HJR 10 Summary

• Alaska Legislature urges Congress to provide adequate funding for the Veterans Health Administration using methods similar to the Veterans Health Care Budget Reform and Transparency Act of 2009, which allows two-fiscal-year budget authority and requires study of baseline projections for veterans' health care expenditures

• Alaska Legislature urges Congress to ensure sufficient, timely, and predictable funding for VA health care programs and to make services accessible to veterans where they live and work rather than requiring veterans to travel to find services

• Alaska Legislature urges Congress to increase funding for traumatic brain injury research and to improve the VA's electronic claims filing process and use of military records information

• Alaska Legislature supports federal and state funding to expand veteran access to health care through community health centers, mental health centers, substance abuse treatment centers, tribal health organizations, and local providers in areas without VA clinics

• Resolution addresses the specific concern that rural Alaskan veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq wars have limited access to earned VA benefits, with Alaska Native health systems and community health centers providing unreimbursed care