Joint Committee on Military and Veterans Affairs
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Bills discussed (8)
| Bill | Title | Sponsor | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
|
HB1423
· 6 mentions in chapter, agenda, transcript
Matched: “HB1423 Cozart TO PROHIBIT A PERSON FROM RECEIVING COMPENSATION FOR…”
|
TO PROHIBIT A PERSON FROM RECEIVING COMPENSATION FOR THE PREPARATION, PRESENTATION, OR PROSECUTION OF A … | Cozart | Died in House Committee at Sine Die adjournment. |
|
HB1498
Act 507
· 6 mentions in chapter, agenda, transcript
Matched: “HB1498 Painter TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING MILITARY-TYPE CANTEENS…”
|
TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING MILITARY-TYPE CANTEENS AND EXCHANGES. | Painter | Notification that HB1498 is now Act 507 |
|
HB1526
Act 575
· 6 mentions in transcript, agenda, chapter
Matched: “…sed? Congratulations, your bill passed. You may continue to HB 1526. Thank you, Representative Stetson”
|
TO AUTHORIZE THE DEPARTMENT OF THE MILITARY TO ENTER INTO PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS; AND TO AMEND … | Painter | Notification that HB1526 is now Act 575 |
|
HB1638
Act 508
· 5 mentions in chapter, agenda, transcript
Matched: “HB1638 Painter TO MODERNIZE REFERENCES TO THE UNITED STATES ARMED…”
|
TO MODERNIZE REFERENCES TO THE UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES; AND TO AMEND ARMED FORCES AND … | Painter | Notification that HB1638 is now Act 508 |
|
HB1515
Act 574
· 4 mentions in agenda, transcript, chapter
Matched: “…ND THE LAW CONCERNING MILITARY-TYPE CANTEENS AND EXCHANGES. HB1515 Painter TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE AUTHORITY TO ORDER…”
|
TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE AUTHORITY TO ORDER THE ARKANSAS NATIONAL GUARD INTO SERVICE; … | Painter | Notification that HB1515 is now Act 574 |
|
HB1077
Act 506
· 2 mentions in agenda, chapter
Matched: “…R. Scott Richardson REGULAR AGENDA Number Sponsor Subtitle HB1077 Hudson CONCERNING THE INCARCERATION OF A VETERAN OF THE UNI…”
|
CONCERNING THE INCARCERATION OF A VETERAN OF THE UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES; AND TO PROVIDE … | Hudson | Notification that HB1077 is now Act 506 |
|
HB1792
· 2 mentions in chapter, agenda
Matched: “HB1792 Springer TO REQUIRE EMPLOYERS TO PROVIDE UNPAID LEAVE ON VE…”
|
TO REQUIRE EMPLOYERS TO PROVIDE UNPAID LEAVE ON VETERANS DAY TO VETERAN EMPLOYEES. | Springer | Died in House Committee at Sine Die adjournment. |
|
HB143
· 1 mention in transcript
Matched: “…oose anyone they want to help them in filing except passing HB 143 will now allow a recourse for veterans to hold bad actors a…”
|
Pre-2017 bill |
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- October 8, 2026
Unknown speaker
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Thank you.
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Thank you.
we're going to go ahead and get started if you would out in the gallery take your seats if you're going to speak for or against the bill make sure you've signed up I would just ask if you're speaking for against the bill that if you've had somebody and you've heard the same thing about three or four times we've got a pretty good memory up here we don't necessarily need to hear a fifth six or seventh time and so there's a committee that's going to start meeting right after we're finished as well so please be cognizant of that otherwise please
come up and voice your concerns or your support or whatever it may be represent painter are you ready with the committee's permission we're going to start out of order this will give some people a little more time to come over and run some of their bills the
first bill that we have represent painter is HB 1498 are you ready yes mr. chair and you have your mission up whoever you want
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
6:30
to bring up? Paul Hara, Representative Stetson Painter, Baxter County District and Fulton County District 3. Would you introduce
Speaker 10
6:37
yourself, sir? Retired Colonel Paul Hara, CEO of the Arkansas
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
6:39
Post Exchange. Okay, you're recognized to run your bill. So HB 1498 is a bill regarding our military
type canteen and exchanges and with that I'm going to let Mr. Paul kind of go into the details of what this bill actually does. Ladies and
Speaker 13
6:56
gentlemen, fundamentally an effort to try to create the post exchange in a way that gives it parity to the Army Air Force Exchange system. They formally operated out of Chaffee as an example and when that facility turned over to the state they were no longer willing to support or able to support the Arkansas National Guard. So the Arkansas Post
Exchange, the MWR at Camp Robinson, headquartered out of Camp Robinson has bridged that gap thanks to the legislators in this room who have created a law that allows us to create an AFES-like organization under Arkansas state law. And these are just clean-up efforts in the law to make sure that we have the same opportunity to serve our soldiers and airmen in the same way that AFES does. AFES is not, like I said, willing to operate an exchange in, for example, the Jonesboro Armory at Fort Jaffe at Ebbing, as all the changes happen there. And that's
where we fall in in filling those gaps so these are just cleanups in the law to make sure we have the ability to do the same kind of things a fees does for our veteran
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
7:54
community here in Arkansas now also want to add to this is even a better bill because there is no fiscal impact so mr. chair with that I'd be glad to take any questions from the committee
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
8:13
committee we have any questions yes Carol hello colonel um all right um so so a piece is not going to be running the
exchange on a camp Robinson no ma'am not at all
Speaker 13
8:22
okay we have a I'm a CEO I'm not a state employee but I work for the organization that is a nonprofit that works on behalf of the agent general to that system for
Speaker 16
8:31
the arkansas national park thank you i read the
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
8:34
bill earlier today and that was just a question that came to mind thank you committee
we have any other questions is there anybody signed up to speak for or against we don't have anybody signed up speak for against represent painter you recognize the close for your bill i am
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
8:51
close mr chair and i would appreciate a good
vote and as a privileged member of this committee i'd like to make a
motion to pass we have a motion do pass is there any discussion okay we do need a second on that do we have a second okay we got a second any discussion seeing no discussion all in favor say aye any opposed the ayes have it congratulations you may continue
with your next bill thank you committee with the chair's permission I would like to have Colonel Wood
up here yes Colonel Wood if you would introduce yourself
Speaker 34
9:24
please. Thank you Mr. Chair. Jeff Wood Department
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
9:31
of the Military. Representative Stetson Painter again District 3 Baxter and Fulton counties. With last time we heard this bill in committee some of you committee members had some concerns and so we took those down and it did exactly what you wanted us to do. We took out the phrase organized militia
and used Arkansas National Guard throughout the bill. Excuse me, just a minute. This is HB 1515, correct? HB 1515. I apologize. Continue. We took
out the word all and used the word part, so that doesn't say the entire Arkansas National Guard may be called up. We took out vague any matter or without limitation from Senator Payton, I think, raised that concern, if I remember correctly, language as it's related to military justice inside of the code sections below and listed categories of individuals by roles that could be called up we limited it further by stating that title 32 orders must not be available and the code sections are referenced are and i can go into details but i will save that
Speaker 34
10:29
colonel wood if you want to add anything thank you i would definitely say that we addressed every concern from the last committee and did an
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
10:40
amendment to address each one of them and happy to answer any questions and with that too i think representative meeks wanted us to clarify to make sure it says paid status that is in that bill as well we also limited the language related to critical staff shortages we also took out the reference to commanding general as an individual who could call individuals to duty and it was unnecessary to list the commanding
general and the adjunct general I think one of the senators made a mention of that would be glad to take
any questions committee is there any questions seeing no questions is there anybody signed up speak for we don't have anybody signed up speak for against represent painter
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
11:17
you're recognized close for your bill i am closed and
i would make a motion do pass we have a motion and a second any discussion seeing no discussion all in favor say aye aye any opposed congratulations your bill passed
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
11:31
you may be continued to hb 1526. thank you committee again representative stetson painter
District 3, Baxter and Fulton counties. Colonel Wood is right here with me. HB 1526, again, is another bill that we had in the committee last time. Some of the committee members raised concerns, so we removed anything that related to domestic operations and focused on recruiting and retention. We removed the without limitations language, which Senator Payton wanted. We removed the language related to gifts. We also added the language that mirrors language in Arkansas code
19-11-265 related to the reporting and review contracts. So partnership agreements with a value of $10,000 to under $50,000 will be reported to ALC, and then agreements over $50,000 will be submitted for review by ALC. And Colonel Wood, we'll be glad to be here. Okay, if not, we'll be glad to take any questions. Okay, Representative Payton, is he recognized?
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Mr.
Representative James Eaton
Unverified
12:31
Chair. so is it review and approval by alc or just review
Speaker 34
12:39
senator on the once is set up just like for contracts so anything over 50 000 will require review just not reporting and anything under will just be um reported uh the value between 10 and 50 000 will be reported and value
Speaker 45
12:51
over 50 will be required review before we can execute on it okay so that would
Representative James Eaton
Unverified
12:58
be approval review and approval i would assume yes review
Speaker 46
13:02
and approval yes senator okay well for the record
Representative James Eaton
Unverified
13:05
we'll go with review and approval thank you committee any other questions
seeing none represent painter you're recognized close for your bill i'm sorry i'm closed and i'm making motion do pass we got a motion and a second any discussion All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Congratulations,
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
13:35
Representative Painter. Your bill is passed, and you're recognized. Present your next
bill. Thank you. I promise, committee, this is my last bill. This HB 1638 is to add Space Force to our code, so may the force be with you.
Yeah, I figured we might need that in the way the session's going. So this is going to be a comprehensive housekeeping measure designated. designed to ensure that United States Space Force is treated equally with our other military branches in Arkansas law to minimize disruptions and benefits and services for eligible service members and dependents by clearly defining armed forces. This bill does not create new programs or benefits, but ensures inclusion and eligibility for existing ones. Again, the purpose of HB 1638 is to modernize the language in Arkansas law
by formally including the United States Space Force in all references to the U.S. Armed Forces and Uniformed Services across various state statutes. It clarifies that this bill changes are intended to align with state and federal definitions as of January 1, 2025. It also introduces or updates definitions of the United States Armed Forces or Uniformed Services to include Space Force. This bill seeks to ensure members and veterans of the United States Space Force
are eligible for the same state programs, benefits, and legal protections as other military branches. Amends over 50 Arkansas code sections to add the United States Space Force along the other branches like Army, Navy, Air Force, the Marine Corps, and Coast Guard. And with that, I'd be Colonel Wood. Just one comment. I think we're only
Speaker 34
15:14
aware of one veteran from Space Force, I guess, moved here and tried to request a license plate. Space Force is only about four or five years old, so most of the folks that they used to stand up Space Force were transferred for other branches.
And so DOD is wanting states to adopt this so that folks, when they go to get benefits, it makes it clear that Space Force is a recognized branch and they can get the same services. Happy to answer your
questions. Ready for questions? Okay, Representative Meeks, you're recognized. There we go.
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
15:51
All right. I think I know the answer based upon what your testimony was. As of right now, we don't have any active Space Force within the state. Is that correct?
That is correct. And will passing this maybe help entice Space Force to come to Arkansas potentially? This is one of the things.
Speaker 45
16:07
It's a DOD that's the one that's asking us to do this. So they kind of grade states on how
Speaker 34
16:13
military-friendly they are. And so I think having this already in the statute, if we were to, you know, potentially go after a Space Force Guard unit or with, you know, military foreign sales like Ebbing and things like that, the more, you know, progressive we are on putting this language in, the more attractive we'll be. All right. Thank you.
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
16:32
Senator Dotson, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm just wondering, how does our Arkansas Air National Guard feel about potentially having somebody that might fly higher than they do? in arkansas
being an army guy i can tell you they probably don't like it because they don't like
Speaker 63
16:46
us much either so and and the marines how do they feel about this what
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
16:50
is space force ask and answer thank you any other
questions committee seeing none represent painter you're recognized close i'm closed and i make a motion do pass
We have a motion to do pass. We have a second. Any discussion? Seeing no discussion, all in favor say
aye. Aye. Any opposed? Congratulations, you've passed your bill. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you,
committee. All right, now, committee, we're going to roll back up to HB 1423, which is Representative Cozart. And Senator Wallace, are you going to come with him? Yes, sir. All right. yeah representative cozard if uh when you get ready if you introduce yourself
senator wallace you also and then you have permission to ask anybody you want to be with you to speak if they'll recognize themselves as well
and you're ready to present your bill She recognizes. All right, Mr.
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
18:03
Chair, I'm Representative Bruce Cozart, District 91, Garland County. Sir, District
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
18:10
19, State Senator, and it's been my experience with Marines that if you throw them a box of crayons, they stay pretty happy.
Anyway, on that point, you've got to make sure at least half of them are red, though. Don't feed us that yellow stuff. recognized I'm will beams
from hot springs Arkansas all right thank you for
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
18:41
being here go ahead representing Cozart all right mr. chair we're here to try to protect our veterans is the best thing I could say I've thought when Will and I talked about a year ago about this bill I didn't realize it would be so
complicated and and it is we talked about it we had some legislation last year didn't get it filed i went to a national conference of legislatures legislators and met a group there that also was pushing the same thing to guard vets and to guard our vets from the people that are taking their money when they're filing their uh benefits and the things that they have to do now i'm not a
vet so i couldn't tell you what all the things you have to file i'm going to let mr beams describe that here in a minute but as i started doing this bill which i started on the second week of the session and i got with senator wallace and we talked about it and he said he was willing to sponsor after we got some legislation we looked at it he said he would sponsor it It's been a continual fight ever since of people trying to want us to amend this bill, change this bill, make it where it was almost just not a bill, water it down so much.
And, I mean, I'm not saying that's bad. I'm just saying that's not what I wanted. That's not what we wanted to do. We wanted to keep it pretty plain. There's a movement across the states of trying to fix this, and that's what I've got Will here for. He's the one that knows that. He's the one that does that. He's the one that travels. So I'm going to kind of give you a brief of what he does or who he is. So Will Beams is a Desert Storm veteran and a 33-year legacy life member of the VFW and has earned the title of Triple Crown Commander.
He currently serves in the VFW National Legislative Committee and as a state legislative chairman for the VFW Department of Arkansas. He is a two-term past president of Arkansas Veterans Coalition from 2018 to 22 and a founding member of the Coalition of Legislative Committee. So now I'll let Will Beams really introduce himself. You recognize, sir.
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
20:57
Thank you very much for letting us be here today. Chairpersons, esteemed legislators, and concerned veterans advocates,
I come to you today to speak in support of HB 1423, co-sponsored by Representative Cozart and Senator Wallace. HB 1423 does one simple thing. It makes the federal laws regarding assisting veterans, family members, and survivors with filing military service-connected VA disability claims, Arkansas law, and makes violating this law punishable under the Arkansas Fair Trade Practices Act. The law is necessary for several reasons.
Veterans were previously fully protected by federal law until 2006 when Congress severed the Title 18 penalties from 38 U.S.C. to facilitate more veterans utilizing the filing process. 38 U.S.C. Chapter 59 requirements for individuals and organizations' accreditation requirements for assisting a veteran with filing a disability claim. These standards remain in effect today with no mechanism for protecting veterans from predatory practices. 38 USC is clear.
Paragraph 5901 states, no individual may act as an agent, attorney, or attorney in the preparation, presentation, or prosecution of any claim under laws administered by the Secretary of the VA, unless such individual has been recognized for such purposes by the Secretary. Recognition is accreditation. And in 5902, no individual shall be recognized under this section unless the individual has certified to the secretary that no fee or compensation of any nature will be charged any individual for services rendered in connection with any claims.
And unless with respect to each claim such individual has filed with the secretary a power of attorney executed in such manner and form as the secretary may prescribe. 5904 is where the rubber meets the road. Individuals must show that an individual is of good moral character and in good repute and is qualified to render claimants valuable service and is otherwise competent to assist claimants in presenting claims. They must have such level of experience or specialized training as the Secretary shall
specify. They must certify to the Secretary that the individual has satisfied any qualifications and standards prescribed by the Secretary under this section, thus ensuring accountability under the law for adherence to standards of conduct. It goes on to specify that no fees may be charged for initial claim filings and that a fee equal to 20% of unpaid benefits may be assessed for assistance with filing an appeal to an unfavorable decision with an initial claim.
Game sharks are unaccredited agents operating outside of the purview of VA guidelines, having turned an otherwise free service for helping veterans acquire their earned benefits into a for-profit industry, which leaves veterans vulnerable and without recourse when victimized by predatory practices. These unaccredited agents generate hundreds of millions of dollars in profits each year, enabling them to hire professional lobbyists to advocate for their interests. It falls to nonprofit VSOs like the VFW, American Legion, Purple Hearts, Marine Corps League,
and the DAV to advocate for needed protection in filings for veterans' disability benefits. Institution of HB 1423 will create accountability for any individual acting as an agent or attorney in the preparation, presentation, or prosecution of any claim for a veteran, family, or their survivors. One must wonder why Claim Sharks avoid accreditation with VA. Accreditation is free, available to any organization or individual, and grants the ability to act
on behalf of a veteran directly with VA in claims and appeals, and gives agents direct access to all medical records for justifying a claim. Accredited agents are required to receive annual continual education to ensure the most up-to-date policies and procedures are available to veterans. The only reason to not get accreditation is to avoid accountability in the amount they charge veterans. In some cases, claim sharks will charge a veteran five to ten months of disability payments
for simply completing paperwork. Veterans must still do all the legwork and obtain necessary medical records on their own file claims themselves with VA and provide similar fees for future increases in benefits
Speaker 85
26:01
in perpetuity which is prohibited under 38 USC
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
26:05
you cut me short okay brevity okay
let's see where can I leave off here
Speaker 85
26:11
let me hit this one thing because I want to bring it up opponents of 1423
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
26:17
are going to claim that the bill will prevent veterans from having the freedom to choose whoever they want to help them file their claim thus limiting who they can go to this is not true there is no penalty for veterans in seeking who they want they're free to use whoever they want. Veterans have the absolute right to choose whoever they want to help them
file their claim and they'll continue to. Arkansas requires builders and contractors to register and obtain a license with the state. This protects Arkansas from predatory and unfair practices and provides a recourse for customers when their provider acts unethically. Some will choose reputable contractors but some will choose chuck in a truck. As is their right, veterans are still going to choose anyone they want to help them in filing, except passing HB 14-3
will now allow a recourse for veterans to hold bad actors accountable under the
Speaker 89
27:22
law. I'm going to wrap up there and just say that I urge you to pass this
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
27:27
bill today with a vote of due pass, and I remain prepared to answer any questions or for any rebuttal. thank
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
27:38
you mr. chair members this is a tough bill i am convinced of one thing there's not a
person in this room right now all my fellow veterans all of you that we all want only one thing and that's to take care of our veteran the problem we have is there's a lot of good organizations out there that are helping our veterans American Legion VFW and some others that that charge are helping as well but there are predators
out there that take advantage of our veterans and they don't wear a sign that says "I'm a predator." Some of our veterans come out with college degrees. Members, we have a lot of veterans that might not even have a GED. And the Army or the military ranks people in four categories. Category 1A, 2B, I think 3,
and then Category 4, we have a lot of kids that were good soldiers and good Marines that were probably Cat 4s, and they're not going to be the sharpest knife in the drawer. And there are predators that are seeking them out. Now, we've got to figure out who the good guy is and who the bad guy is, and that's what you all are faced with, and with that I'll be quiet.
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
29:29
Mr. Chair, I just got a couple of other things to say. Most veterans' checks are anywhere from $500 to $4,000 a month. So you imagine you've got somebody coming in and taking part of that check away from a veteran who are approved for 100% disability would receive about $3,800 a month. A consultant of that might charge up to $19,000 to that veteran to get his benefits for him. That could happen. You could have also some of them that might hold that registration that they're doing for a few months
to get that more back pay up so they could make more money. So it's happened. I'm not saying that's what they do, but that has happened. It is listed. All the stuff I've read, I've found all kinds of things that happen. All we're asking is for people that want to do this, that want to help them, is to get the certification, and just that's all they've got to do. I mean, there's no reason that they can't do it. going to have a limit of a certain percentage that they can charge to do that and that's fine we're not trying to take away that they can can't make money i mean i make money when i go out
and contract i mean most of you guys make money when you work on your jobs i think that's what you've got to do so that's what we're trying to do um by not passing this this could reflect a little bit negatively on the governor's operation home base i don't really know what that is that's That's something Will just handed me, so I'm going to leave it with that, and we'll try to answer the questions that you have. Representative Meeks, you got a question?
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
31:10
Yeah. You're recognized. So two quick questions. First of all, I'm going to try to summarize all this. So my dad's a veteran, and if I want to help him receive some of these benefits, as long as I'm not getting compensation I can help them or anybody else can can help them as long as they're not getting compensation but if I'm seeking to be paid because I'm an expert in this area I can only do so under this if I have become accredited for it and then the amount of payment is going to be based
upon a set standard is that a correct summary of what we're doing here that's correct well
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
31:50
think that was what we were summarizing you recognize the summary says that it this law the
veteran can see whoever they want accredited agents are better at handling these because they have direct access they are forbidden by federal law for charging for an initial claim and can only take 20% of any claim on a appeal anybody else that
operates outside of those standards if they're charging more is violating the law anybody can help a veteran for
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
32:24
free okay and that's why i'm happy so if i'm helping my family member i'm not going to be in violation of this right okay uh the last question is assuming this gets passed is there a website a place where there's a list of these accredited agents so if i've got veteran who is interested in seeking help we can go to this location and they
can say you know is this group or organization actually accredited or not kind of like a you know better better Business Bureau or whatnot va.gov va.gov very good all
right thank you mr. chairman senator Payton you have a question? You recognized? Thank
you, Mr. Chair. I thought I heard one of y'all say that this creates a course of action. Are you saying that there's currently no course for civil action if
a veteran's been defrauded by one of these
people helping them? Civilly, yes. Criminally, no. Well,
that would be true with any contractual law that individuals have, but in other words, I don't understand. Well, I guess I'd like for you to explain to me the title on page one, line 33 and 34. Not really sure what we're saying there with the defrauding and then guard in parentheses VA Benefits Act.
But, I mean, if there's people out there defrauding veterans, it seems to me like there should be a course of action. And I'm trying
Speaker 110
34:10
to phantom why you all think there's not a course of action. There used to be. It tied Chapter 38, or, yeah, 38 U.S.C. to 18 U.S.C., which is criminal penalties. They severed that in 2006, and there's a huge
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
34:25
push, both federally and in many other states, to reattach that.
We're asking states to make this regulation part of their law. And here in Arkansas, we want people to be able to prosecute criminally for what they do.
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
34:41
If they do this, Senator Payton, it's a Class A misdemeanor. Well, and when you say
this, let's be clear. We're not saying somebody that defrauds a
veteran is a Class A misdemeanor. We're saying somebody that charged for the service, whether they defraud it or not. Whether they charge it or not?
No, this bill makes it illegal to charge for the service. Regardless of whether you're doing a good job or a bad job, you're going to be a Class A misdemeanor for charging for the service, not for doing a bad job, not for defrauding them. If you're not accredited. Right. Yes. But what I'm saying is to defraud somebody right now, there's a civil and criminal course of action, unfair trade practices law, and breach of contract.
I mean, there's a lot of laws that deal with contractual situations. I would assume that these people that are charging the veterans for their service
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
35:43
have a contract with the veteran science. You're correct. According to the federal law now, which we're presuming we just follow here in Arkansas, it's illegal to enter into a contract for pay outside of what the VA and the federal law currently dictates. So you can't charge for your initial claim, and you can't claim more than 20% of what their benefits are.
As long as you stay within those areas, you're free and clear. I actually know a veteran who was quite happy. He went to a claim shark, and he paid $40,000 to that claim shark to get a $160,000 settlement. He's happy as a clam. Then why do you call that person a shark? He's not going to file a complaint. He's not going to file a complaint. But your veterans who are suffering from PTSD and are having trouble working and getting by and making money, who don't know that these services are available to them, who get taken advantage of by a claim shark,
are going to suffer greatly. And they have no recourse except to take someone to civil court, which they're already not going to be inclined to do. Making this illegal under law allows them to make a criminal penalty, which can be prosecuted for them and protect that veteran. I appreciate your position. It seems to me like
you want to make them a war to the state and the state to watch out for them instead of them being adults that can enter into contractual relationships. Not at all. If that were
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
37:08
the case, we wouldn't have an Arkansas Department of Veteran Affairs.
Speaker 95
37:11
Thank you. senator hammer i believe you had a question you're recognized
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
37:19
thank you mr chair and i'm just kind of seeing it from my point of view based on the explanation everything what you're trying to do is block out the sharks as you called them from being able to take advantage of veterans by requiring that those that do help veterans have to be certified is that is that correct ideally yes okay so without this legislation
if a veteran is taken advantage of how many of them can actually afford to go and seek civil action against someone based on the limited income that they would have because it seems to me like You're trying to be preventive so that that doesn't become the case. Or am I missing it? That is a completely accurate observation. That's
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
38:09
exactly what I would say because, like I said, some of them
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
38:15
make $500 a month, and if they're taken advantage of, they're not going to have the money to go to court,
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
38:21
so they're just going to let it ride or just go away. Senator
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
38:36
Walsh, I'll ask you a question. Once again, the person we've really got to protect is that young veteran, poorly educated, and he's going to be the victim for the most part. I respect
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
38:49
you as much as any veteran I know.
