VA Loan Updates

NEW HAVEN — After being activated twice by the U.S. Army Reserve and serving in Iraq, John Deluz came home expecting to take advantage of the G.I. Bill as a student at Southern Connecticut State University.

But when Deluz decided to exercise his right to leave the Reserve, having fulfilled his minimum commitment of six years, he said his military superiors told him, “All of your education benefits cease as soon as you’re no longer on active (weekend) drilling.”

Meanwhile, Jack Mordente, SCSU’s director of veterans’ affairs, said he discovered that Deluz and thousands of others in his situation actually are entitled to have G.I. Bill benefits pay for their education.

Mordente studied a 2005 law enacting new G.I. Bill benefits that makes National Guard and Reserve members who return from war eligible for education payments similar to active duty troops.

Mordente, who is president of the National Association of Veterans Program Administrators, said he learned in May that many returning troops were getting wrong information about educational benefits to which they are entitled.

“My colleagues from other colleges around the country are reporting similar situations,” Mordente said.

Through discussions with Department of Veterans Affairs officials in Washington, Mordente said he confirmed these returning veterans could revert back to the original Reserve G.I. Bill. They can then use their remaining entitlement from that law for the number of months they were activated, plus four more months. Multiple periods of activation can be added together.

“State and unit-level military leaders and school veterans’ counselors don’t know the facts because the VA and the Department of Defense have not made the legal rights of these war veterans widely known,” Mordente said.

As a result of Mordente’s discovery, the VA changed its Web site to reflect correct information. But he maintained the Department of Defense has remained silent.

Keith Wilson, director of VA Education, said Monday that Mordente’s information was correct, which is why the Web site added the information.

“There’s probably never enough we can do to make people aware of the entire range of benefits they’re entitled to,” Wilson said. “We’re always trying to make people as aware as possible.” But he added, “We can do a better job of explaining in better detail.”

Wilson encouraged veterans to call 1-888-GI Bill 1 or visit the VA Web site: www.gibill.va.gov.

Bob Clark, assistant secretary of defense, deferred comment to the department’s office of public information spokesman, who did not return a call Monday.

Deluz, 25, of New Haven, said he was in the U.S. Army Reserve when he was activated in October 2001. He said he spent about a year stationed in this country.

Deluz was again activated in February 2003 and went to Kuwait and then Iraq. His obligation ended in December 2003.

But since he returned to SCSU, Deluz has paid about $4,000 per year in tuition and administration fees, with the state paying about $3,000 of that total. He has paid his own books and supplies costs, which he said the G.I. Bill should have covered, as well as tuition.

Now that Mordente has contacted Deluz and helped him with the detailed paperwork, Deluz said he should receive $10,000 or more in deferred compensation.

Asked how he feels about what he went through, Deluz said, “I’m very disappointed. This is another example in which programs for veterans are not being given to them, or are reluctantly given. We gave our service freely.”

“When I joined (the Reserve), they said they’d pay for my college,” Deluz noted. “I got cheated out of the bargain.”

He said he has worked two jobs for 34 months, paying tuition and his expenses.

“I felt let down,” he said. “I felt unimportant. It’s like they said, ‘You did your service, now go away.’”

Rick Scavetta of North Branford, who had enlisted with the U.S. Army Reserve, then went on active duty with the U.S. Army in Afghanistan, said he believes veterans in Deluz’ situation often are “given false information” about educational benefit entitlements because, “It keeps a unit deployed; they keep drilling.”

Scavetta added, “If it’s happening to a few of us here, it’s probably happening to thousands across the country.”

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