Office connects veterans with entitled benefits

As the Washington County Veterans Affairs officer, Sue Rich spends 30 hours a week assisting the county's military veterans.

The mission of the office, which is staffed by her and a part-time administrative person, is to help connect veterans with the benefits to which they are entitled.

'We're multifaceted here,” Rich said. 'The veteran population is 1,433. I'm currently assisting about 50, which is my current caseload. That changes almost weekly.”

A lot of what Rich does is helping veterans file for service-connected compensation.

'That would be if a veteran has an illness or injury they got during service,” Rich said. 'With Vietnam veterans, there are a lot of presumptive illnesses they have like diabetes, heart disease and certain sorts of cancers.

'If they have those, they are presumed to have been exposed to Agent Orange if they served in Vietnam.”

She also assists with pension claims.

'Pension claims are based on income,” Rich said. 'If a veteran has a low income, the pension amount can bring them up to the level that the VA requires.

'We do a lot of nursing home veterans who may be on Medicaid. Their income is taken from Social Security to pay for their Medicaid eligibility. We help to get them a little extra money.”

Once the Veterans Affairs Office helps a veteran file and get, it doesn't end there.

'Their illness or injury can become worse, so we can file for an increase,” Rich said. 'Or if a veteran dies, the widow comes in, and she may be eligible for some benefits depending on if they died of a service-connected disability or if she now qualifies for pension because his income is no longer there.”

Rich said that more than $5.5 million in federal money comes into the county for veterans.

'That's federal money that come into Washington County to Washington County veterans and surviving spouses,” she said.

The office offers county assistance for qualifying veterans can get temporary financial help with expenses like rent and utilities.

When Rich first started with the office in 1990, that was the primary focus of the office.

'Back then, we weren't doing what we do now,” Rich said. 'We were doing mostly county assistance.”

In 2008, Rich became nationally accredited, opening the door to help veterans with federal benefits.

'Most of the work that I do in this office is helping them on the federal level now,” she said. 'It's getting them enrolled in the VA Health Care System. It's getting them the entitlements they're entitled to from the VA.”

With the focus shifting to federal benefits, Rich has seen a decrease in need for county assistance.

'We really haven't spent a lot of taxpayer dollars from the county level recently,” she said. 'I don't know why that is, but a lot of it, I think, is because we're getting veterans on the federal benefits they're entitled to. Therefore, they're not as reliant on county assistance anymore.”