Thank you. And is this okay? In your opinion, is this bill going to be okay if it gets through to do what it's intended to do? I think this bill's a start. It's a start.
Speaker 95
39:06
Yes. In the right direction or the wrong direction? I think it's a start in the right direction. And I say that
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
39:13
because right now our veterans are in the wilderness. There are some people charging veterans that are really helping them.
I don't deny that. And it's not the VFW. It's not the American
Legion. But there are others that are pure predators. And we've got to build a box to start to identify the good guys from the bad guys.
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
39:42
All right. And specifically, what does this bill do just in short terms? Because I've tried to listen to everything. But in short terms, what does this bill do then to build that box just in real short terms?
Speaker 95
39:55
I think, and I'm going to ask for some help here, but I think the fact that we're going to have folks become accredited is a step in the right direction. Okay,
Chair
Unverified
40:07
that's all I need to hear. Thank you. Senator Dodson, you got
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
40:13
a question? Recognized? Thank you, Mr. Chair. so this takes away any of the ability of the good actors to help veterans
for compensation unless they are accredited or through this process is that I think
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
40:33
I've no sir it doesn't take away their ability to earn but it does set limits on it based on the federal standard well don't they already have those limits and the limits are there that we did the the limits are there under federal law however federally there's no criminal punishment the only way that we can act to help veterans is to do this where Congress has failed and make it law here in Arkansas that's why that's why this bill was brought before you because Congress wasn't able to do it we have the power to here in Arkansas so if they
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
41:08
still within those limits whatever those federal limits are the 20% or the not charging for the initial but the appeal in those instances someone who is not accredited can still charge because I mean this this
seems to me like it's I I understand we're trying to catch the bad actors, and that's half the laws that get passed are to try to address the bad actors.
The problem with it is you catch all the good actors, and you never do catch the bad actors with some
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
41:49
laws. So if someone is acting in good faith and they take care of the veteran, similar to the person that I mentioned that got a $160,000 claim, there's not going to be a complaint. There's not going to be any recourse. they're happy with what they got and there's still be illegal though if this passes it's illegal to go work on someone's house unless you're a licensed contractor too but it happens every day well what we want to do is make sure
Speaker 110
42:13
that there's recourse for those that were preyed upon and that they do have
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
42:19
a way to have somebody represent them when they are a victim we have the
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
42:27
responsibility not to make good actors criminals this will not make good actors just because they happen to you know make somebody happy while they're breaking the law and there's no complaint but they're still violating the law I don't what I
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
42:45
think the good people are not going to violate
the law and I think most people that are trying to do it right wouldn't get accredited it's not it's not hard to do it's very simple to do so if you get accredited then you can do what you want to do but I mean trying to do the right thing is what we're after it's getting people I think after we if this bill passes and I'm just gonna say if because I don't know it's up to y'all whether it passes or not if it passes there's a lot of education that needs to be done to our veterans there's needs to be a flash out to to let them know what's happened how it happens and what could
happen it's you know it goes back to them then that's gonna be their job to get the message out. So people need to know anything, you know, we have our laws don't always go to everybody. Nobody knows it's even happening sometimes and they're still doing the bad things until they get caught. So we're not trying to kill out the good actors, we're just trying to make everybody knowledgeable of what it takes to
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
43:42
do this. Well in your example, I mean that sometimes the perception of a good actor or bad actor is in the eye of the beholder. If somebody
charged $40,000 and got $160 and was happy with that, that's a good actor. That's a good deal, even
though it might not follow within those parameters that you were talking about. A little more than
Speaker 142
44:03
what the parameter would be, but if they're happy, that's yes. If they're happy with it, though, I mean, that's called
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
44:09
the free market. Yeah. Where both people are happy, they come away with
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
44:13
a better result. That's probably a very one-in-a-lifetime type deal. Not a lot of them are going to have that unless they've really been a lot of back pay coming so
Speaker 89
44:23
can i talk about the example real quick
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
44:30
it go ahead with your permission i had someone who was going to come today who fell victim to a claim shark and he was unable to come but in his experience he paid an initial fee to a veteran to file to a claim shark to file his initial payment which in his opinion they purposely messed up so now they've earned that money because they filed the payment now they have the ability to legally charge him more money the agreement that
he made with them under contractual law was that they would get six months of any increase that they helped him get they were savvy enough to pass to get him approved for a 10 percent disability under va and then came back and told them you know what we're going to get six months of that but we can get you more we can we can take you higher so they filed again for 30% and then again for 50% and then again for 70% they got
him up to 90% for which he receives $2,400 a month in total what that claim shark earned from him based on all increases in perpetuity was $70,000 that's what we're trying to prevent. Not good actors, but people who purposely are turning what they do into a for-profit industry off the backs of disabled veterans. Nobody's going to complain when they're helped, like you said. It is free market economy, and veterans are free to choose whoever they want.
It's only when someone acts in bad faith that a veteran's going to
Speaker 89
46:03
want to report them, and they need to have a means of having somebody punished for being a bad actor. in
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
46:10
your example you said he went they went back again and again and again one two three four five times so he made five different agreements with him he didn't
Speaker 150
46:23
he didn't know there was anything else available
Speaker 152
46:31
mr. chair may I say something yeah go ahead senator members understand
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
46:40
some of your veterans come back perfectly normal some of your veterans never make it back all the way mentally and it is very easy to find a person like that and groom them for lack of a better word
Representative Stan Berry
Unverified
47:06
And that's a great example. Representative Barry, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You just mentioned the situation where the gentleman, the veteran, ended up getting 10% disability from. What are several more examples of what that veteran would ask these people for services to him, to the veteran?
I mean, medical, you mentioned disability. What are some other examples of what that veteran would go to these people and
get them to help him with or offer? so i correct me
Speaker 110
48:00
if i'm wrong but i think your question is why would he go back five times no no
Representative Stan Berry
Unverified
48:09
i'm i'm asking what are some examples that if i wanted somebody to help me and i'm a veteran
what are some of the things that i would go to these people and
ask them for help uh so they're and i i probably don't know what it's available to me actually
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
48:31
they go to agents to get help with their claims in order to receive disability benefits which would help make their life a little bit better in in due to their uh disabilities from service related uh actions uh an example where someone would get a 10 disability would be tinnitus i've got a ring
in my ears and so they grant 10 percent. A 30 percent would be something like IBS and they'll take you up to that. Sleep apnea will get you to 50 percent. Muscle and back pains will take you up to 70 percent. PTSD will take you to 80, 90 or 100 percent. And these claim sharks know how to introduce these things rather than all at once and take a veteran all the way. There are actors out there that will do this in increments in order to maximize on what they can get from
Representative Stan Berry
Unverified
49:24
the veterans money and that's unscrupulous and they these these people and we're calling them bad
actors these people uh know how to manipulate the the system to to get what they can for that veteran and they're taking yeah i don't want to label them all as flat-out criminals
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
49:43
but yes There are those out there. Yeah, I don't want to label them
Representative Stan Berry
Unverified
49:48
as criminals either, but I thank you. Senator Sullivan, you're recognized.
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
50:00
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm trying to ask a real short question. So you've talked a lot about there's a lot of people this and a lot of people that, a lot of criminals, a lot of people victims. How many victims of this are
there that we come across that we can say there have been this many people victimized through
Speaker 89
50:20
this poor behavior? I can't give you that exact number, but I do know that
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
50:25
in the committee that I was in in D.C. here recently, Nancy Mace pointed out that there was one organization that was making over $100 million a year trying to represent veterans,
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
50:34
so I'm sure that's a pretty high number. Well, I'm not asking that wasn't the question what your
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
50:40
question is how many victims had there been how many people have been taken as victims? There's a high number right if you look on if you look on the websites of this you'll find Examples, but they don't ever put out a total number of how many people have been victims, but there's victims in every state That's what I come up with and I don't know what that number is it could be so many here could be so many there there are You know, it's it's a big like he said. It's a big thing. There's a it's a big lobby deal
they make enough money they have a big lobby presence and I mean I have nothing got that we have lobbyists all over okay so bottom line we
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
51:16
just don't know we don't know how many I couldn't give you a number okay and you mentioned early that there's a big push to get this bills like this pass who's doing the pushing on this side to push this through well yes the gentleman made a statement at the very beginning he said there's a big push to get this bill
Speaker 170
51:37
through state legislators, jurors. Who's doing the pushing? They are. Actually, I think Representative
Speaker 110
51:43
Cozart said that. However, the answer is most of the large veteran service organizations in the United States,
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
51:48
they are all pushing it at the federal level and not getting the results we need. As a member of the National Legislative Committee, I came back to my state and said, this is something we can solve here in Arkansas without waiting for Congress to act. Okay, thank you. The biggest
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
52:04
thing, that is a big thing. That's why I've seen it at the National Legislative Conference that they're after the state legislators to do this because the federal
is not taking care of the job. Representative Brown,
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
52:18
you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Beans,
we've met, and you probably don't remember that, but one of the things that's kind of a little confusing for me, I'm very familiar with filing those claims because I assisted my husband. with filing his claims and I was his power of attorney but whenever you fill out that initial claim then the veteran is has to go to the VA to be examined by
the VA doctors correct and that isn't that who determines the amount of disability that that veteran is is is scheduled for at that time so representative
Brown I do remember you we worked on tax exemption for military survivor benefits and military pay so absolutely veterans coalition meetings The VA medical does not determine the amount of disability.
There's two separate agencies within VA. One is VBA, Veterans Benefit Administration and Veterans Health Care Administration. That would be the hospital. They diagnose conditions, which the veteran can then submit as part of their claim, and VA will decide based on the diagnosis what percentage they're
eligible for. So who are the people who are most vulnerable to these bad actors?
Are they people in the more rural areas who may not know that they could go to their county service officer? May I answer that question?
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
54:10
Yes, sir. It's going to be your young, uneducated, enlisted. Well, I used to
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
54:15
make the comment to Larry, what do these people do who live in the rural areas and they don't have a degree, and you and I live right here in Pulaski County, and we can run back and forth to Building 65 any time we need to. And it was just a concern for me that people out in more remote areas
didn't have access to service officers. You
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
54:42
get, we have some very good veteran service officers in counties, but we also have some that are mediocre. Correct. And some that are worse than that. And so you get young veterans. My home county, Mississippi County, has a good VSO, didn't always have a good VSO. And so you had groups of veterans needing help that weren't getting help, weren't getting advice.
And I don't care who you are and how smart you are. The federal VA system is a maze to have to maneuver through. And try doing that with a GED. And that is where the problem comes in. And that's where the national organizations like DAV and American Legion help a lot. But also, you have other organizations that, I will tell you,
you have organizations that charge and make a profit, and they also help. The problem is identifying the helpers from the predators.
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
55:52
And I have one other
question. When you said that they got a percentage of this 160, that was that veterans back, like if you file a claim and you're denied, and then you disagree with that denial, they go back and reevaluate,
and if they do award you, then they pay you from the time you first filed the claim. So you're saying that this individual, this bad actor, got a percentage of
that big chunk, correct? No, I'm saying that the person who got a $160,000 settlement entered into a separate contract outside of VA allotments, And the bad actor got much more than they were supposed to because they did not follow the 20%. So
bottom line with this bill, you're saying that anybody that helps should not be paid for the initial claim.
And then they're only limited, if they are accredited, they are limited to receiving only a certain percentage of whatever that veteran receives. Now, are they eligible to receive that percentage in perpetuity, or just what's that 20% of? It is one-time payment of whatever their back pay
is. You're familiar with what the back pay is back from the date of filing, and it can be paid directly to them from VA. Thank you. Representative Hudson, you're recognized.
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
57:21
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I see in the bill, it talks about the fact that anyone who's helping a veteran with
these types of claims has to follow similar rules to those that attorneys have to follow
when they're representing veterans for their claims for disability and for other things. And I think that there has been some confusion through here as though there is no way for people to be compensated under your bill. But I think that you would probably agree with me that attorneys are very frequently compensated for the work that they do for veterans after entering into contracts that are ethically allowed under the Arkansas Bar Association's Model Rules of Ethics, which it says in here.
So could you explain for the committee's benefit exactly how those relationships work and how people are compensated ethically and legally and would still be able to ethically and legally be compensated under this
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
58:25
legislation? So the federal law dictates what someone can earn for representing a veteran. And quite commonly, attorneys will make an agreement with somebody under contract for, I guess, I think they call it treble rewards, one-third of whatever the benefit is.
And that is standard for an unaccredited lawyer to want to do that. An accredited lawyer, and there are many out there, will only charge the 20%. are they going to make a great living off of that no but it's doing the right thing for a veteran and still allowing them to receive compensation for the time they're going to have to put into it all right seeing no other
questions we do have several people signed up to speak for
and against this bill mr chairman we'll back off and let them have it for a while Okay, thank you. We'll get you back up here in
a few minutes. All right, first to speak against the bill. I'm sorry, I'm going to murder your name, whoever you are. Wayne Ruthven. I'm sorry, sir. I don't know if I got that right or not. Good job, sir. Okay. Come on up and introduce yourself, and you're recognized.
