing that to our attention, Bob. It had come up elsewhere, but it won't fall on deaf ears. We'll see if we can't do something to improve that.

Mr. MORAN. Thank you.

Mr. JOHNSON. If I might offer, Mr. Chairman, a part of the problem on recently-discharged veterans is that the services hold those records at their individual headquarters anywhere from 90 to 180 days before they turn those records over to the Federal Records Center in St. Louis. Part of the initial delay is the hopefulness on the part of the Defense Department that those folks are going to come back in 6 months and reenlist. That subjects those who are recently discharged to further delays when they hold their military records.

Mr. APPLEGATE. It is sort of a method then.

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes.

Mr. APPLEGATE. Mr. Burton.

Mr. BURTON. I just have one more question. It seems to me that if they want to hold those records for that purpose, that they could have a duplicate set, or it could be fed into the computer and they could go ahead and forward that information. I mean, there is nothing wrong with them keeping a set of those records for those who

Mr. JOHNSON. Then it becomes a duplicative reproduction in that area, and then you end up ultimately with an extra set of records that you have made.

Mr. BURTON. But to hold those for 6 months when somebody needs them, just because they're anticipating somebody might want to re-up, that doesn't make sense.

Mr. JOHNSON. There is a potential there that the service member may be able to go back to his parent service who still holds those records and request the records from that source, rather than going to the Federal Records Center.

Again, I reiterate, we're talking about recently discharged veterans, within 6 months of their discharge. Those service records can be requested from the parent service. Frequently, it is just a matter of not knowing where the records reside and, therefore, you automatically submit your service record request to St. Louis and they just hold it and don't forward it.

Mr. BURTON. Since you have some expertise in this area, you, along with your colleagues at the table there, might put your heads together and come up with some kind of a proposed solution to speed up this process and bring it to the attention of the subcommittee.

Mr. JOHNSON. It is kind of a whose got the button issue. Without knowing where those records reside, you really don't know where to send your request. A shotgun request is the most likely answer. If you have a guy within 30 to 180 days of discharge and he, unfortunately, didn't make a copy of his records to bring with him when he left, then the best thing to do is shotgun the request-one to St. Louis, one to the last duty station, and one to the Military Personnel Center, asking for copies of whatever records are required for that individual. Then just wait and see who answers it.

Mr. APPLEGATE. Do you know this to be a fact, that they hold those records for that purpose? If so, do you have any idea what kind of success they have?

Mr. JOHNSON. It depends on the economy of the situation. I know for a fact the Marine Corps holds the records for 6 months. I am not sure-