A
press release from the Social Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee:
Ways and Means Social Security Subcommittee Members, led by Chairman Sam Johnson (R-TX) and Ranking Member Xavier Becerra (D-CA), sent a letter to Social Security Administration (SSA) Inspector General Patrick O’Carroll inquiring into recent press reports which have raised concerns about decisions made by a Social Security administrative law judge (ALJ).
In the letter the Members stated: “We are very concerned about the particulars of this story as well as any potentially similar occurrences that may be taking place elsewhere in the Nation. Over the years, the Social Security Administration (SSA) has made great strides in tackling the hearings backlog, but it is essential that this progress adhere to the Agency’s policies and procedures while also demonstrating good stewardship of precious taxpayer dollars.”
The Members asked that SSA:
1. Revew ALJ workloads, adherence to Agency policies and procedures, and related monitoring.
2. Provide information on those ALJs who differ very significantly from their peers in their productivity or decisional outcomes.
3. Assess what factors may account for any variances in these rates, as well as how the ALJs obtained the cases they worked and whether they held hearings.
4. Describe and assess the use and effectiveness of management controls regarding ALJ adherence to SSA policies and procedures and any constraints, including statutory limitations, which make it difficult to ensure ALJs’ adherence to those policies and procedures.
5. Describe and assess the effectiveness of SSA’s quality review system for ALJ decisions, including reviews by the Appeals Council and the Office of Quality Performance.
The full letter can be read here.
5 comments:
What do you bet that only the ALJ's who issue favorable decisions will be scrutinized. The ones who turn everyone down will be left alone.
Here's looking at you, Queens Five.....will you finally be chopped down to size?
Nope.
There is some new info on the current ALJ case problems in the Huntington WV SSA office.
Here is a link....
http://westvirginianews.blogspot.com/2011/06/attorney-accused-in-wv-social-security.html
anon 2, if there was a choice (as there appears to be here) i would prefer scrutinizing the serial approvers over the deniers. why? the denied claimants still have a right to file in federal court. the american people cannot take the aljs or the unjustifiably approved claimants to court.
Also, none of the Queens judges have denial rates that are truly that skewed. The "worst" have denial rates in the mid-60s, which quite frankly is probably rather reasonable.
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