And again, I will just remind you that we only have
a certain amount of time to
Speaker 190
1:00:01
finish this, so please. Yes, sir. Wayne Ruthven, I'm the Chief of Staff at the Arkansas Department
Speaker 192
1:00:07
of Veterans Affairs. I'd like to start by saying that we don't disagree at all with Representative Cozart's bill as far as the premise of the bill goes. Like him, we at the Department of Veterans Affairs do not like and wish that there were no predatory individuals trying to get rich off the back of veterans.
So claim sharks, bad actors, whatever we want to call them, we are against them as much as all my friends behind me. However, we do have some reservations about the language in this bill. There's been a lot of discussions prior to this about nuances about the bill. You had a lot of questions, you got a lot of good answers, but it's those nuances that concern us. We believe that the bill needs some critical review and some analytics put to the language
in the bill to ensure that one, the bill itself and the readers of the bill, particularly veterans, understand all of their rights when it comes to receiving VA benefits and working with veteran service officers, et cetera. We have what we believe is a robust, multilayered veteran service officer program in Arkansas. have veteran service officers in virtually every county at least 72 as of today and over 90 veteran
service officers in those counties we have another 12 district veteran services office officers working for our department the ones in the counties of course work for the county judges but they work together in partnership to ensure that all veterans know that they can come to any of those individuals and receive claims help or any other assistance related to the veterans benefits free of charge and we try to re-interact that at every
step of our process in every place and by all of our people and by all the County VSOs however regardless of how much of that we do there are going to be veterans who look for other alternatives for whatever reason and there's a myriad of them but they do and as was mentioned earlier by the people at the table we only want to ensure that number one the veteran knows that those other options do exist there are legal options that do exist and if they want to go
that route that's their choice if they think they can get a higher disability rating. It can be done quicker. It can be done with less paperwork. That's up to them. And we just want to ensure that when they do do that, that one, the bill indicates that that's an option they have. And it lays out the federal law and the limitations as far as how much can be charged
at so they are aware of that going forward those particular details you don't find in the bill today so we believe that some more specific information in the bill would make it much stronger would make it much more easy for the veteran to understand it and what his or her options are and particularly the option of looking for other sources other than veteran service officers and free if they If they want to pay some money, and they want to do that through a reputable firm with certified individuals, that should be their choice.
Speaker 193
1:04:05
Sir, that leaves my discussion. Sir, are you willing to take some questions? Committee, any questions? Representative Meeks, push a button
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:04:17
for me. You're recognized. Thank you, and thank you for your service. I'm just a little confused on your testimony because it sounds like you're
saying that veterans need to know that they should have a choice to be able to go to a reputable firm that's going to be able to take care of them. And that's what the bill is trying to do is to make sure that when they go to somebody that it's a reputable person who's taking care of them.
So it sounds like the bill is doing what you want it to do. You'd also mention in your testimony that maybe some other specific data. What other specific data would you like in there? As we
Speaker 198
1:04:54
read the bill, it specifically states who a bad
Speaker 192
1:04:59
actor is and what makes a bad actor and that we're going to make that
Speaker 190
1:05:05
a violation of state law. It doesn't say what a good actor is and how you can use a good
Speaker 192
1:05:12
actor for those services should you choose to do so.
so it's that type of delineation that we think ought to be
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:05:22
in the law okay i'm not sure how you do that but
uh thank you sir seeing no other questions thank you sir for your testimony got dallas
erdman thank you sir and then we have to speak again fort zach bumgarden come on up identify yourself and you're recognized
Zach Baumgarten
Unverified
1:05:51
thank you mr chairman my name is zach baumgarden
Speaker 206
1:05:57
i'm an attorney here in little rock i am the pro bono program director for the veterans legal services clinic at the bowen school of law i'm also chair of the veteran section of the arkansas bar association i'm here today though to express my own personal opinions not those of my employer or any of those i'm affiliated with um the points i wanted to bring uh to try to shore up some answers so in my work i serve veterans exclusively low-income veterans um is who we serve at our
clinic at the law school um so we get calls i would say almost daily i know senator sullivan was asking for a number i would say in the two years that i've been in this position we've had at least 100 calls about folks who fall in prey to this or call to say they're getting targeted by these groups for this so a hundred that just found us i would at least double that that are probably getting these claims um how these claims operators operate i'm also a disabled veteran forgot to say that um and so if you google i need help with veterans benefits you google that
you will start getting emails you'll start getting phone calls uh mail in there if you try to get like questions answered these are aggressive people they're not just saying hey uh here's explaining the contract this is what happens you know we're going to help you out they're being aggressive they are lying to veterans about what they can do they are hiring doctors to make false claims about things so they are costing the va millions of dollars when they're doing this also they are operating in gray areas of the law that are not that that are hard to pinpoint everything
down and so they are stealing money honestly from the va by making false claims in names of veterans is part of what's happened sometimes these veterans don't even know these claims were made they're just being told oh hey we got you this money so you're good to go they are taking the money over and over and over again that's what I want to stress is that as an attorney it's all free that our services so I don't charge but it's usually between 20 and 33 and a third is what we're allowed to under the rules charge and most attorneys who do this it's contingency based so
they're not charging up front they only get paid when the veteran gets paid that is not how these claim charts work it is billing you oftentimes up front they have to sign contracts that they're going to pay them thousands of dollars no matter what happens and i have veterans calling me crying because they're being sent to collections because they didn't get anything and these bad actors are sitting there sending them to collections saying well you got to pay me no matter what we have a contract they are scaring them into um these things and so as senator waltz was saying
i would love to think everybody would read their entire contracts do everything but i think me and the other attorneys in the room we wouldn't have jobs if everybody did that and so they are being preyed upon they are being lied to by these companies and being tricked into these things these bad actors are doing that and i think um the concerns that about the bill are valid but i think it is more important that we get this legislation passed now because we can't wait these firms are getting bigger and bigger they're worth millions and millions of dollars and they are pushing to try to stop these bills so even if for some reason there are concerns about the bill
and the holes in them I think it's more important and the benefits of this bill way outweigh anything else that there is I also wanted to highlight that nine other states have passed this legislation so it's not like arkansas would be the first this is ongoing across the nation the national organization of veteran advocates which i'm also a member of which is a nationwide advocate group of attorneys and vso's who do this work have encouraged the congressional bill the guard act bill that's being trying to be passed on the national level and i talked to them about
this bill and they said this was one of the better ones that they've seen this is good there's no loopholes because some of these bad actors are also coming in getting line items put in the bill that this one company can operate in the state or this one thing and so i think this is very important because our veterans we should we don't have to be the ward for these people but we should protect veterans at every chance we get and that's what
this bill does is protect our veterans thank you are you willing
to take questions yes sir senator payton you're recognized thank you mr. chair so how many of those cases have you taken and represented have you been
successful and so in the deceptive trade practices or breach of contract or anything like that so what we do is
Speaker 206
1:10:28
i work it's all pro bono attorney so we've had some sent out the biggest luck we've had is we send it to the ag's office and have them uh talk to them and so they get on the case and sometimes when it goes away i don't hear what the outcome is um because i don't directly represent a lot of these veterans but so we try to get them uh either with those other attorneys or the ag's office has worked to try to go after these but again they're limited on what they can do
Speaker 44
1:10:53
so are you saying the answer would be zero that i've represented right yes okay but you do think that the ag's office has taken up the case on some of these so i know they have taken a few
Speaker 206
1:11:07
to try to help them out i don't know what the outcome of that was because once i passed that case off in my role
i don't always get what the outcome is uh how would we describe these cases if we were going to ask the ag's office for a report on on any of those cases that they've taken up for the outcome
Speaker 206
1:11:24
my understanding is they go through their consumer protection because it is a contract based
so it's someone being taken advantage of through a contract
mr chair i would request that we seek that information from the attorney general's
office all right well we'll go ahead and ask more questions and we'll consider that right thank you representative nazarenko you're recognized thank you
Representative Jason Nazarenko
Unverified
1:11:52
mr chair and thank you for uh being here all of you uh representative cozart and
uh senator wallace and i appreciate uh your passion i'm
passionate as well retiree i retired about five years ago from fort campbell so i know around fort campbell area we've got like a lot of predatory everything predatory lenders vehicle uh predatory uh you know preying on the soldiers as they're getting out or even whether they're in you mentioned nine other states have enacted legislature do you know which those states are i i did not bring the
Speaker 206
1:12:22
list with me i should have um but i just you can easily google a lot of them are framed as the veterans consumer protection bills because that's where it's going so if you
look up um there's been several that have passed here recently in the last few years
Representative Jason Nazarenko
Unverified
1:12:38
thank you for that i appreciate it because that was one line of my question i was kind of curious if we've reached out to other states i know when i retired i was working with our local chamber of commerce because i saw a great opportunity to help out veterans bringing them to our state we've got what what veterans want yes is we're in a great spot here I know you had talked about like home base you know right here Arkansas and I think that's a great initiative and I'm anxious to see that continue to flourish and I think this is
a great opportunity have we reached out to any states with this legislature have we reached out to other states some that I'm thinking of that aren't very far from us would be like Fort Campbell Kentucky 101st you've got Fort Hood you know Texas these are some that are real close by that have a huge number of veterans getting out and so I feel like they're going to have a great experience on this I'm curious have we reached out to any VAs in those local areas where we can make sure that what we've got is the great bill that we're wanting to
do because to Senator Wallace's I think this was a good you know good start but I'm wondering if we've reached out to make sure that we've got a great bill
Speaker 206
1:13:49
to really help out sure so um like i said the national organization of veteran advocates that i'm part of they're trying to track all the bills that have either been passed or going through state legislatures currently and their legislative director told me that in her opinion our bill was one of the better ones that
Representative Jason Nazarenko
Unverified
1:14:05
they saw okay i'd be really interested and i'll have to google but i'm really interested in what other states especially around those large military installations so thank you mr chair
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:14:13
thank you mr chair um so i'm just curious you how many veterans do you help each year so last year
Speaker 206
1:14:24
we had a record of over 250 veterans reach out to us asking for assistance okay and then um
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:14:29
and you say you do all this pro bono so you don't get paid anything at all we don't get paid anything at all okay that's why i thought
Speaker 206
1:14:37
it was important to say like i'm not trying to get up here talk because i'm a attorney who wants to make sure other people aren't getting
Speaker 209
1:14:46
a piece of the pie i don't charge anything so it doesn't matter you know it doesn't matter me yeah okay so thank
you seeing no other questions thank you for your testimony sir thank you To speak against the bill, we've got, it looks like, Mark Christensen. Come on up, sir. Identify yourself, and you're recognized.
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:15:20
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. Thanks for allowing me to provide testimony today. My name is Mark Christensen. I'm a 25-year Army veteran and chief of staff at Veterans Guardian. We are a veteran-owned and operated company with over 200 employees who are spouse of veterans or spouse of active duty service members. We've been awarded the BBB Torch Award for Marketplace Ethics for multiple years. We're a Department of Labor Higher Vets Platinum Award recipient for multiple years running. And we have many clients who are members of, and we hang plaques of gratitude on our walls
from every VSO represented here. We achieve about a 90% success rate with an average of 85 days for a decision. Sir, I'm
Speaker 236
1:16:03
going to ask you to go ahead and get to the point. As one of
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:16:09
the claim sharks, I want to, so-called claim sharks, I want to dispel some rumors and some myths that may have been presented up here today. Private companies cannot become accredited. They cannot. There is no pathway for private companies like ours to become accredited. Accreditation model is, accreditation is modeled on failure.
Attorneys get 20% to 33% of back pay that's awarded to a veteran for claims. We think the right process is to do it up front and get it right the first time. We charge a five times increase for a monthly increase in disability benefits, one time contingent based. We let veterans know about the free services available to them and help guide them to them and contact them if they so desire. Over 70% of our clients have tried the free services before. The clients here in Arkansas are telling you,
the thousands of clients that we've had, are telling you that they want free market options, not fewer options. This bill effectively shuts down the free market in Arkansas. That is not what the veteran population here is asking for. That's not what we're asking for. The intent of the law is admirable. We support getting bad actors out of the space, but there's some common sense consumer protections that can be in place without removing the entire free market choice from veterans.
Speaker 237
1:17:32
And with that, sir, things have gone on. I'll be
Chair
Unverified
1:17:39
happy to answer any questions. - Thank you, sir. David Ray, Representative
Representative David Ray
Unverified
1:17:45
Ray, you're recognized. - Mr. Chairman, I'm over here to your right. So thank you for your testimony. You mentioned that it's impossible for a private entity to become certified. Can you just explain the certification process? And if a private entity can't even be eligible,
what is the pool of potential providers in this space? Chairman, sir, the pool of
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:18:11
providers is limited to attorneys that want to do this work. They can become accredited. They fill out a form in a couple weeks, they're accredited. The Veterans Administration has chartered veteran service organizations to provide that accredited representation. They internally accredit their own people. They recommend and certify their own people.
