Concurrent Retirement and Disability Payments (CRDP)

[TBONE]

Has anyone heard anything on the Concurrent Retirement and Disability Payments (CRDP) issues? I read the following from a Power Point presentaion

Bills Introduced –109thCongress

•H.R. 303 and S. 845 -eliminate the phase-in period
•H.R. 2368 –eliminate the phase in period and extend CRDP to veterans with disabilities rated less than 50%
•S. 558 -extend to veterans with disabilities rated less than 50%

[maxtor]

here is what came out in VETSPAC. the 3rd and 4th paragraph dont really make sense. i dont know if they are starting in 2006 and phase it in until 2009 or go to paragraph 4 and sounds like they wait until oct 09 and give all of it to us????????



The Senate and House completed Conference Report on the 2006 NDAA

The Senate completed the Conference Report and will send it to the President for final approval this week. Rep. John M. McHugh, R-N.Y., Chairman of the Armed Services panel that oversees personnel issues, said to CQ Today reporters, “It’s the most enhanced personnel package I’ve seen in my 13 years here.”

The Senate-passed SBP/DIC provision by Bill Nelson, D-Fla., which would have authorized just over $900 million in annual entitlements for the widows and orphans of veterans who were killed or fully disabled, was stripped from the final bill along with Senator Reid's provision to eliminate the ten-year phase-in for approximately 28,000 CRDP recipients rated as "unemployable".

Only a reduced version of CRDP IU phase-in passed and costs $800M less. A CBO estimate for direct spending for the shortened CRDP IU phase-in is $164M between 2006-09, and follows a considerable increase in retiree benefits since 2002.

The CRDP IU phase-in pay increase will only take place in 2009, after the end of the phase-in period, according to the OSD office of Compensation Policy. The new law also eliminates the DOD "policy review" that many hoped would lead to a parity between 100% disabled and those rated as 100% for unemployability.
Republicans in the House balked at the proposal’s cost and Senator Nelson and others were incensed that Congress failed to help the families of those who died in their country’s service. “I’m outraged,” Nelson said in a telephone interview. “Once again, the widows and orphans are left holding an empty bag.” The 2006 NDAA now contains a provision to conduct an actuarial study of the SBP/DIC funding assets.