Caucus aims to alleviate military families’ burdens

Military families have a lot of the same issues as anybody else – employment, education, health care – but their problems are compounded by the massive government bureaucracy that is the Department of Defense.

On Monday, a group of about 100 service members and dependents gathered at Fairchild Air Force Base to discuss how hard it is to raise a family in the military with a panel of officials who are in a position to do something about it.

There is a great deal of partisan wrangling these days, acknowledged U.S. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, “but this is one area where both parties have come together.”

The first meeting outside Washington, D.C, of the Congressional Military Family Caucus was headed by its co-chairs, McMorris Rodgers, a Republican representing Eastern Washington, and Rep. Sanford D. Bishop, a Democrat from southwestern Georgia, home to the Army’s Fort Benning and the Marine Corps Logistics Base.

“We often mention service members,” Bishop said, “but we cannot forget the families who sacrifice just as much.”

The lawmakers were joined in a panel discussion by Robert Gordon, deputy assistant secretary of defense for military community and family policy, and Tom Riggs, director of the Washington National Guard Joint Service Support Directorate.

Among the issues discussed:

• Guard and Reserve care : Riggs said that civilians injured on the job are entitled to workers’ compensation insurance and that active-duty military continue to be paid while recuperating. But National Guard and Reserve troops who require rehabilitative care upon return from deployment must make a difficult choice.

They can return home to long waits for Department of Veterans Affairs care or submit to a 45-day “lockdown” in which they are evaluated at military hospitals near base.

Riggs called on the military to “stop this restrictive policy” and allow returning Guard and Reserve members to receive “Warrior Transition” care at medical facilities near their homes.

• Housing : Air Force wife Tiffini Ingram said military families were hard-hit by the housing market crisis. About 57 percent of Fairchild’s active-duty members live off base.

Families throughout the nation are paying off mortgages that are more than homes are currently worth, Ingram said. But unlike civilians, military families are subject to relocation orders known as “permanent change of station” that force them to take big losses on the sale of the homes they leave behind.

The military homeowner assistance program, she said, is falling short of its intended purpose when relocated families lose buyers during a lengthy and expensive closing process.

• Retirement and health benefits : Audience members expressed concern about what effect $450 billion in defense cuts would have on military retirement benefits, including increased medical co-payments.

McMorris Rodgers said that while it’s true the Department of Defense was looking at retirement and health care costs, “which are eating up more and more of our military budget,” she would be reluctant to change benefits for current retirees.

Failure of the congressional supercommittee to compromise on budget reductions and revenue enhancements would trigger even more across-the-board defense cuts. However, McMorris Rodgers remains optimistic.

“I’m still hopeful the supercommittee will come together,” she said.