But not everybody in those organizations is accredited. Make no mistake that there are unaccredited representatives in those organizations working on disability claims. The other are private individuals. If you wanted to become accredited, you could apply for accreditation, get accepted by the VA, and have to take a test, and then you can become accredited. But all those entities represent veterans before the Board of Veteran Appeals. Independent companies like ours, consultants, do not.
We're simply consultants. We don't represent the veteran before the agency, which requires accreditation. The continuing education requirements also, by the way, is about three hours every two years for those accredited entities. Do you
have a follow-up there, Representative Ray? I do. Let me get you back in. Oh,
Representative David Ray
Unverified
1:19:31
okay. There you go. All right. Could you just help me differentiate the consulting services that you provide versus the accreditation services?
How are they different or how are
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:19:44
they the same? Sure. In some ways, they're similar. So the service officers sitting behind me would tell you they do initial claims for veterans, either immediately after they got out or years later. And we would do the same. We would help with those initial claims once somebody's out. Attorneys generally work on appeals, so something that's been unfavorably decided by the VA.
And the VA appeals process takes many, many years. On average, it's about three years. So if I get denied for a claim, that attorney is perversely incentivized to have this thing last longer. What we believe in is a holistic approach to getting it right done up front. So we can look at a veteran's entire service record, entire military medical records, post-duty medical records. We can figure out what they should have been rated for that they weren't when they got out of service,
things that they're already rated for that should be increased, and secondary conditions to things that they are rated for. That holistic approach done up front prevents veterans from getting into this lengthy appeals process, and it gets the veteran the benefit faster. And so I would say we're similar in the fact that we do some of these up front. The difference, I would argue that it's not simply filling out paperwork because it's not that simple. If it were that simple, we wouldn't have to exist. These claims are incredibly complicated, especially the longer that a veteran gets out of their service.
So, you know, we have the benefit of having medical experts on our staff to review things that others don't and bless the service organizations for trying to get through that, but they just certainly don't have the capacity or the expertise to do it well. Thank
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:21:40
you. Representative Meeks, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So you testify that your organization can't become accredited, and I'm going to give you just an example from my own life.
I used to work for a technology company, And the company could not get network certified, but they hired me, and I as an individual within that company was network certified. And, you know, they hired other individuals who were network certified. So then as a company, they were able to do networks. You know, in a doctor's office, the doctor's office itself is not medically certified. It's the doctors within. And obviously, those doctors don't do everything. They have people help them with claims and so forth.
um, within your organization, you could have people become accredited. Uh, so I guess my, my question is, is do you have anybody, and it sounds like you're one of the good guys. So I'm not trying to be accusatory by any means. Um, but it would seem to me if you're somebody who's doing the job and doing it right, that by being able to say, Hey, we've got people within our organizations that, that are accredited, that that would be assigned to the veteran that, Hey, hey, this is somebody I can trust versus being an organization that, you know, we've been doing this for years,
we've got great experience, but we've never taken the time to
get accredited. You kind of see what I'm saying there? And so I'm just kind of
Speaker 254
1:23:04
curious what your response is on that. Sure. I would
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:23:08
argue, one, yes, we are a good actor in this space. We're the biggest company in the country that does this. The problem that you run into is that if we have an accredited representative inside our organization, immediately then you must only deal with claims after they've been adjudicated.
Everything else you have to do for free. So it goes back to the failure model. Lawyers do all that stuff pro bono up front, hoping that there's something that they can do later on and get 33 and a third percent of the back pay because that's where it comes from, right? That's how they get paid. We believe in getting it right up front. It's holistic up front. And so we just can't because when you have those accredited representatives in there, then you must change your entire business model to go back into what already exists,
which we don't think is efficient. And also we've been the advocates on the federal level to change accreditation. For the last four years, we've been fighting to get Congress to act to change accreditation to allow private companies into that tent of recognized accredited actors. And we're hopeful that Congressman Jack Bergman, who introduced the SAVE Act at the federal level, is going to be successful this year pushing that bill forward.
Chair
Unverified
1:24:28
But until that accreditation model changes, private companies cannot get accredited. All right. Thank you.
sir Dodson recognized thank you mr. chair um so if you could be accredited
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:24:43
under this how would that change your model under the existing like
your your fee structure didn't sound like it fell and and i forgot i didn't follow it exactly your contingency fees and everything but it didn't seem like it fell in line with what was explained before is the allowable
20 percent and nothing charged on the front end or anything like that how would that change your model could you still operate within that or or you're not able to do that so to
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:25:16
be clear the unaccredited companies i can't speak for every unaccred unaccredited uh entity for sure the national association of veteran rights is sort of the trade organization that over that you know is is trying to make sure that consultants in this space adhere to certain
Chair
Unverified
1:25:33
standards what they've determined to be a fair standard is a fee model that is contingent based five times the monthly increase that a veteran might achieve so if you're getting a hundred dollars today we help with the claim you get 200 tomorrow our
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:25:51
fee is one time five hundred dollars right? Okay, that makes sense. The 20% that everybody talks about is based on the accredited fee
Chair
Unverified
1:25:59
structure that exists in the 38 CFR for attorneys and agents. It is based solely on
back pay. So I can do a claim today, it gets denied, I can go hire an attorney, and that attorney is going to put in the appeal. And those appeals on average last 36 months. So So that attorney, when I get a favorable decision back from the VA, collects all the way back to the date that I submitted the claim or filed my intent to file to the decision date and could take anywhere between 20 and 33
Speaker 259
1:26:32
and a third percent. So depending on the claim, it could be hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Speaker 231
1:26:37
So in a similar type of situation, if
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:26:42
they went from $100 to $200, that $100 over 36 months would be $3,600, and they could charge 20% to
33% of that $3,600 difference. That's fair to
Chair
Unverified
1:26:57
say, but they would base it on 36 months of the actual rate that they would get paid at.
So if they were going to get paid $100 over that 36 months, $3,600 times 20 or 30%. Times 20% or three and a third. Somewhere in that ballpark. $1,200 or a little
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:27:20
less, but you're still far cheaper in that sort of scenario. But your one-time fee, five times what the monthly increase is. And the veteran doesn't have to wait for failure. Right. And so you said you average 85 days. That's correct. So they're getting something a whole lot faster. That's correct. But that's the free market.
They're making that decision if they go with you versus something else where they might have to wait for
Speaker 236
1:27:47
failure. The first thing we do when we
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:27:51
talk to veterans that ask to work with us, the first thing we do is have them fill out a one-page disclosure, sign and acknowledge a one-page disclosure that says that there's free services available, what our fees are, and how to get to those free services if they desire. About 50% of our clients every month are referrals.
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
1:28:12
Thank you. Senator Sullivan, you recognize? Thank you, Mr. Chair. So do you have veterans who have paid money up front but
Chair
Unverified
1:28:25
never received their disability services? Mr. Chairman, Senator, I don't know of any client that we've ever had. We don't charge
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
1:28:35
up front fees at all. Do you know of veterans
who are? are outside of your that you that maybe have come to you for services that previously had
worked with one of these bad actors and paid money up
front and not received services i senator i can't say that i've run across
Chair
Unverified
1:28:52
anybody that's paid something like that we have had people come to us from other companies that didn't necessarily like their contract structure of the other company things like that okay thank you representative meeks recognized thank you mr chairman i'm sorry about
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:29:10
jumping back in here but i'm i'm trying to think through this because the you know the the bill sponsors are trying to stop the the bad actors uh which i think all of
us here on the committee want that to happen but at the same time we don't want to hurt the good actors as is i mean it seems like you are one of the good actors um if we were to try to restructure this bill in a way to maybe allow the state to accredit your business give this I don't know how that would work but I'm just throwing it out there what could we do to modify this bill or to stop the bad actors from preying on our on our veterans while still making sure that you know you
can continue to provide the services that
Mark Christensen
Unverified
1:29:59
you're providing sure so thank you for that question Louisiana, North Dakota, and South Dakota have passed laws that are really consumer protection-based. They put in some really common-sense measures, fee caps. You can't have doctors working on your payroll, things like that. One of the things that the state of Louisiana did is they put in their provisions for private companies who assist veterans in Louisiana to report back to the State Department of Veteran Affairs every year
how many veterans from Louisiana we've seen or helped, and whether they were successful or not. And so we think those are incredibly fair reporting requirements, and you'll find out who's acting and who's not acting in the state. All right, thank you. Seeing no
other questions, thank you, sir, for your testimony. We've got one other person to speak against it. It's either Ray or Roy Callas. Please come up, identify yourself and who you're with, and you're recognized.
Speaker 269
1:31:01
Chairman, members of the committee, my name is Ray Colas, and I'm here today on behalf of Veteran Benefits Guide in opposition to House Bill 1423 as currently written. Now, Veteran Benefits Guide provides veterans with a private, legal, and federally compliant service outside of the Veteran Affairs to assist veterans to make sure that they receive the benefits that they have earned. Now, we strongly support Representative Cozart's bill and the intent of his bill, however, this bill prohibits the services of some of the good actors who operate in this space, who are honorable companies, who help to serve the veterans.
Unfortunately, the proponents of the bill have inaccurately insinuated that organizations such as ours are operating in violation of federal law, and that we choose not to be accredited. Federal law states, and as recited by the VFW gentleman who sat here, which I support and 100% agree with everything he said when he recited federal law, the key that you may have missed is that it is as you are acting as an agent or attorney. Federal law states no individual may act as an agent or attorney in the preparation, presentation, or persecution of a claim under laws administered by the secretary without first being accredited.
We support that. I would like to state for the record that we do not act as a veteran's agent, we do not provide the veteran with legal services, and we do not represent the veteran before the VA. So it's very unfortunate that the very individuals who have pledged to assisting veterans who are sitting here misrepresenting federal law and portraying us as the bad actors, not only to the veterans, but to the public. As members of the committee, you depend on fair and accurate information in order to
make an informed decision, especially when it comes to protecting veterans. Now, House Bill 1423 would roll back Arkansas's free market principles. Some of those principles support freedom of choice, freedom of representation, and access to veteran services. The bill also creates a disservice to our fellow veterans in the state because it favors a failed government system where there's an option for similar services that were created
for veterans by veterans. So we would be more than happy to partner with members of the legislature to improve the protection for veterans while also allowing a path for honorable, for-profit organizations such as ours. Are there bad actors in this space? Sure there are, but we should separate the good from the bad and not eliminate an entire industry. Now, Representative Meeks, you asked a great question. You gave an example if you were to assist a family member. And the response you receive is 100% inaccurate.
If you were to assist, as an accredited agent or attorney, if you were to assist your family member by preparing the paperwork for he or she to submit, and you would receive compensation, you would be in violation of not only federal law, but also the state law as it's currently written. Because federal law prohibits you from receiving a fee for initial claims. We also have a question that was asked, and unfortunately the post was in the way, but an example, VFW, the question was asked, where is this coming from, where are these bills
coming from? It is coming from the VFW. There is a national effort against our services, and we've proved this. This is not a bill that's meant to simply protect veterans, because I think we can all agree we're on the same page when it comes to protecting veterans. However, this bill goes beyond federal law by attacking our industry. And we've proven this by providing an amendment to this bill, which would essentially, it copies federal law word for word to be replaced by Section A-1.
And if you do not see it before you, that means it was rejected. So exactly what are we trying to accomplish here? So we are here, hopefully, in order to accomplish the same thing by making sure that we're able to protect our veterans and separating the good from the bad. And as the bill is currently written, we would ask for you to vote no
on House Bill 1423. Would you take any questions, sir? Absolutely. Representative Meeks,
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:35:30
you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I was actually talking about free services to family, not paid services, clarification on that.
So, you know, while we've been sitting here discussing this, I've actually gone to some AI here and talking about looking into this. And in, you know, 2023, there was like $477 million worth of scams against veterans. In 2024, it's over again $400 million, 167,000 fraud cases against veterans. Some of the data says that veterans are 40% more likely to be targeted by scams than the general public.
So definitely we have an issue here. And what I'm struggling with the bill here is, like you said, we all want to stop the bad guys. And it seems almost like the choice that we're looking at is we can put a dent in stopping the bad guys, but we're going
to hurt some of the good guys in the process. So the question that I asked the last gentleman, I'll throw it out to you. What changes could we do to achieve the aims of stopping the bad guys while protecting the good guys?
Speaker 269
1:36:43
Absolutely. The first, most immediate, and most important change, because, again, you have consensus here. Everybody thinks that we're operating in violation of federal law. Federal law was recited. Let's put it in this bill. Replace A-1 with a section that was recited in federal law. We would absolutely be supportive of the bill. And I will tell you, if you do do that, they will either reject the amendment or abandon the bill altogether.
