Final Regulations On Overpayment

From today's Federal Register:

We are revising our title II regulations and adding title XVI regulations on personal conferences when waiver of recovery of an overpayment cannot be approved. These final rules allow for the conferences to be conducted face-to-face, by telephone, or by video teleconference in these circumstances.

DATES: These final rules are effective February 11, 2008.

Cleveland Gets Help

From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

If you're one of the 14,000 people in Northeast Ohio who have been waiting months -- or years -- for a judge to decide if you qualify for government disability checks, 2008 could bring good news.

A number of improvements have been launched to try to reduce lengthy waits for disability hearings in Cleveland and across the country.

One of those changes was the opening Dec. 17 of a National Hearing Center in Virginia. Five hundred Cleveland cases were transferred to the center, where they will be handled in video hearings, according to Mark Hinkle, a spokesman for the national Social Security Administration office in Maryland. And, Hinkle said in an e-mail, an additional 120 Cleveland cases will be sent there each month. ...

Since he was sworn in about a year ago, Astrue has been working on solutions.

Among them, Hinkle said, is adding six judges to the nine who now hear cases in the Cleveland hearing office. ...

Those judges will be among 150 added across the country, Hinkle wrote in an e-mail response to questions from The Plain Dealer. "Training for the first new hires is scheduled to begin in mid-April 2008," he wrote. So it will be months before they begin hearing cases.

As deserving of extra help as Cleveland is, Atlanta is even worse. Is Atlanta getting extra help with its backlog which is even worse? Of course, the Atlanta newspaper has not been running articles on the backlog. Is help being allocated based upon who needs it most or on who yells the loudest?

Even though Social Security is getting $150 million more than the President asked for and Commissioner Astrue asked for and planned for, according to this article the number of Administrative Law Judges to be hired is staying at 150, which is little more than needed just to cover attrition over the two year time period from the time President Bush introduced his budget plan until there is a new budget.

More Comments On Proposed Procedural Regulations

Probably there are still more comments mailed to Social Security waiting to be processed, but here are two recently posted comments from Senators.

• Senator John Kerry
• Senator Joseph Lieberman

Treasury Still Trying To Promote Privatization

The Department of the Treasury has released its "Issue Brief No. 3 Social Security Reform: Benchmarks for Assessing Fairness and Benefit Adequacy."

Bomb Threat In Ohio

There seems to be a lot of this going around. From the Daily Jeffersonian:

A bomb threat was reported this afternoon at the Social Security office on Woodlawn Avenue in downtown Cambridge [OH].

Local law enforcement and emergency personnel responded to the scene and an explosives sniffing dog was brought in.

No explosives were found and there are no reports of injuries.

The FBI is conducting an investigation.

AARP Comments On Proposed Procedural Regulations

The American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) has submitted comments on the proposed procedural regulations changes. I have reproduced the AARP comments on the separate Social Security Perspectives Blog, since I have not yet seen them on the federal website where all these comments are supposed to be displayed. Perhaps I missed it or perhaps Social Security is still uploading these.

In the unlikely event you did not already know it, AARP is an 800 pound gorilla when it comes to Social Security. It would take a brave Commissioner to adopt these proposed regulations in the face of such strong opposition from AARP, but the Bush Administration has not been shy about doing things that a basketball fan such as myself would describe as "in your face."

Social Security Subcommittee Hearing

From the Social Security Subcommittee of the House Ways and Means Committee:

Congressman Michael R. McNulty (D-NY), Chairman, Subcommittee on Social Security of the Committee on Ways and Means, today announced that the Subcommittee will hold a hearing to examine Social Security provisions affecting some public employees and other workers and their families who face hardships in retirement, or in the event of disability or death. The hearing will take place on Wednesday, January 16, 2008, in the main committee hearing room, 1100 Longworth House Office Building, beginning at 10:00 a.m.

ALJ With Second Federal Job

At the National Organization of Social Security Claimants Representatives (NOSSCR) conference a few months ago, Social Security Commissioner Astrue referred to a disciplinary action against an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) who was holding down a second full time federal job. I had posted about this.

I have been contacted by the person whom Astrue must have been talking about, Kelly S. Jennings. Jennings has sent me the statement reproduced below. I have no personal knowledge of the situation. I think it is appropriate to post this statement here, since Astrue was publicly criticizing Jennings, even if Jennings' name was never mentioned.

In 1994 Kelly S. Jennings was appointed an Administrative Law Judge with the Social Security Administration and assigned to the Atlanta (GA) North ODAR.

From 2003 to 2005, official SSA statistics reveal ALJ Jennings was among the most productive ALJs in the Atlanta North ODAR with disability case dispositions of 249 in 2003, 395 in 2004, and 449 in 2005 for a 3 year disposition total of 1,093 cases. In addition, Judge Jennings heard 144 disability cases in 2003, 318 cases in 2004, and 309 cases in 2005 for a total of 771 disability cases heard from 2003 to 2005.

In 2003, Judge Jennings was also selected by SSA to serve as a Quality Assurance Review (“QAR”) ALJ. SSA placed Judge Jennings in a Flexi-place/Alternate Duty Station (“ADS”) status and sent him hundreds of disability cases and decisions issued by other SSA ALJs from SSA headquarters in Baltimore to review for legal sufficiency and quality purposes.

In January 2003 Judge Jennings, a Colonel in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps having served 25 years in the U.S. Army Reserve, was mobilized and deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom (“OIF”). For his service in Iraq, Colonel Jennings was nominated for the Bronze Star Medal.

From 2003 to 2005 Judge Jennings provided military orders and leave requests on a continuing basis to the ATL North Hearing Office Chief ALJ (“HOCALJ”) who knew of his mobilization and deployment in support of OIF.

The Regional Chief Administrative Law Judge (“RCALJ”) (“GARMON”) and the Associate Commissioner of the Office of Hearings and Appeals (“THURMOND”) were also aware Judge Jennings had been mobilized and deployed to Iraq.

SSA continued to send disability cases to Judge Jennings by email for review and decisions for editing even while he was deployed to Iraq and Kuwait.

When he redeployed from Iraq to the United States in order to attend and eventually graduate from the prestigious U.S. Army War College, Judge Jennings would at periodic times use a combination of accrued/carryover annual/military/advanced leave and while in a Flexi-place/ADS work status conduct Social Security disability hearings and issue decisions.

Using accrued/carry over annual, military, and advanced leave, together with being placed in a Flexi-place/ADA work status by SSA, Judge Jennings continued to receive his salary from Social Security for the hearings conducted and disability case dispositions accomplished.

In 2007, nearly two years after having been released from active duty with the USAR and mobilized in support of OIF, an anonymous complaint was submitted to the SSA OIG, alleging Judge Jennings had received “dual income” from both Social Security and the USAR from 2003-2005.

In August 2007, Chief Judge Frank Cristaudo and Deputy Commissioner-ODAR Lisa DeSoto determined Judge Jennings was really not working for SSA as an ALJ from 2003-2005 due to his military status with the USAR as a mobilized reservist.

In August 2007, Cristaudo ordered the Time/Attendance (“T/A”) records of Judge Jennings retroactively amended for the years 2003-2005 in order to place him in a Leave Without Pay (“LWOP”) status and to revoke previously authorized and SSA management approved use of annual/military leave.

In November, 2007 SSA sent Judge Jennings a certified letter demanding repayment of SSA salary from 2003-2005 in the sum of $309,662.04 plus interest within 30 days.

Subsequently, in November and December 2007, SSA without notice to Judge Jennings invaded and confiscated $43,804.20 from his Thrift Savings Plan (“TSP”) account and $21,954.85 from his Federal Employee Retirement System (“FERS”) account despite the fact Judge Jennings had protested the $309,662.04 debt determination and had requested a hearing.

In August, 2007 Cristaudo and DeSoto suspended Judge Jennings from his duties as an ALJ and instituted an action with the MSPB to remove him from his position as an SSA ALJ.

The MSPB proceeding against Judge Jennings is pending and an MSPB Administrative Law Judge recently raised the question to SSA to the effect that if Judge Jennings was really not working for SSA as an ALJ from 2003-2005 as SSA contends, how he could legally hold 771 hearings and issue 1,093 disability decisions. This issue remains unresolved.

SSA has notified Judge Jennings his T/A and leave records for 2003 are lost and only partial T/A and leave records are available for 2004 and 2005. An SSA OIG audit confirmed the 2003 T/A records for Atlanta North ALJs were missing and cannot be located.

The SSA action before the MSPB has been set for hearing in March, 2008 on the question of whether the facts support removal of Judge Jennings from his position as an SSA ALJ. Judge Jennings has been forced to spend thousands of dollars in attorney fees, costs, and other expenses to defend himself against the MSPB action.

Mean while, the number of disability cases pending for hearing in the Atlanta North ODAR has climbed above 13,000 as one of the worst pending in the Nation.