hi I'm Christine Clemens and I'm an attorney at Chisholm Chisholm in Kilpatrick today I'm
going to talk about a recent letter uh the American Federation of government employees
sent to Congress regarding the hiring practices for veterans law judges at the board of veterans
appeals the American Federation of government employees or afge is an American labor union
representing around 700 000 employees of the federal government on December 1st 2022 the
afge sent Congress a letter expressing concern over the way that bva hires veterans law judges
or vljs and asked Congress for assistance in resolving the issue to ensure fairer hiring
practices more timely decisions from the board and an overall improved experience for veterans
specifically the letter focuses on the change in hiring requirements for veterans law judges
in the past vlj applicants needed to have a minimum of seven years experience in veterans
law ensuring they were all well-versed in VA regulations ever-changing case law from
the court of appeals for veterans claims and more however in February 2020 this seven year
requirement was eliminated from the vlj hiring criteria this meant vljs with no veterans law
experience could be hired since the summer of 2021 over 85 percent of vljs hired at the
board of veterans appeals have zero experience in veterans law data shows that inexperienced
vljs have issued significantly fewer decisions than those with seven plus years of experience
for example 13 inexperienced vljs issued an average of one to six decisions per week in 2021
while more experienced vljs issued between 13 and 26 decisions per week based on these figures the
inexperienced vljs will likely issue approximately 3432 decisions compared to their experienced
counterparts who will issue approximately 14 872 decisions this is a staggering difference of over
11 000 decisions which which represents more than 10 percent of the board's annual output the letter
also notes that experienced vljs are now being asked to train their new colleagues in addition to
their numerous other duties even board attorneys are being asked to assist meaning they're training
their own supervisors this conflicts with the board's long-standing policy that vljs
are charged with training and mentoring attorneys these practices are demoralizing to experienced
vljs and board attorneys who spent years studying veterans law this may affect the board's ability
to retain quality employees and these practices even prompted a group of experienced vljs to
write their own letter to cck highlighting these issues check out our video to learn more
ultimately veterans are the most negatively impacted by these practices inexperienced
judges without proper training will continue to issue fewer decisions meaning veterans will be
forced to wait even longer for the hard-earned VA benefits they and their families depend on we will
continue to keep you informed as the situation unfolds so stay tuned thanks for tuning in