Speaker 196
1:37:07
Okay. All right. Thank you. Seeing no
other questions, thank you, sir, for your testimony.
Speaker 245
1:37:15
Senator Wallace, Representative Cozart, are you guys ready to close
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
1:37:36
for your bill? yes sir you ready you're recognized thank you for being patient with us today i know this along it seems like every time at the end of session we get longer and longer on some of these bills
well thank you the last gentleman was sat here yes they did offer an amendment i showed it to my bill drafter, and he says, well, basically that guts your bill. So he takes it right back to where we were. So that's why I rejected his amendment. I'm sure there was something we could have done and represent me because I'm sure there is something we can do. I think we have to do something now to start. As far as for Senator Payton, we'd be waiting until a special session
for the Attorney General to make a decision and get us an answer on what you were asking about. So I hate to say that, but that's usually how it goes. But I don't know what to tell you. I think it's a good bill. It's a good start. We come back every session and refix and do things again. I think it's a good start to get us going. If we don't do this bill today, we're still in the same position. We're still having people that are getting scammed. I'm not saying they're bad actors. I'm just thinking that we're having a lot of problems, and we need to fix the problems that we've got. And I'll turn to Senator Wallace.
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
1:38:51
Senator Wallace, you recognize? Thank you, sir. Every day we do nothing, veterans are being harmed. Is this a perfect bill? No. I would like to sit at the table and I'd like to have our Arkansas regional VA I'd like to have these gentlemen behind us who gave very good testimony at that table.
I'd like to have VFW there, American Legion, Marine Corps, all sit around. And I think with that group, we could come up with a better plan, maybe a perfect plan. General Patton said in World War II that he would rather have a good plan now than a perfect plan two weeks from now. And I think that we are in a similar situation.
We need to protect our veterans. We need to protect our uninformed veterans. This bill is a start. It's not the finish, it is the start. And thank you for allowing
me to be here. Thank you for your testimony. Do you have something else, Representative Cozart? We're closed. Okay. Senator
Payton, we're going to ask staff to query the Attorney General,
see if we can get that information, get it distributed
to us on this. In the meantime, Representative Painter, you recognized? I'll make a motion to do pass. We have a motion to do pass. Do we have
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:40:53
a second? Second. We've got a second. Any discussion? Will this be a majority of the quorum or divided by chamber? Just tell us the threshold. well
Speaker 245
1:41:03
the threshold is whoever says it louder is going to
win this particular vote now if we
want to divide the chamber or something like that then we'll need to
do so okay all right I do believe represent Brown you want a discussion
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
1:41:36
of the motion I'm concerned that this bill will actually put some good actors out of business and I know how difficult it is to process those claims it's tedious
It's time-consuming, and it's mind-boggling, and it's, you know, it's my understanding that they only do the initial claim. They don't do, what do you call it, when you dispute a claim, appeals. And I'm just really concerned that this is going to put good actors out of business. I wish we could amend this bill. That's my discussion. Representative Binks, I'm going
to let you speak, but we already have a motion.
on the floor which we're going to have to
vote then we may have to come back and do a roll call in order to make a decision on this because we have a motion in the second do pass and because of that then probably have to roll call it if that's what you want to do if it's close enough or whatever meeks
you're still in okay again you understand what we're doing we've got we have a motion on
Speaker 123
1:42:47
floor yes discussion discussion we have a discussion before you call for the
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
1:42:51
vote and we have a motion of the second discussion on the motion that would be the appropriate time would not be for a division of the chamber on discussion of the
Speaker 295
1:43:05
motion was that not the appropriate time to move for
Speaker 296
1:43:10
division of the chamber okay does everybody understand where we are
on this okay we're gonna vote and then we'll roll call it if necessary are we good all right thank
you all right we have a motion and a second all in favor say aye those opposed the ayes have it roll call okay roll call but divisions of the chamber we'll start with
Speaker 300
1:43:49
the Senate yes senator Clark senator Clark senator
hammer senator hammer senator sullivan senator sullivan no senator tucker senator tucker senator King? Senator King? Senator Dotson? Senator Dotson? No. Senator Payton? No. Senator Payton? No.
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
1:44:35
it's I'm sorry but the the bill has failed thank you committee for staying so late and I appreciate you staying sorry we didn't have a perfect bill for you representative Hudson are you ready to present your amendment in your bill I thought
we had the amendment all right well then let's represent Springer are Are you ready to present your bill?
Speaker 309
1:45:06
What's that against? Okay. I'm just waiting for them to run across the street, and I'll just have five times here. What's
Speaker 311
1:45:23
the problem was, we didn't have any discussion. Oh, yeah, I got that. We didn't have any discussion, and then we ended up in a motion, and she
Speaker 314
1:45:29
said, "We've to do this and then okay all right we've got to figure it out yeah yeah
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
1:45:33
yeah but you knew there wasn't any votes for it all of a sudden
Speaker 315
1:45:37
Yeah, and that's why I could do it with the same things. Representative Springer, are you ready to present your bill? Yes, sir.
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:46:07
You're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, members. I know it's late in the evening, and hopefully we can proceed with this bill. It's my understanding that I did make contact with members of the committee. I shared the bill with you, and I did hear from one member of the committee who had some concerns about the bill and made some suggestions as to the bill. I want to make sure that I have a good bill, so I'm here willing and able to accept any type of amendments that you all propose.
Let me just share with you what one of the members said, and I just wanted to see whether or not you agree with those. One member indicated that there needed to be additional verification as to the status of the veteran in question. So they gave me a list of additional documents that the employer could utilize in order to confirm whether or not they were in fact a veteran. And also the representative also indicated that they thought that once the employer made a decision that it was not necessary for them to prove anything.
So with that being said, I would just like to open it up to members here to ask questions or let me know whether or not you have any additional concerns. I think I told each one of you that previously you should be familiar with this bill because I attempted to run this in our previous session. And based upon the previous session, members had indicated they were concerned about the economic impact this bill would possibly have. And I've indicated that there is no economic impact, and I also indicated that there was concern about whether or not it would be some abuse utilized.
And basically, in response to that, the bill clearly states that the person requesting the leave would give at least one month's notice to the employer with respect to the leave that's being requested. So with that, I'm available to attempt to answer any questions that you may have
Chair
Unverified
1:48:19
about the bill. Senator Dotson, you're recognized. Thank you,
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:48:25
Mr. Chair. Representative Springer, as looking through here, are you at all concerned that private employers may discriminate against veterans in hiring practices
if a veteran, they are required to
give this time off, but a non-veteran, they're not required to give this time unpaid leave off? I don't
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:48:45
think that that's the case here. I think they're totally different because everybody would have that opportunity to do that, to make a request for it. So this is not limiting the opportunity for other persons to make that
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:49:00
request. So non-veterans would be allowed to request unpaid leave off for Veterans Day?
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:49:07
Yes. I don't think it's saying that they
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
1:49:11
cannot. I guess I didn't read that
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:49:16
correctly in here then. Thank you. Representative Meeks, you recognized? Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm
all full of questions tonight. So I like the intent of what you're trying to do here. I don't know if I can support the bill, which I'll get into just in a moment. My question is the definition where you have cost, significant economic or operational disruption to the employer as determined by the Department of Labor and Licensing.
So does the department have like guidelines or policies laid out as to what defines a significant economic or operational disruption? Do you know? I don't know the answer to that. And
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:49:59
that's the part of the bill that one of the representatives indicated that once they
make a decision that, you know, they would have considered those sort of things. So, basically, that's something that I would like to hear more, have more contact with you all about to see whether or not you believe that that's a hindrance to you accepting this bill.
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:50:23
Right. I mean, I like the thought that, you know, that that is in there, but, you know, if, you know, the employer says that it is a disruption and the employee says, no, I don't think it is, then do they call someone at the Department of Labor to – you kind of see what I'm saying? There's no – it's not very well defined as to what that means because I could say that, you know, it's a busy time for us.
We're getting ready for the Christmas rush or whatever, and I can't afford to have anybody gone, right?
And then, but, you know, because I know there's things like this for, like, religious, so just some question marks on that part.
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:51:08
Well, that's why I say that in a month's notice for the request, then the employer should have sufficient time to make, you know, to adjust the schedules and make sure that they have the necessary employees there available. So
I think that that's why the month in advance would cover that particular concern.
Senator Payton, you recognized? Thank you, Mr. Chair. Do we have any other holidays and situations where employers are compelled to grant unpaid leave for Christmas or Fourth of July or Memorial Day or Easter or anything like that? I'm not aware
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:51:49
of that. I don't have any information on that. I thought that this would be a good
bill in that we were trying to, you know, make, for lack of a better word, consideration for veterans for all the service that they had done.
So this was a way, I believe, that we could, you know, do that sort of thing to kind of allow them
to be able to take off on days such as this. And I think that's admirable. And I think for
an employer to do that for his employees would be admirable until the state says you have to. And then the employer has to
do it. They don't get any goodwill or credit for doing it. There's no difference between them and any other employer because the state compelled them to do it.
And then you have jealousy between the employees because the employees that are not veterans have to work an extra shift because the veterans took off. So, I mean, I agree with you that it's a great gesture of gratitude for an employer to recognize a veteran and arrange for them to have time off. I think it's terrible
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:52:58
for the state to compel that. Well, you know, I'm back to the same response that I gave before. The state would make accommodations based upon the request.
The bill clearly says that this particular person has to notify the employee at least a month in advance. So I'm back to that same position that by doing so, that would give the employee an opportunity to make arrangements such as the concern that you have voiced. Right.
And if I could have a follow-up, Mr. Chair. So when you say inform the employer a month in advance, I mean, that's not a request. That's a demand because the law
is going to compel the employer to grant that request.
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:53:40
Well, not necessarily. If you look at the bill on the first page, lines 35 and 36, that employee has to give written notice submitted one month in advance. So it's not like that they're just coming. I'm just saying that's not written notice.
It's written demand. No, I mean, it says written
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:53:58
notice. Okay. I mean, to me that means, I interpret that to mean that they have to make a written request to their employer. It has to be in writing in order for them to address it.
And the state says that the employer has to grant it. I'm sorry. The state says
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:54:18
that the employer has to grant it. Well, no. It says that they have to give proof that they're there, and then they make a decision based upon the request. Okay. It doesn't say that they have to. It clearly says that they will review.
So I'm looking at the subtitle. It says to require employers to provide unpaid leave. Is that not accurate?
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:54:39
That's what it says, but if you read down further in the bill,
There are some parameters that must be followed by the state in order for that to take place. I think it clearly protects the state about concerns that they may have with respect to, as you've indicated, that they may not have available employees. So that's why the notice is a month in advance and they're giving sufficient time in order to address those type of concerns. Okay, thank you. Representative Springer, I have a
question in that. I just listened to what you say, but I'm looking at line 31 through 34.
It says a private employer that does not otherwise provide for paid holiday leave for Veterans Day shall allow an employee who is also a veteran to have the entirety of Veterans Day as unpaid leave. That sounds directive to me. That does not sound like it's permissive. But then
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:55:32
it goes on to say that there, and I guess that's where we're missing it, Written notice submitted at least one month in advance of the date for his or her intent to have the entirety of Veterans Day. Then it goes on to say that they must submit proof of their status.
And then the employer shall not reject the request of an employee who is a veteran unless the employer can demonstrate different things. And I guess that's where we get down to the point that one of the representatives brought to my attention. Once they make that decision, then they may not need to communicate what's here in lines 9 through 16. I'm sorry, but I
don't read it that way. But anyway, Representative Meeks, you're recognized.
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:56:19
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Back up. Kind of something on what Senator Payton said that, you know, as a veteran, I love the heart of what you're trying to do here. But at the same time, I didn't, you know, wear the uniform because I wanted special treatment later. It's definitely nice. My hope is that every employer across the state would do this. So the question I'm going to ask, and then kind of, again, going back to what Senator Payton was saying, is we in the General Assembly, we're basically like the board of directors for our state employees.
I think I could get comfortable supporting this if we said that the state, that we will do this for our own employees. Does that make sense? So the state of Arkansas, we've got, I don't know, 40,000 state employees out there. And if we were to do something along the lines that said, hey, we're going to make it a policy of the state that if it doesn't create a hardship for the agency, that we want the agency to allow the veteran to take the day off, I think I could get there where I could support it because it's saying, we're going to do that.
