House Committee on Veterans' Affairs

Washington, D.C. – On Thursday, October 8, 2009, the House Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity, led by Chairwoman Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-SD), approved seven bills that would improve benefits and services to veterans provided by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

“This Subcommittee passed a slate of bills that will provide needed changes for veterans and their families,” said Chairwoman Herseth Sandlin.  “These bills address the unique needs of our veteran population and I would like to thank the Subcommittee members for addressing these critical issues here today.”      

• H.R. 1182, Military Spouses Residency Relief Act (Carter)
  H.R. 1182 would amend the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act by extending the same residency rights to military spouses as are currently extended to active duty service members.  

• H.R. 2416, The Success After Service Act (Adler)
  H.R. 2416 would require contracting officers of the VA to use purchases of goods or services through the federal supply schedules for the purpose of meeting the government-wide goal for participation by small businesses owned and controlled by veterans and service-disabled veterans.

• H.R. 2614, Veterans' Advisory Committee on Education Reauthorization Act of 2009 (Kirkpatrick)  
  H.R. 2614 would reauthorize the Veterans Advisory Committee on Education until the end of 2015. 

• H.R. 1168, as amended, Veterans Retraining Act of 2009 (Boozman)
  H.R. 1168 authorizes $100 million per year to provide a living stipend and moving assistance to veterans who have been unemployed for at least 4 months, who are not eligible for training or education under the Department of Veterans Affairs, and are enrolled in a U.S. Department of Labor re-training program. 

• H.R. 2696, as amended, Servicemembers’ Rights Protection Act (Miller)
  H.R. 2696 would expand Servicemembers Civil Relief Act protections to service members seeking to cancel certain service contracts due to a change in duty station where such service is not provided.   

• H.R. 2461, Veterans Small Business Verification Act (Herseth Sandlin)
  H.R. 2461 would clarify current law and require VA to verify that firms are veteran-owned small businesses or service disabled veteran-owned small businesses in order to be listed in the Vendor Information Pages database maintained by the VA Secretary. 

• H.R. 2874, as amended, Helping Active Duty Deployed Act of 2009 (Connolly)
  H.R. 2874 would amend the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act to improve the equitable relief available for service members called to active duty, including allowing greater flexibility for family cell phone plans, rental leases, and motor vehicle leases when a service member has changed duty stations or been deployed.   

The bills will next be considered by the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs.