It no longer matters whether Nebraska veterans needing a county’s emergency help served during a military conflict, thanks to a statewide push begun by Lincoln County officials in November.
Veterans Service Officer Tom Gann’s quest paid off Tuesday when Gov. Jim Pillen signed Legislative Bill 1300, one of 13 bills involving western Nebraska state senators that passed April 11.
LB 1300 included all or parts of six other bills, including LB 869, which sought to repeal a restriction on county relief for veterans to those who served “during a period of war” as defined by the federal government.
Two groups of living veterans found themselves out of luck: first, those who served between the Vietnam War’s April 1975 end and the October 1983 Grenada invasion; and second, those serving between the end of that brief conflict and the December 1989 invasion of Panama to depose and arrest ruler Gen. Manuel Noriega on racketeering and drug charges.
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“I’m excited, very excited,” Gann said Saturday about LB 1300’s signing. “I won’t have to turn down a veteran for county aid.”
Gann, who became Lincoln County’s veterans service officer in September 2022, first approached the county’s veterans service board and then county commissioners in November to enlist their help in removing the restriction.
All veterans are eligible for aid from the state, he said, “but state aid is slow because this state is big.”
He told the County Board Nov. 7 that the typical 30- to 45-day wait for state help wasn’t fast enough for peacetime veterans who served honorably but needed immediate help to buy food or clothes or pay housing, utility, funeral or medical bills.
“With county aid, all I have to do is make a couple of phone calls to my veterans board, and they come down and sign the check and (veterans) get the aid in about a day,” Gann said Saturday.
Removing the restriction on peacetime veterans relief won’t make much difference in Lincoln County’s budget, he said. But he had to turn down five to 10 veterans in distress over the past year because of when they served.
“Those guys were still willing (to serve), and they were fortunate not to have to go through a deployment and be absent for six months or more,” Gann said.
With county commissioners’ encouragement, Gann successfully lobbied the Nebraska Association of County Officials before the Legislature convened in January to find senators willing to push to end the restriction.
Commissioner Micaela Wuehler joined Gann in his effort, which won its initial victory when Lincoln Sen. Eliot Bostar introduced LB 869. Sen. Mike Jacobson of North Platte cosponsored that bill instead of offering his own.
LB 869 received its mandatory public hearing Feb. 21 before the Government, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee, chaired by Gordon Sen. and retired U.S. Army Col. Tom Brewer.
Wuehler and Gann both testified in the bill’s favor. “Sitting with hundreds of veterans in the Capitol building, testifying for this deserving group, is one of the defining moments in my life,” Wuehler said.
Committee members chose to attach LB 869’s content to LB 1300, another Bostar bill dealing with military topics. All contents in Unicameral bills must deal with the same general subject.
Despite filibusters unrelated to Gann’s quest, LB 1300 won 41-0 first-round approval April 3. After further debate, it moved to final reading on a voice vote April 9 and won 46-0 passage last week.
“By the grace of God, I’m glad we got (the law) changed,” Gann said. “I was sweating bullets.”
Gann and Wuehler weren’t the only Lincoln County residents who saw their hopes for legislative changes ultimately rewarded last week.
Pillen Monday signed LB 852, a combination of two bills offered by Jacobson in successive years. The older one, LB 32, dealt with a situation brought to the District 42 lawmaker’s attention by retired North Platte lawyer Stephen Kay.
Kay’s wife, Jean, has suffered from multiple sclerosis since 2002. She became eligible for Medicare early as a result, but he had to quit his 40-year legal practice in 2018 to find a job with health insurance to cover health and pharmacy costs that Medicare and Jean’s federal disability checks didn’t.
Stephen Kay ended up taking a federal job in Fargo, North Dakota, forcing him to commute back and forth to North Platte for three years until Jean turned 65 and could obtain a private “Medigap” policy in October 2021.
LB 32 called for requiring Nebraska health insurers offering Medigap to offer at least one type of policy for early Medicare recipients. Its original text also covered end-stage renal disease, which was dropped after negotiations with insurers to advance the rest.
The Banking, Insurance and Commerce Committee didn’t advance LB 32 in 2023. But Jacobson, a committee member, persuaded his colleagues this year to merge it with LB 852, which forbids durable medical equipment suppliers not participating in Medicare from charging unlimited prices to Medicare patients.
Jacobson’s merged bill had a smoother path than LB 1300. Named a priority bill by Speaker John Arch, it won 38-0 initial approval March 14, quickly advanced to final reading April 3 and received 46-0 final approval April 11.
Kay, who testified along with his wife at LB 32’s public hearing on Feb. 7, 2023, thanked Jacobson for his efforts in a brief email.
“I am glad disabled Nebraskans under age 65 will have the opportunity to purchase a Medigap plan,” he said.