We as a state, we're going to set the example in this regard. My concern is, it's kind of like Senator Payton is, is I'm afraid we may be cheaping it by forcing the veterans. So I guess my question is that I'm ultimately trying to get to, would you be amenable to amending this so that it was, you know, we're saying that we as a state government, our employees, we're going to do this and not force the private sector to do that. And I don't know how my other colleagues here feel about that idea,
but I'll just throw that out there for whatever's worth
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:58:04
it. That's exactly what I stated when I made my initial presentation is I want to make sure that the bill is a good bill and you all feel comfortable in, you know, giving me a due pass on it. So I'm willing to sit down and try to make some amendments. So I'm willing to do that. No problem. Senator
Springer, do you want to pull your bill down and do
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:58:23
some more work on it? Yes, I do. I would like to do that and make sure that person, and that's why I sent it to members of the committee in advance because I wanted to make sure, based upon my experience the last time,
that you all would give me this type of feedback so that we can make it a good bill. And that's what I said when I initially sat here and opened up and said that I would like to have feedback from each and every one of you so that we can make this a bill that you all can, you know, support. all right
representing go ahead and pull your bill down and do some more work on it no guarantee that you're going to get an opportunity with this
committee again but I think that the bill as
it's written right now will not pass so I think that's probably a good idea
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
1:59:10
so can I so I can I get the names of representative Meeks
and represented and senator paint Payton for you all for us to get together on this then all right thank
you very much all right thank you committee we're doing a little work on an amendment here for the last bill as soon as we get that done to be handed out and representative Hudson will present her bill and amendment you ready all right here we go
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
1:59:47
Thank you. Thank you Mr. Chair and committee with your permission I've got a couple of people from AOC that I'd like to have come down go ahead
represent Hudson if you'll recognize self and if
you'll have the the members joining
you the individuals join you also if you would recognize if you would identify yourselves as
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:00:30
well Ashley Hudson house district 75 I'm Nathan
Speaker 339
2:00:34
McCarroll mr. staff attorney at the administrative office of the courts responsible for specialty courts and in
Speaker 340
2:00:39
that role I'm also the statewide specialty courts coordinator. And
Chair
Unverified
2:00:44
I'm Stephen Tabor. I'm a circuit judge in Sebastian County.
Speaker 343
2:00:48
I'm Tim Scherer. I'm project director
for the Sebastian County Veterans Treatment Court Expansion Project. Representative Hudson, you are recognized
to present your amendment. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We're just having
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:01:02
a few technical difficulties. Colleagues, this bill originally came to me from the Arkansas Veteran Coalition.
When they got together this summer for their annual conference, they had recognized that there was an issue that they wanted to fix, and so they came to me and asked for some assistance with it. Basically what's happening is when there is a veteran who is incarcerated,
there are certain issues that arise with regard to the administration of their benefits through the VA and also their ability to access certain other benefits that may help them while they're incarcerated to get access to services that may benefit them and help them, you know, perhaps get into a diversion program, get into veterans courts, things like that. So with that issue in mind, I started working with the Veterans Coalition to try to come up with a way to identify these veterans when they come in to these facilities.
because, as you'll hear, there are certain situations where we aren't getting that information through, and so veterans are ending up either unable to access services that they need or, in some cases, continuing to get, say, their disability benefits while incarcerated and then receiving a bill at the end of their incarceration from the VA when they want to recoup those benefits. I think we can all agree that when you're trying to get back on your feet after being released from prison is not the best time to be given a giant bill, and so what we're trying to do is to fix some of
these issues on the front end, work with our federal partners, and ensure that veterans are not stuck with these types of problems as they're coming back out and trying to reintegrate into society. The other thing that we're trying to do is to make sure that we're connecting these veterans who are incarcerated to both state and federal services that they may be entitled to and they may not know they're entitled to so for example if we can divert a veteran who has been charged in circuit court but can be diverted into a veterans court which connects them with different services and programs rather than just leaving them to be incarcerated for a period of time we
certainly want to give that veteran an opportunity for rehabilitation sometimes there's also access to different services through the VA system for health care specialized mental health treatment even diversion into residential treatments to get them out of the prison system entirely all things that we'd like to do for our veterans so what this bill does are we still talking about the amendment oh
let me get to that real quick too the amendment yes so what the amendment does is we clarified some of those issues because in the first draft of
this bill we did not have clarity on the best
way to do that and so we added some language regarding the vrss system which we'll talk a bit more about with the aoc representatives um and also clarified some of the language on how these notifications will occur we also added the additional house sponsors and a senate sponsor members do we have any questions on
Speaker 247
2:04:02
the amendment just a minute push your butt
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
2:04:13
You're recognized, Representative. So is the amendment the new bill, or is there stuff that we need to be paying attention
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:04:20
in both? So the amendment that you received right now is very similar to the one that I sent last night. The only differences from the ones that I sent last night or this
morning, whenever, was that we clarified that the – Before you go down that trail. So is the amendment the bill in
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
2:04:35
its entirety? Yes, more or less, yes. Okay. That's what I was after. Okay. Thank you.
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
2:04:43
yes question I've heard you recognize yeah I've heard several references to information that was sent last night I don't
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:05:01
get any of that okay I had that I sent it I believe I sent it through miss Cooper this morning actually
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
2:05:07
well I'm just making a statement okay you've been you've referenced several times I've Senate I don't get that information this is the first time I've seen this okay I
don't think I missed anything did I miss Cooper says they sent it out this morning in the email so
I know I received it and I know some other members did I don't know Dan why okay why it didn't
happen and we've got a motion to adopt the amendment do have a second we've got a second any discussion All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Ayes have it. Congratulations you can present your bill as amended. Thank you. What? That's what
Speaker 304
2:05:56
I said. No. No. I said the amendment. I said wake up. I've been here
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:06:03
too long. You're messing up my flow Senator. Go ahead.
Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I apologize for jumping the gun. I was anxious to
try to get us all out of here, and I know that y'all are anxious for me to stop talking. What we're trying to do with this bill is make sure that we connect these veterans with the benefits that they have a right to and make sure that they can access them. We want to divert them where we can. We want to shore them up where we can, and we want to do it in a way that is fair and applied evenly across the state and also primarily utilizes resources that we already have. I've got people up here to talk
specifically about these veteran diversion programs and why it's important to get access to these veterans early so that we can get them diverted and also how this VRSS system that is referenced several times in the bill is also through a system that is already accessible. It will not cost anything to implement. It is a website that is accessible and that some of our programs are already using. So with that happy to answer any questions and also see if Judge Tabor or any of his colleagues have any comments on that. Do you guys have anything to add? You're recognized. If I
Chair
Unverified
2:07:18
could very very quickly tell you our experience with this VRSS program and Tim has some facts and figures but I founded the Sebastian County Veterans Treatment Court program in 2015 to honor my father, who was a World War II veteran. He was shot in Okinawa. My brother serves. As you can imagine, the military flows deeply through my family. And so I started this program to help our veterans. Initially, we came up with an idea to identify veterans because it's a treatment
program. We treat people with substance abuse issues. We treat people with PTSD. We treat people with other mental health issues other than PTSD that are justice-involved. And we know that if it's a treatment court, not only for their benefit to, if they need treatment, to get treatment as soon as possible, but for the benefit of the jail to get them out of jail as soon as possible so they don't become a problem and a burden and a cost every day there.
We wanted to identify them more quickly. Our sheriff agreed to include a question on the booking form about whether or not they had been served in the armed forces. That helped some. On an indigency form and arraignment, we asked them the same question. That helped a little bit. But we still knew through practical experience and through research that that was not effective in identifying all the veterans.
Many veterans don't self-identify, some because of shame. They feel like they've brought dishonor to their service. Others for fear of retribution. Others because of confusion. They think if they didn't serve overseas in a combat area, maybe they don't qualify as a veteran. So Tim, when he came on board, he heard about this VRSS program, and he signed us up for it. And so what we found, and I don't want to steal too much of your thunder, Tim,
but he did research over what period of time? About, well, I
Chair
Unverified
2:09:34
what we found is that 45% of the veterans booked into Sebastian County Jail who were veterans were not identifying as veterans. But the VRSS system identified them for us so that we could target them because here's what happens. If we get that information from VRSS, if somebody, the VJO, Veteran Justice Outreach Officer, will go to that person in jail,
if they have a treatable issue, then they are considered and more often than not admitted into Veterans Treatment Court and released from jail quickly. into treatment, as opposed to incarceration. We also have a grant for non-VA health care eligible veterans, which Tim and he has a fellow he works with. They go into the jail and work with those people. All that is possible, that early identification, getting them out of jail, getting them treatment, is because of the VRSS system.
And so nobody slips through the cracks. Now, even if they are not eligible for our court for one reason or another, that doesn't mean they don't get help because of our utilization of this system. Because very often what the VJO will do is say, well, they're not eligible for our court, but you know what? We can help this person with housing. We can help this person with treatment. And so they are helped, even though they might not come to our court, they are helped.
And as we've discussed this, we talked about the issues about, yeah, it saves us money by getting them out of jail quicker. It helps them by getting them treatment quicker. But it also helps in avoiding recidivism because, A, they're being treated. Almost everybody that comes in veterans treatment changes their life, I can tell you. It's the most satisfying part of my job. But they also get help with housing.
What are the problems we see in criminal court every day? I do criminal court when I'm not doing specialty courts. What causes the problem? Drugs, alcohol, mental health, homelessness. Those are the things addressed more quickly because of this system. And that's why we're such big fans of it. It's a savings, it's a monetary savings, but it's what we see that you don't is the non-tangible savings,
the saving of families, the putting of families back together, the saving of lives, turning taxpayer burdens into taxpayers. That's what we're in the business of, and VRSS is a huge tool in our arsenal. So thank you for hearing us today. Do either one of you
other gentlemen have something to add that is substantially different than what we just heard? Well, I can add some
Speaker 364
2:12:38
techniques. You recognize? The VRSS system is, well, that's what we call the gold standard.
The Veterans Administration has this huge database that contains all the names of everybody who's a veteran. Now, as Judge Tabor said, we used, like many veterans treatment courts around the country, used a questionnaire, and that was the first approach. But the collaboration among all the veterans' treatment courts around the nations, we all recognize that that was a problem trying to rely on the questionnaire's self-identification.
The judge went through all the reasons or many of the reasons why veterans may not self-identify. And we found out over this three-month period, we had approximately 2,500 bookings in Sebastian County. Of those, 174 were identified by VRSS as actual veterans. But when we went back and computed, looked at how many of those people actually self-identified, only 55% had.
45% of these people failed to self-identify for whatever reason. So the use of this really has helped us pick up a lot of people. It's hard to say that direct one-to-one relationship, but the time we started using VRSS to the time when we did the most recent survey, we increased our numbers of vets in our census like 30%.
I cannot say guaranteed that this is the only reason why, but we feel like we have the gold standard here. Now, on a somewhat technical basis, what we have in Sebastian County is that the jail simply gives, sends e-mails to me, we do it on a daily basis, e-mails to me, simply a list of the people they booked that day. It's not rocket science, it's their names, date of birth, social security number, and a unique identifier, which is like their booking number.
The jail sends that list to me, and then I upload it to VRSS. In our example, and we're a little unique, in our example, once the jail emails that list to me, they're out of it. They have no more work to do. There's a lot of work that we do within the Veterans Treatment Court in using that data. But I'm telling you, one, that the VRSS system really works in helping to identify the vets.
That's the first step we have. And second, that for the most part, the use of VRSS is easy. Once I get that, it's a simple spreadsheet, like an Excel spreadsheet, it takes me a minute to upload it to the VRSS website. A couple hours later, they send back another spreadsheet that says, well, these are the vets of those groups.
So that's what I have to contribute here, that it's really helpful to us. And for the most part, for the jails, it's not that hard. It doesn't seem like, in our example. Thanks, sir. You have
something? go ahead you're recognized very very quickly uh i would
Speaker 369
2:16:17
just say that judicial council supports this bill uh that's why i'm here
Speaker 370
2:16:21
i'm here to share the thoughts of the specialty court judges across the state because they realize the impact this would have on our specialty courts and in particular the veterans treatment courts um we just want to clear one thing um there was an acronym
that was used the vjos the vjos are veterans affair you know veterans administration federal employees and they're key to all of this working what happens when tim submits that list to the brss website is not only does he get data back on which of those people are veterans but it alerts the federal va that there are people who are veterans sitting in a county jail they then dispatch that vjo veterans judicial outreach officer to go and meet at the jail with the
veteran and it's there that you know that that connection is forged so that that VJO can start connecting them with services offered by the VA substance use treatment mental health treatment but also with housing needs and other needs like that and so what happens is whether they end up on a track into a veterans treatment court or not what happens is that person usually ends up getting out of jail a little bit quicker because they have somewhere to go and and treatment waiting for them and they also receive services that hopefully end up keeping
them out of jail in the future keep them from being a returning customer
Speaker 274
2:17:47
so thank you thank you you got everybody
Chair
Unverified
2:17:52
uh you ready for questions you guys questions well very well senator dotson
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
2:17:58
you're recognized thank you mr chair um just i i think you may have answered this to a certain extent but these are all services that are already things that veterans qualify for and are, they just don't know that they're aware,
they're not aware of them potentially, and the facilities might not be aware that the veterans qualify for the services that they could treat. Yeah, that's correct. I mean, you
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:18:24
know, I guess if we're being technical, I mean,
the veterans court obviously is something new that they may not have previously qualified for and would have been qualified for by virtue of, you know, the incarceration. But, yeah, these are all services that they may not have even known that they were eligible for, whether they weren't registered with the VA or didn't know that these
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
2:18:44
benefits were available to them. And if I read the bill correctly, these are basically primarily for those that are being incarcerated six months or more?
