In mid-September 2003, Linnie Blankenbecler kissed her husband
goodbye.
Fresh from the sergeants major academy at Fort Bliss, Command
Sgt. Maj. James D. Blankenbecler was headed to Iraq to assume
the top noncommissioned officer slot with his new unit, the 4th
Infantry Division’s 1st Battalion, 44th Air Defense Artillery
Regiment.
Just days later, Linnie opened the door to the couple’s Fort
Hood home. The soldiers standing before her gave her the dreaded
news: the 40-year-old Arlington, Va., native had been killed
Oct. 1, 2003, during an ambush on his convoy in Samarra.
Fort Hood’s military and civilian communities filled the
Killeen Civic and Conference Center for his funeral service.
Classmates from Shoemaker High School lined the road as Linnie
and her youngest daughter, Jessica, drove to the service.
In the initial weeks after a soldier’s death, Linnie and other
families like her received an outpouring of support amid the
bureaucracy that follows.
The initial payments appear to ensure the loved ones left behind
are well-provided for. But the families of soldiers killed in
Iraq and Afghanistan are finding their military benefits quickly
dwindle once faced with today’s cost of living.
On Tuesday, April 12, 2005 about 30 of those families took their
case to the highest office in the land.
Linnie and Jessica were among the 90 relatives of Fort Hood’s
146 fallen soldiers who laid out the shortcomings to President
Bush, behind closed doors, during his visit to Fort Hood.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the families’
concerns received a sympathetic ear from Bush.
“We did make some notes of the concerns that they expressed,
and we will be following up on those,” he told pool reporters
traveling with the president.
McClellan declined to offer specifics, citing privacy issues;
however, Linnie and Inge Colton, the widow of Chief Warrant
Officer-2 Lawrence “Shane” Colton, who was killed April 11,
2004, in Baghdad, said finances and the military’s handling of
their cases were key issues aired before the president.
“I told the president that my husband believed his family
would be taken care of, only to find out that’s not what
happened,” said Inge during an interview Thursday. “He said
I wasn’t the first widow to address this with him.”
Linnie said the president and Fort Hood’s top commander, Lt.
Gen. Thomas Metz, both appeared concerned and even surprised by
what they were hearing. She believes steps are being taken to
remedy some of the issues because the next day she received a
telephone call from Andrew Card, the White House chief of staff.
“President Bush did tell me that if I had any concerns I could
go to General Metz with this,” Linnie added. “He asked me
did I bring this up with General Metz and I said, ‘No, you’re
the man.’”
Since her husband’s death, Linnie has remained in the Fort
Hood area while Jessica completes her time at Shoemaker High
School. Days after James died, Linnie received the OK to remain
in post housing until the end of Jessica’s school year but
moved after she had to pay $899 for rent on those quarters, the
equivalent of what had been her husband’s housing allowance.
In the days after the tragic news, Linnie received a $12,420
death gratuity to help with immediate expenses. The
government-subsidized Soldier Group Life Insurance plan paid
another $250,000.
But not everyone gets that.
“SGLI insurance is a soldier-elected benefit, bought and paid
for with monthly premiums by the soldier,” Linnie said. “Many
surviving spouses did not receive this SGLI insurance because
the soldier elected not to pay for it, and decided it was not
needed. This is not a government benefit, but a conscious choice
of the soldier.”
Monthly benefits also kicked in.
Linnie began receiving Social Security payments and a widow’s
pension from the military, which based on a percentage of her
husband’s final annual income, came to $1,961.44 a month until
Jessica turns 18.
Combined, the payments are nowhere near what the family had been
living on. Faced with new off-post housing expenses and taxes,
Linnie and other spouses whose soldiers have paid the ultimate
sacrifice are finding it tough to make ends meet.
“If my husband were alive today, his military base pay for
2005 would be $4,755 a month as a command sergeant major serving
22 years,” Linnie said. “That is $57,060 per year without
housing allowance, paid utilities, hazardous duty pay, etc.”
At the heart of the financial woes for the surviving spouses, is
the survivors benefit plan and the dependent indemnity
compensation.
Paid by the Department of Veterans Affairs, the dependent
compensation actually is subtracted from the survivor’s
benefit payments. It is a method similar to the disability
payments that have been docked from military retiree paychecks.
Under pressure from veterans groups, Congress last year began
phasing out the unpopular practice, dubbed “concurrent
receipt.”
In Linnie’s case, payments under the military’s survivors
plan dipped from 55 percent of her husband’s monthly base pay
of $4,566.25 to $1,961.44. The indemnity compensation payment
worth $993 has been subtracted from that, leaving her with a
survivors payment of $439. Added to the amount is $247 a month
for each child until they are 18 or until they finish college.
In Linnie’s case, Jessica will reach that cutoff two years
from now.
