Speakers At NOSSCCR Conference

 I am bumping this up since Blogger's problems had it hidden for so long.

The National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) is having a conference this week in Baltimore. I am unable to attend. Eric Schanufer has been kind enough to take some notes on the speakers at this morning's general session. Here are Eric's notes with some light editing by me:

Carolyn Colvin, Deputy Commissioner of Social Security

• Nine States under Disability Determination Services (DDS) furloughs
• About 4,700 representatives are registered for electronic access
• Through second quarter of 2011, 386,000 requests for hearings precessed
• Anticipate processing 814,000 requests for hearings in fiscal year (FY) 2011
• Average processing time is less than one year as of March 2011
• FY 2009 36,000+ attorney advisory fully favorable decisions, FY 2010 54,000+, FY 2011 at present 32,000+
• There is a virtual screening unit. It now has 72 attorney advisors. In FY 2011, it has screened 22,000 requests for hearings and rendered 6,000 fully favorable decisions
• In FY 2011, about 130 Administrative Law Judges ALJs will be hired with support staff. There is a hiring freeze except for Office of Disability Adjudication and Review (ODAR). The Agency will lose 2,500 employees through attrition.
• In 2011, eight new hearing offices will be opened, including August, GA, Columbus, MO, Franklin, TN, Reno, NV, and Tacoma, WA. Eight offices that were planned will not be opened, including El Paso, TX, Marquette, MI, Muncie, IN, and St. Paul, MN.
• About 4.5% of initial claims will be paid either through Quick Disability Determination and Compassionate Allowance.
• The Tallahassee Teleservice Center is on hold.
• There is limited overtime.
• Information technology investments are on hold.
• About 50,000 DDS denials will be reviewed by Quality Review.
• There are 538 certified non-attorney representatives. There will be an examination in 2011. The Agency is looking for a contractor. The Agency is working on regulations for certifying non-attorney representatives.

Judge Thomas I. Vanaskie, Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. 

• District Judge Robert W. Pratt introduced Judge Vanaskie 
• Judge Vanaskie discussed the Third Circuit's case of Capato ex rel. B.N.C. v. Comm'r of Soc. Sec., 631 F.3d 626 (3d Cir. 2011).
• Stated that he knew of four cases involving videoconference. He provided citations for two. Below are quotes from them:
• Kirby v. Astrue, 731  F. Supp. 2d 453, 457 (E.D. N.C. 2010) (“This Court finds as a matter of law that an ALJ cannot impeach the credibility of a claimant, nothing else appearing, based on his or her personal impressions, such as how often a claimant shifts positions, or moves around during a hearing conducted via video conference. There could be any number of reasons for such movement by a claimant and there is no one valid interpretation as to why a claimant was sitting in a certain manner or continuously standing up that an ALJ can use to impeach the claimants credibility.”).
• Holliday v. Astrue, No. 05-CV-1826 (DLI)(VVP), 2009 WL 1292707, at *11 (E.D. N.Y. May 5, 2009) (“The transcript hearing indicates that Plaintiff appeared via video teleconferencing equipment before an ALJ who presided from Virginia. (R. 35, 156-57.) The Court notes that Plaintiff was notified in advance of the hearing that video teleconferencing equipment would be used, and apprised of her right to object to the use of such equipment, as required by 20 C.F.R. § 404.938(b). (R. 35.) Even so, construing Plaintiff's pro se pleadings and papers `to raise the strongest arguments that they suggest,’ Triestman, 470 F.3d at 474, the Court finds that the use of teleconferencing equipment here may have been especially prejudicial, since it may have impaired the ALJ's ability to (1) observe the existence and severity of Plaintiff's lesions; (2) make proper credibility determinations; and (3) evaluate whether Plaintiff was intoxicated at the hearing, thus rendering her unable to knowingly waive her right to an attorney. On remand, in determining whether Plaintiff will be appearing at the hearing in person or via teleconferencing equipment, the ALJ should consider whether the need to assess these factors prevents the use of teleconferencing equipment in this case.”).

Eileen Sweeney Award

NOSSCR gave the Eileen Sweeney Award for public service to:

• Daniel Devine
• Richard Morris

Glenn Sklar, Deputy Commissioner for Disability Adjudication and Review

• There is a fifth National Hearing Center in St. Lous.
• There are now 1,400 ALJs. There is a historically high attrition rate for ALJs. Fifty have left this year.
• ODAR wants ALJs to meet “pace,” i.e., dispose of 500-700 cases per year. At present, three quarters of ALJs on “pace.”
• There is a 5-2 ratio of “new” cases to “old” cases.
• No Hearing Office has an average processing time of greater than 500 days.
• Less than a dozen Hearing Offices have average processing times of greater than 450 days.
  8,000 invitations have been sent to representatives for eFolder access. 4,700+ representatives have eFolder access.
• There will be access to the eFolder at the Appeals Council in the summer of 2011.
• There will be case status summary access in eight to nine months (winter 2012).
• In FY 2011, there will be 130,000 video hearings.
• There are 841 hearing rooms with video equipment, and 317 desktop video units.
  There have been 5,300 RVP hearings (hearings in the representative’s office) to date. There are 28 certified representatives. At present, a DSL line is used. There will be a national rollout this year for IP-based RVP.
• $300 million has been cut from information technology.
• The Agency is on the “cusp” of furloughs.
• ODAR is in a slightly better position than the Agency generally.
• All temporary remote sites will be closed after scheduled hearings are held. Some temporary remote sites will be made permanent remote sites.
• There is a “full freeze” in the field offices. There will be no information technology innovation for representative fee payment.
• There is no routine provision of CDs to representatives who have electronic access.
• It is OK to use a stamp to complete Form 1696s. 

Nancy Altman, Co-Director, Social Security Works, 

•  Spoke about Social Security solvency.
• There is a petition to be signed.

Nancy Shor, Executive Director NOSSCR

• The Disability Insurance Trust Fund will not run out of money in 2018. Money will be reallocated from the Retirement Trust Fund to the DI Trust Fund.
• It appears that where a representative signed up for electronic access matters. If a representative signed up for electronic access at a Hearing Office, CDs are not sent to the representative. If a representative signed up for electronic access at an SSA "event," e.g., a NOSSCR conference, CDs are sent. CDs should be provided upon request to all representatives.
• NOSSCR wants to know about problems with encyrpted CDs and using Electronic Records Express.
• NOSSCR is aware that an entire representative's staff wants to use electronic access, but the agreement for such access restricts access to the representative him- or herself.
• The Senior Attorney Advisor program will be extended to August 9, 2013.
• The disability program will not go away. See what the response was to Rep. Ryan's plan for Medicare. A "knife cannot successfully be put" into the "heart" of the disability program.
• NOSSCR has asked Social Security's Office of General Counsel to consider using a standard language for addressing debt collection issues after Ratliff.