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:18:53
Yes, we tried to limit this to either class A misdemeanors or felonies, and those are the people who are in it rather than having the people who are just in and out, you know, there for a few
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
2:19:04
weeks or whatever so yes these are class a misdemeanors and so when they come in 14 days everybody gets screened yes like 100 of all into it's a regular part of the intake process for anyone who is going to be incarcerated six months or more it it triggers that intake process that they get that survey and then if they qualify for services then they connect them
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:19:27
with those services so everybody everyone's screened correct but then only the ones that qualify for services through the va because vrss which is run by the veterans administration will spit back out the names of those people who are veterans
who are eligible for services okay thank you senator payton you're recognized thank you mr chair and probably for
the judge more than anybody else um i've heard i've heard it said i think by you and that your colleague did left that half of these and the statement that was made for whatever reason have not self-identified
i realize they're under criminal charges or whatever uh do they have the right to any privacy there if they're not wanting to identify as a veteran or if they don't want the services they're being offered uh do we you know constitutionally have a right to force that on them or not well i
Chair
Unverified
2:20:24
I would tell you there is no requirement that anybody comes to Veterans Treatment Court. That's strictly a voluntary thing.
There are no repercussions if they don't identify on either the booking slip or the indigency form. Now, the VRSS is a federal database. You know, I'm assuming that they have researched and signed off on this as far as the database. The only information that Tim would get back in our instance is these are the individuals who are veterans. If we go talk to them, the VJA goes talk to them, and they say, go pound sand.
We don't want your court. We don't want your help with housing. That's that. We walk out and leave them alone. Nobody else knows any of their information.
Well, and when that statement was made a couple of times for whatever reason, I started trying to imagine what reasons that a veteran would not want to self-identify. I'm not sure that I can imagine every scenario, but, I mean, they might not want the other inmates to know that they are a veteran.
Chair
Unverified
2:21:37
Exactly, and that's one of the reasons cited in the research and in my practical experience is fear of repercussions from inmates. Other inmates have no idea about any of this. Okay. Because those other inmates, their information is going up, too. The only thing is their names aren't coming back because they're not veterans. And they're never told that the VGAO is not going back to their cell block to talk to them. And when somebody goes up because they have a visitor, they don't know who it is.
So the other inmates won't know about it.
What about the personnel in the jail? I don't know
Chair
Unverified
2:22:17
why they would know. Because, well, all they do is give, they send him the booking list every day. I'm not sure they even know what he does with it. And then he uploads it in three keystrokes up to this federal database. A couple hours later, like he said, he gets the list of, hey, we submitted these 20 names. Here's three veterans.
And so I doubt that the jail even knows that. And
Speaker 364
2:22:49
one other thing, Senator. It's not just people who refuse to identify. There's a lot of these guys who don't realize that they should be considered vets. They may be guys who've been in the reserve, never did active duty, weren't deployed, and they've never applied for VA benefits. So they think, are you asking me am I a VA person, rather than are you a vet?
So they're not identifying, not because they refuse.
Well, and I totally understand that. I think my dad was in his 60s before he realized he had any veteran benefits. Yeah, had a brother the same way. But still, I mean, I understand once somebody's convicted of a crime that, you know, they lose some rights. But during the adjudication process, you know, if for some reason they want to be incognito, I don't want to take that right away from them.
Chair
Unverified
2:23:45
Right. Well, that information is in the database, period, and it's not getting spread out. If they're not interested, that information is not getting spread out. I can tell you I don't remember anyone that's ever come up since 2015 that has said, no, get away from here. The most common response I get is either I have dishonored the uniform, so I don't want to identify, or I didn't serve in combat, so I don't think of myself as a veteran.
Those are the two most common, in my experience, that I hear. But we've never had anyone, to my knowledge, say we're not interested in help.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you. Representative Brown, you're
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
2:24:38
recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Another benefit brought up in your introduction is
that veterans who are receiving VA benefits, when they are incarcerated, during that period of time while they're incarcerated,
they're not eligible to receive their VA benefits. Is
Speaker 356
2:24:55
that correct? They're not eligible to
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:24:57
receive the full amount of their benefits. It's reduced down to a percentage while they're
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
2:25:03
incarcerated. So then this, for those
who don't realize or don't think to inform the VA that they are incarcerated, this would prevent them from accumulating that backlog of payments that they would then have to reimburse.
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:25:21
Representative Brown, that's exactly right. And so that way we're not leaving these veterans with a big bill when they get out. I mean, when you're talking in terms of concerns about recidivism or reintegration into society, getting back home and then getting a letter in the mail that says you owe the VA $10,000, $20,000, $30,000, $40,000 is no way to start. Correct. Thank you. If I could add just one
Speaker 370
2:25:46
thing, Representative Brown, there will still be people who slip through.
Connecting them with the VJO, alerting the VJO at the VA that this person is in custody so that the VJO can go and meet with them can help on the back end when something doesn't work right, where their benefits aren't reduced properly, where the VJO can often step in and work out a payment plan or even work to get the overpayment, repayment, withdrawn from the VA. I want to say
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
2:26:18
I really like this bill, and I especially like that you're working through the VRSS
best to get those veterans directly connected to the VA, which can actually
do something. Thank you. All
Speaker 84
2:26:54
Wait a minute, hold on. Oh, I'm closed.
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:27:10
And make a motion do pass. There you go.
All right. All right, we've got to go through this. Unfortunately, we do have some people signed up to speak against the bill and for the bill. And Mr. Ruffin, do you want to speak against this bill? Come on up.
Speaker 77
2:27:44
Identify yourself and you're recognized. Thank
Speaker 393
2:27:52
you, Mr. Chair. Again, Wayne Ruthven, Chief of Staff, Arkansas Department of Veterans Affairs.
Speaker 192
2:27:58
Just like the last time I was here, we don't have real concerns with the bill and the purpose of the bill. We do have some concerns with the language. For example, multiple times in the bill, it indicates that the Department of Corrections or correctional facility personnel will provide notification of the incarceration of the veteran
and later the planned release of the veteran, and that notification will come to the Arkansas Department of Veterans Affairs. Well, we don't have any way to act on that notification. If that notification is intended to get to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, then we suggest it go directly to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. All we're going to do is slow it down, and we don't need to be in that process. On the other hand, I'm not sure why a notification is even necessary,
as was given in the earlier testimony. Correctional facilities could, in fact, add that information to VBSS and use that way to notify the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. And if I may, to Senator Payton's comment earlier about is there any reason to not self-identify there absolutely is a reason not to self-identify once incarcerated depending on the status of their crime and what a category of their felony
for example their VA benefits are stopped they're supposed to stop and be turned back on prior to release so they can start receiving those benefits again as immediately as they walk out that was our thought when we looked at this bill at the whole time that all the notification process was to ensure that benefits which should be stopped are stopped and benefits should should be turned back on or turned back on i didn't hear any of that in the previous discussion
but that's the reason that they would not self-identify can i interrupt you
for just one second representative meeks you have a point
Speaker 396
2:30:02
So, yes, Mr. Chair, I just wanted to add to our partner. Do you have the
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
2:30:07
new bill for some of the concerns you've addressed have been addressed in the new amendment? So I don't know if
you've been given this copy to Doe. I
Speaker 192
2:30:17
don't think I do, based on what you're holding up. At one point, I know that there was a consideration to take our name out
and put the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, But the last thing I had access to was our agency was listed multiple times in the bill. Yeah, because on
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
2:30:32
the amended version, it looks like it is the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. So I think that concern may have been taken care of. That's exactly how we wanted it to read. Okay, and she's provided you with a copy. So maybe you can look through there real quick and see if your concerns have been properly addressed and if you're still opposed to what we're trying to do.
Speaker 190
2:30:56
Well, I'm looking at it and the term I'm looking at repeatedly is Department of Veterans Affairs. Without the United States or Arkansas,
Speaker 192
2:31:34
request in talking to some of the people who did the drafting
from the coalition was that that be the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. They need to know so they can
Speaker 401
2:31:45
stop and start benefits. We don't need to know. There's nothing we can do
with that information. All right, thank you. Are you ready for questions, sir? Yes, sir. Senator Dodson, you're recognized.
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
2:32:00
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So just kind of a process question on that. As far as someone, you said, who would not want to self-identify or notify,
even if they didn't want to be, if they're incarcerated, their benefits turn off, correct? So if, or they should turn off, if they don't turn off, then they would be in violation and potentially liable to a clawback or some sort
of penalty because they're being overpaid for benefits that they're not eligible for at that time, right? Yes,
Speaker 192
2:32:36
sir, you're correct. But again, the way that you find out is through some process, typically self-identification.
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
2:32:43
Whether they want to notify or they don't want to notify they don't there by virtue of being incarcerated They're ineligible for those
Speaker 393
2:32:51
benefits at that time depending on their status
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
2:32:53
of incarceration. That's correct, sir And if if their status of incarceration They're still qualified for benefits then those would continue
even if it was notified. Correct is also correct. All right, so thank you Representative painter you recognized
have a motion. Let's hear your motion motion in public debate
second we have a motion and a second do we have any discussion no no not debatable very well all in favor say aye any opposed the ayes have it and we will end debate representative Hudson would you please come back up again thank thank you mr. chair I
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
2:33:42
am closed and make a motion do pass we have a motion in a
second as amended as amended any discussion seeing no discussion all in favor say aye any opposed the ayes have it congratulations committee we are adjourned Thank you.
Agenda
REGULAR AGENDA
HB1077 Hudson CONCERNING THE INCARCERATION OF A VETERAN OF THE UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES; AND TO PROVIDE FOR NOTIFICATION TO THE ARKANSAS DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS OF THE INCARCERATION OF A VETERAN.
HB1423 Cozart TO PROHIBIT A PERSON FROM RECEIVING COMPENSATION FOR THE PREPARATION, PRESENTATION, OR PROSECUTION OF A CLAIM WITH REGARD TO A VETERANS' BENEFITS MATTER EXCEPT AS AUTHORIZED BY FEDERAL LAW.
HB1498 Painter TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING MILITARY-TYPE CANTEENS AND EXCHANGES.
HB1515 Painter TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE AUTHORITY TO ORDER THE ARKANSAS NATIONAL GUARD INTO SERVICE; AND TO AUTHORIZE THE USE OF THE ARKANSAS NATIONAL GUARD FOR MATTERS RELATED TO MILITARY JUSTICE AND TO ADDRESS STAFFING SHORTAGES.
HB1526 Painter TO AUTHORIZE THE DEPARTMENT OF THE MILITARY TO ENTER INTO PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS; AND TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING GIFTS RECEIVED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF THE MILITARY.
HB1638 Painter TO MODERNIZE REFERENCES TO THE UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES; AND TO AMEND ARMED FORCES AND UNIFORMED SERVICES LISTINGS TO INCLUDE THE UNITED STATES SPACE FORCE.
HB1792 Springer TO REQUIRE EMPLOYERS TO PROVIDE UNPAID LEAVE ON VETERANS DAY TO VETERAN EMPLOYEES.
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — JOINT COMMITTEE ON MILITARY AND VETERANS AFFAIRS, Apr 1, 2025 | Agenda | 1 | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Representative Marcus E. Richmond Chair
Unverified
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
Speaker 10
Speaker 13
Representative Matt Brown
Unverified
Speaker 16
Speaker 34
Representative James Eaton
Unverified
Speaker 45
Speaker 46
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
Senator Jim Dotson
Unverified
Speaker 63
Representative Bruce Cozart
Unverified
Senator Dave Wallace
Unverified
Speaker 83
Speaker 85
Speaker 89
Speaker 100
Senator John Payton Chair
Unverified
Speaker 110
Speaker 95
Senator Kim Hammer
Unverified
Chair
Unverified
Speaker 142
Speaker 97
Speaker 150
Speaker 152
Representative Stan Berry
Unverified
Senator Dan Sullivan
Unverified
Speaker 170
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
Speaker 190
Speaker 192
Speaker 193
Speaker 198
Zach Baumgarten
Unverified
Speaker 206
Speaker 44
Representative Jason Nazarenko
Unverified
Speaker 209
Mark Christensen
Unverified
Speaker 236
Speaker 237
Representative David Ray
Unverified
Speaker 254
Speaker 259
Speaker 231
Speaker 269
Speaker 196
Speaker 245
Speaker 286
Speaker 123
Senator Scott Flippo
Unverified
Speaker 295
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Speaker 300
Speaker 309
Speaker 311
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Speaker 315
Representative Joy Springer
Unverified
Speaker 339
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Speaker 343
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Speaker 369
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Speaker 274
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