washingtonscene
LEGISLATIVE NEWS THAT AFFECTS YOU Take Action NDAA to Pass?
The House and Senate voted to approve the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), authorizing $618.7 billion in defense spending, in early December 2016.
thorization Act (NDAA) with a vote of 92-7; the House passed it one week prior with a vote of 375-34. The bill’s next stop was the desk of President Barack Obama. The House and Senate Armed Servic- es committees proposed increasing the NDAA by $3.2 billion over what Obama requested. The extra funds would be used to boost servicemember pay by 2.1 percent this year, up from the 1.6-percent raise Obama proposed. The NDAA included several other
A
measures for which MOAA has lob- bied. In addition to boosting the pay raise, lawmakers stripped out plans to disproportionately raise TRICARE fees. New officers or enlisted servicemembers likely will face larger TRICARE fees, but current servicemembers and retirees would be exempt if the bill is approved. If enacted, the NDAA would not change servicemembers’ basic allowance for hous- ing benefits. The original proposal would have left servicemembers sharing the same housing with just a fraction of their hous- ing allowance, depending on how many other servicemembers lived there. No new changes were being proposed for housing allowances in FY 2017. The NDAA also would extend the
Special Survivor Indemnity Allowance until May 2018 at the current rate of $310 a month.
s of press time, the Senate had just overwhelmingly approved
the FY 2017 National Defense Au-
Additionally, the bill proposed halting personnel drawdowns. It would add 16,000 more soldiers, raising the Army’s end strength in FY 2017 to 476,000; 3,000 more Marines, raising the Corps’ end strength to 185,000; and 4,000 more airmen, increasing the size of the Air Force to 321,000. If ultimately approved, the NDAA
also would provide resources for the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and to deter further Russian ag- gression in Europe. Col. Dan Merry, USAF (Ret), MOAA’s
vice president of Government Relations, is pleased Congress had time to vote on the NDAA and send the bill to the presi- dent before the end of 2016. “We appreciate the magnitude of ef-
fort by the Armed Services committee members,” Merry says. “Even in this tough fiscal environment, they found a way to treat military people fairly.”
Arlington Full?
The iconic cemetery might not be your final resting place.
F
or veterans of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, not even a Medal of Honor could guarantee a
spot in Arlington National Cemetery (ANC). Over the past several months, the Advi- sory Committee on ANC has been dis- cussing how to address capacity.
JANUARY 2017 MILITARY OFFICER 29
Visit
capwiz.com/moaa/ home to send your legislators a MOAA- suggested message on key issues affecting the military community.
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