Joseph Sarandos
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My apologies AND thanks!
Because we are at a very critical and intense phase of my dealings with the Vets Administration, following 2 remands by the BVA, my VFW reps and I have been extremely busy (and so far successful) at "beating back" even more anti-regulatory actions and "stalling" tactics on the parts of incompetent and/or malicious non-veterans who are employed by the VA. "In a nutshell," the VA owes me a lot of money, but such employees are trying their best to keep me from collecting it within my own lifetime. LOL
Anyway, this is the reason why I’ve been unable to devote enough time to this forum lately, for which I apologize.
My thanks go out to you members and readers who’ve continued to “spread the word” about this forum, which efforts on your parts are reflected in the daily and weekly View-counts.
Unfortunately, we are experiencing a “dip” in the average View-counts from last month, with the exception of only the most-viewed topics, so we’re running about 400 short of our “spike” averages of more than 1,200 per day.
Hopefully, the upward trend will be restored once I become able to spend more time here, or once we start getting more original writings posted by more of you, or both.
In the meantime, I am still very pleased with the attention we’re getting.
Sincerely,
Joseph
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4/13/2006, 2:55 pm
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NamVet2
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Re: My apologies AND thanks!
Sorry to hear about your problems with the VA, Chief.
There's a lot of that going around these days.
I read Aaron's take on the situation in another thread here, about the percentage of new cases coming out of Iraq, and he's got it right according to the consensus of my own group. The VA is not getting enough funding to cover all the new cases along with all the old ones, and the BVA is overwhelmed with appeals.
It's good that your rep is the VFW, since it seems to be having the most success at the BVA level even though it is also overwhelmed with cases and short on personnel.
I wish you the best of luck in getting timely justice.
Greg
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4/14/2006, 5:17 am
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Joseph Sarandos
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Re: My apologies AND thanks!
quote:
NamVet2 wrote:
Sorry to hear about your problems with the VA, Chief.
There's a lot of that going around these days.
I read Aaron's take on the situation in another thread here, about the percentage of new cases coming out of Iraq, and he's got it right according to the consensus of my own group. The VA is not getting enough funding to cover all the new cases along with all the old ones, and the BVA is overwhelmed with appeals.
It's good that your rep is the VFW, since it seems to be having the most success at the BVA level even though it is also overwhelmed with cases and short on personnel.
I wish you the best of luck in getting timely justice.
Greg
Thanks Greg.
For what it's worth, my congressman is in direct 2-way communication with the BVA now, and that seems to have cut through a lot of the "red tape" stalling at the lower levels.
The regs require, and the BVA had ordered "expeditious treatment" following its first remand a year ago. The AMCRU had precluded expediency by "losing track" of my file instead of providing it to the VFW in a timely manner. The BVA is not happy about this.
Therefore, the BVA totally rejected the AMCRU's submitted statement and recommendations and issued a second remand just 9 days ago. This makes mine a "squeaky wheel" case with the BVA, so we don't expect any stalling this time around, even though it'll be a few more months before the case gets back to the BVA for final disposition.
If I end up getting all that's owed to me, I'll send your group a recap of how we handled it, so it might help some others who get placed into the same circumstances.
Joseph
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4/14/2006, 6:56 am
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Incog4
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Re: My apologies AND thanks!
Greg,
Being that I'm a fairly close neighbor and we visist back and forth often, I know more than a bit about Joseph's VA case. Whether it was out of pure incompetence, malice toward Joseph, or some of both, the Oakland VA had been screwing him over for years before he finally got to the BVA, and the primary basis of his appeal was that Oakland had grossly mishandled his claim-file, denied his requests for certain tests, and misinterpreted the evidences. The BVA agreed with Joseph, and so it remanded the case with specific instructions as to what had to be done before the case came back to the BVA. The AMCRU ignored the instructions along with causing unnecessary delays, which is why the BVA issued the 2nd remand with instructions (either unprecedented or very rare action by the BVA, according to the VFW). The new involvement of his congressman had at least something to do with the 2nd remand. I'm not a lawyer or an expert, but I spent lots of hours going through the records of Joseph's always successful rebuttals of the findings and decisions of the Oakland hearings officers, so I can safely predict that he'll ultimately win the appeal against the AMCRU hearings officers, even without his submitting any new evidences. As the VFW reps see it, and I agree, it is only a matter of months from here on out, especially because the BVA has now twice exhibited impatience with, resentment of, and doubts toward Joseph's internal opposition to his appeal. So, barring his being killed, or dying from some accident in the near future, I say he will live long enough to collect and enjoy the money that's legitimately owed to him. He's in terrific physical (and mental) condition other than his back problem. I've got a bottle of expensive champagne and 2 huge Havanas in my fridge, waiting to celebrate his victory with him.
Aaron
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4/14/2006, 2:46 pm
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Joseph Sarandos
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Re: My apologies AND thanks!
Greg,
Aaron is justified in his optimism, and what he wrote is correct as far as he explained it. Nonetheless, the AMCRU had prematurely reduced my Rating and Payments, and this can't be reversed until after a separate Hearing on the matter, which Hearing itself is being delayed by the AMCRU, in that my entire file has not yet been sent to my VFW rep in Oakland, and the AMCRU claims that "it doesn't exactly know" where the file is at the moment. Eventually, the BVA will get this all sorted out and remedied in my favor, and it should happen rather quickly, but it is stalled at this time. I'll let you know when it starts moving again.
---------------------------------------------------------------
Aaron,
Keep the champagne chilled, but stick those Havanas in your freezer "just in case". LOL
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4/18/2006, 10:15 am
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