“In the beginning, you’re told you’re going to get that,
and get that, and get that and everybody forgets you’re going
to lose that, and that, and that,” she said.
“In two years’ time, I am expected to live on survivors
benefits of $993 for DIC and $439 for SBP, which don’t forget
— SBP of $439 represents his 20 years of military service,”
Linnie said. “That is a total monthly benefit of $1,432 or
$17,184 yearly income. From living on a command sergeant major
income of almost $50,000 in 2003, I am now expected to live on
$17,184 per year.”
Linnie said the survivor’s insurance also does not last long.
“If a widow lived within her budget, with a very conservative
amount of $30,000 a year or $2,500 per month, this SGLI
insurance of $250,000 would last only eight years,” she noted.
“Most widows are very young, with very young children and tiny
babies. In eight years, their children could still be in
elementary or middle school and SGLI would be gone if not
properly invested.”
Even Social Security payments are not a lifetime benefit, Linnie
said.
“When a child reaches the age of 16, the widow loses her
Social Security,” Linnie noted. “For me, as an older widow
with a 15-year-old child, this happens in six months.”
The children’s portion of the Social Security also ends once
they are 18.
Facing her new reality, Linnie said she abandoned her goal of
returning to Hawaii, a place where she and James had been so
happy.
“I don’t think that’s possible,” she said, her eyes cast
downward for a moment. “It takes a lot to live in Hawaii. I’m
not going to go there to kill myself financially.”
Instead, she has bought a house in Harker Heights and is careful
about her plans for the future.
Despite the shortfalls, lawmakers faced with record federal
deficits have been slow to respond despite the favorable wartime
tide in favor of boosting pay and benefits for military
personnel and veterans.
The death gratuity last was addressed in 2003 when it was
doubled from $6,000 to $12,420. Still, it remains a paltry sum,
say some lawmakers, when compared to payouts to police officers,
which range from $40,000 to $100,000.
Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., and Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., are
sponsoring a bill to increase the instant death gratuity payment
for troops killed in combat zones from $12,420 to $100,000.
However, that would not cover seven of Fort Hood’s 4th
Infantry families whose soldiers were killed in a Nov. 29 Black
Hawk helicopter crash in Central Texas while preparing for the
division’s scheduled return to Iraq.
The bill also calls for raising the payout from the subsidized
Serviceman’s Group Life Insurance to $400,000 from the current
$250,000. It is one of the more generous on the table.
“Every soldier who goes into harm’s way needs to know that
if something happens to him or her, his family will be well-
taken care of. I know the American people share that view,”
Sessions said, as he introduced the bill earlier this year. “This
is a large raising of the death benefits, but it’s well within
reason, and we’re in a time in which $100,000 is not near what
it used to be. But that’s a good step forward for the basic
death benefit.”
The Pentagon in February backed the plan, unveiling its own
measure to boost the insurance payment to $500,000. The Pentagon
is wanting the death benefit increases to apply to all soldiers
who die in the line of duty. However, the military’s increased
payments would be made retroactive to Oct. 7, 2001. That is when
the Afghanistan war began, but it leaves out the families of the
Sept. 11, 2001, Pentagon casualties who watched payments to
their New York counterparts average $2 million.
Sessions said his measure would cost about $460 million in the
first year, including some $280 million in retroactive benefits.
Linnie said the proposal is long overdue.
“I personally thank Senator Sessions, President Bush and all
those involved, for finally realizing how insulting the
survivors benefits really are to date,” she said. “This
increase is a step in the right direction and will help to
ensure that we have a better chance at surviving after our
spouses were killed at war.”
Campaigning for change, Linnie and Inge both say any remedy is
unlikely to help them. Still, they say it is important not to
give up for the families who may one day walk in their shoes.
“It is not the money issue, it is the principle issue. Honor
what you say,” Linnie said.
The women said they are just looking for a little simplicity,
fairness and the chance to review decisions about complex
financial options made during a time of grief.
“Give us the option at 24 months to review initial decisions
with a clear head,” Inge said. But most of all, she added, “get
rid of the offset,” the practice of docking the Veterans
Affairs payment from the survivors’ portion of their soldier’s
military pension.
And inform the soldiers and the families about what they can
expect.
“This needs to come out — your families are not going to be
taken care of 100 percent,” Inge said. “The 4th ID will be
leaving in a couple of months, so they need to be aware of it.
“They need to arrange for extra life insurance. They need to
go with their husbands to the briefings,” she said. “They
need to go with their husbands to get a will.”
More importantly, Linnie added, they must check those extra life
insurance policies for a military clause that would prevent
payout for a death either in the line of duty or in a combat
zone.
“I had one policy that did not pay,” Linnie said.
Contact Debbie Stevenson at deborah@kdhnews.com
