House, Senate chairs offer vets’ health bills
House, Senate chairs offer vets’ health bills
WASHINGTON (AP) — With Congress scheduled to recess in a week, the chairmen of the House and Senate Veterans Affairs committees offered competing proposals Thursday to fix a veterans’ health care program scandalized by long patient wait times and falsified records covering up the delays.
Both proposals would scale back separate House- and Senate-passed bills after lawmakers in both parties expressed shock at price tags totaling more than $35 billion. The new proposals would still allow veterans to go to private doctors if they face long waits for appointments at VA hospitals and clinics, or if they live more than 40 miles from a VA site.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., chairman of the Senate panel, made the first move, announcing a proposal that would cost about $25 billion over three years to lease new clinics, hire thousands of doctors and nurses, and make it easier for veterans who can’t get prompt appointments with VA doctors to get outside care.
The proposed price tag is $10 billion less than a bill passed by the Senate last month and nearly $20 billion less than a House-backed measure.
Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., chairman of the House veterans panel, countered hours later with a proposal that would require only $10 billion in emergency spending, with a promise of more spending in future years under the normal congressional budget process. Miller’s bill would keep most of the provisions in the Senate-passed bill and also would authorize about $100 for the Department of Veterans Affairs to address shortfalls in the current budget year.
Miller announced his plan at a hastily scheduled meeting of House and Senate negotiators who have been working on the veterans bill for more than a month. Sanders skipped the meeting, as did all Democrats on the negotiating committee except one, Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Ariz.
House Speaker John Boehner called Democrats’ nonappearance at the meeting “shameful” and said that if President Barack Obama cares about America’s veterans, “he needs to pick up his phone out in California and tell Senate Democrats to get to work.”
Despite the partisan divide, Miller said talks on the veterans had not collapsed and that he remains optimistic a deal can be reached before Congress adjourns next week until September.
Sanders called Miller’s proposal a “take-it-or-leave-it gambit” that showed a lack of good faith.
US unemployment aid applications decrease
WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of people seeking U.S. unemployment benefits fell last week to its lowest level in more than eight years.
Weekly applications for unemployment aid dropped 19,000 to a seasonally adjusted 284,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. That’s the lowest reading since February 2006, nearly two years before the Great Recession began.
The four-week average, a less volatile measure, declined 7,250 to 302,000. Claims for jobless aid have been falling for the past three months. Recent reports have coincided with the temporary summer shutdowns of auto plants, yet the impact of those closures is addressed through seasonal adjustments.
Applications are a proxy for layoffs. When employers hold onto their workers, it’s a sign of potential income gains, increased hiring and confidence that the economy will grow. The recent drop-off in unemployment benefit applications point to a substantial number of jobs added in July, raising expectations for the monthly employment report to be released August 1.
“All in, it looks like we may be in for another solid payroll report,” said Jennifer Lee, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets.
The decline in people applying for benefits buttresses other reports that the economy is improving.
Employers added 288,000 jobs in June, the fifth straight month of job gains above 200,000. That’s the first such stretch since 1999, during the height of the dot-com boom. The unemployment rate has fallen to 6.1 percent, the lowest since September 2008.
Total layoffs in May dropped below pre-recession levels, the government said in a separate report. Job openings are at their highest level in seven years, while more workers are quitting their jobs. Workers usually quit when they have an offer for a better position or confidence that they can find one.
Tornado slams Virginia campground; 2 dead
CAPE CHARLES, Va. (AP) — The sky turned black and cellphones pinged with emergency messages. Moments later, a tornado ripped through a sprawling, carnival-like campground Thursday, snapping dozens of trees and flipping over RVs.
A tree fell on a New Jersey couple’s tent, killing them, and their 13-year-old son in a tent next to them suffered life-threatening injuries. About three dozen other people were hurt, with injuries ranging from cuts to broken bones to more serious, Virginia State Police spokeswoman Corinne Geller said.
“All hell broke loose,” said Joe Colony, who has been coming to Cherrystone Family Camping &RV Resort campground along the Chesapeake Bay for 30 years. “We got an emergency message on a cellphone and within 30 seconds, the thing hit and it blew down 40, 50 trees in the park.”
About 1,300 people were at the campground, readying for a summer day of swimming pools, mini-golf, pier fishing and other activities at the 300-acre resort in rural Northampton County.
The National Weather Service had issued a tornado warning for the area about 9 a.m. EDT Thursday and later confirmed a twister had hit.
Joe Micucci said he and his wife couldn’t escape in their car because hail was the size of softballs. The couple rode out the storm in their camper.
“We saw at least five (campers) that were flipped over. One was completely gone and only had its wheels left,” said Micucci, of Washington Township, New Jersey.
Across the country in Spokane, Washington, severe thunderstorms knocked out power to more than 60,000 customers and damaged dozens of homes Wednesday. One driver suffered life-threatening injuries when a tree slammed onto his car, impaling him. Severe thunderstorms were forecast for the northern Plains on Thursday and could threaten the Deep South and mid-Atlantic.
In Virginia, Lord Balatbat and Lolabeth Ortega, of Jersey City, New Jersey, were killed, Geller said.
Eastville volunteer firefighter Brittney Eder said she left the campground before the full force of the storm hit.
“It came in real quick,” she said. “The sky turned jet black.”
Micucci and others were evacuated from the campground to a nearby high school. He said he wasn’t sure when he would be able to go back and survey the damage.
Peter Glagola, spokesman for Riverside Shore Memorial Hospital, said the hospital was treating more than two dozen patients as of Thursday afternoon, most of which were in fair condition with injuries ranging from cuts to broken bones.
Glagola said more patients were expected to be brought to the hospital, which is about 30 minutes north of the campground. One patient in critical condition was flown to VCU Medical Center in Richmond, he said.
Hospitals in Virginia Beach and Norfolk had been preparing for mass casualties but had received just three patients, one of which was taken to a nearby children’s hospital, said Sentara Healthcare spokesman Dale Gauding
Coast Guard spokesman Petty Officer 3rd Class David Weydert said crews also were responding to reports of boats overturned in the water in the area. Good Samaritans pulled at least three people from the water, he said, though their conditions were unknown.