Fugitive Felon Fiasco

From the Wall Street Journal:

A federal judge approved a civil-court settlement requiring the Social Security Administration to repay $500 million to 80,000 recipients whose benefits it suspended after deeming them fugitives.

The supposed fugitives include a disabled widow with a previously suspended driver's license, a quadriplegic man in a nursing home and a Nevada grandmother mistaken for a rapist.

They were among at least 200,000 elderly and disabled people who lost their benefits in recent years under what the agency called the "Fugitive Felon" program. Launched in 1996 and extended to Social Security disability and old-age benefits in 2005, the program aimed to save taxpayers money by barring the payment of Social Security benefits to people "fleeing to avoid prosecution."

But some federal courts in recent years have concluded that most people the agency identified as fleeing felons were neither fleeing nor felons. The problem: Social Security employees relied on an operations manual stating that anyone with a warrant outstanding is a fugitive felon, whether the person is actually fleeing or attempting to avoid being captured. ...

Some "fugitives" were victims of mistaken identity. To identify felons, the agency cross-checked its database with databases of old warrants obtained from various law-enforcement agencies. If a match was found -- of a person's first and last name, and either Social Security number or date of birth -- the person was deemed to be a fugitive and his benefits suspended. The program didn't compare middle initials or gender.

Willie Mae Giacanni, 79, a retiree near Reno, Nev., was informed by the Social Security Administration in 2006 that her $350 a month benefit would be suspended because of a warrant outstanding in New York, a state she has never visited.

She said she "called different precincts," trying to find out what she was wanted for. A detective told her the warrant was for Willie Frank Thomas, who was wanted for kidnapping and rape in 1972. Although Mrs. Giacanni's first husband's surname was Thomas, and the suspect shared her birth date, he had a different Social Security number, middle name, gender and race, according to the New York City Police Department's fugitive-enforcement division.

Benefit Checks May Now Go To Viet Nam and Cambodia

Social Security has posted new rules in the Federal Register that will allow benefit checks to go to Viet Nam and Cambodia.

Bill Passes House On Medicare Premiums

This happened fast! From Congressional Quarterly:

The House on Thursday passed a bill that would prevent Medicare premiums from rising sharply for about 11 million senior citizens.

The vote was 406-18.

The legislation would block a big increase in Medicare Part B premiums for the affected seniors, who account for about 27 percent of those enrolled in the health insurance program for the elderly and disabled.

They are in jeopardy of a steep increase in their monthly premiums because of complexities in federal law and the likelihood that Social Security recipients won't get a bump in their benefits next year to cover the cost of the premium increase. ...

The Senate is expected to act on the premium bill soon.

The bill would cost $2.8 billion and would be offset by reducing the Medicare Improvement Fund, which the Health and Human Services Department uses to make improvements to Medicare Part A and Part B.

Colvin Nominated For Deputy Commissioner

The White House has announced that Carolyn Colvin has been nominated for the vacant position of Deputy Commissioner of Social Security. Here is background information on Colvin supplied by the White House:

Carolyn W. Colvin is Special Assistant to the Secretary of the Maryland Department of Transportation. Prior to this position, she was the CEO of AMERIGROUP Community Care, a company dedicated to caring for the financially vulnerable, seniors and people with disabilities through publicly-funded programs. Colvin served as the Director of Montgomery County Department of Health and Human Services for over three years and as Cabinet Director of the Department of Human Services for the District of Columbia for over two years. She also brings over six and a half years experience working for the Social Security Administration, serving as the Deputy Commissioner for Operations and the Deputy Commissioner for Programs and Policy. In those roles, she provided executive leadership and directed the work of nearly 50,000 employees and the policy and programs of Social Security. She currently is a member of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, the Arundel Community Development Services, the National Forum for Black Public Administrators, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

LA May Help Disability Claimants

From the Los Angeles Times:

With the cost of helping Los Angeles County's welfare recipients expected to hit $1 billion by the end of this fiscal year, county officials are pushing a plan to shift the burden of some of the most hard-core unemployed to the federal government. If they succeed, local taxpayers could save tens of millions of dollars, and thousands of disabled welfare recipients would see their aid more than triple.

But the hurdles could prove high. County officials propose spending $7.2 million to help applicants through a notoriously difficult process to qualify for federal disability assistance. ...

A county-commissioned study released this summer found that a third of general relief recipients surveyed had a disability that would qualify them for federal aid. ...

To help those people apply for federal aid, county officials propose spending $7.2 million on caseworkers, housing subsidies and medical evaluations and research.

Tests To Continue

From today's Federal Register:

Our current rules authorize us to test, individually or in any combination, certain modifications of the disability determination procedures. 20 CFR 404.906 and 416.1406. We have conducted several tests under the authority of these rules. In the "single decisionmaker,'' test, a disability examiner may make the initial disability determination in most cases without obtaining the signature of a medical or psychological consultant. We also have conducted a separate test, which we call the "prototype,'' in 10 States. 64 FR 47218. Currently, the prototype combines the single decisionmaker approach described above with the elimination of the reconsideration level of our administrative review process.

We have extended the time period for selecting claims for these tests several times. Most recently, on August 10, 2006, we extended the time period until September 30, 2009. 71 FR 45890. We have decided to extend case selection for the current disability prototype process (single decisionmaker and elimination of the reconsideration step) and for the separate test of the single decisionmaker until September 28, 2012.

Editorial In Detroit News On Backlogs

The Detroit News has an editorial about the long delays in adjudicating Social Security disability claims. This is a followup to a news item they ran recently.

Appropriations Situation

From the Capitol Insider put out by the Disability Policy Collaboration:

With the start of Fiscal Year 2010 less than two weeks away, both Houses of Congress are expected to pass a Continuing Resolution (CR) to keep the federal government operating on October 1. None of the twelve FY 2010 appropriations will be enacted by then. Four of the bills are ready to be finalized by House and Senate conferees. The House has yet to appoint their conferees. The first CR is likely to expire on November 1. At least one more CR will be necessary before all of the bills, either singly or combined into an omnibus appropriations bill, will be enacted.