Copyright 1995 by National Clearinghouse for Legal Services, Inc. All rights reserved. At A Glance

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2 Copyright 1995 by National Clearinghouse for Legal Services, Inc. All rights reserved At A Glance Continuing strain within the claims adjudication system of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has brought the system near to breakdown. Thirty-nine thousand cases are backlogged at the agency's Board of Veterans' Appeals, and adjudication of an original claim can take more than 200 days. VA is under pressure from Congress, which has passed several pieces of legislation designed to improve the agency's claims procedures; further legislative attention can be expected. Other recent developments include a decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that limits the types of final agency claims decisions that can be challenged on the ground of clear and unmistakable error and the United States Court of Veterans Appeals,' holding that VA administrative proceedings on remand are not part of a civil action for purposes of the EAJA. This article examines: the systematic breakdown of the VA's claims adjudication system; challenges to prior, final administrative denials under exceptions to the general rule that claims that have been finally denied by VA cannot be relitigated and granted; the continued refusal of the Court of Veterans Appeals to award attorneys fees under the EAJA; changes in the regulations on compensation for Agent Orange claims; LSC's pro bono program at the Court of Veterans Appeals, and; legislative developments on obtaining compensation for veterans disabled after the Persian Gulf war. The coming year should bring continuing efforts to reform the VA's adjudication process and the promulgation of regulations governing disability compensation for Persian Gulf war veterans.

3 By the National Veterans Legal Services Project Veterans' Law Developments This article was written by the staff of the National Veterans Legal Services Project, 2001 S Street, N.W., Suite 610, Washington, D.C , (202) , (202) (Fax). I. Systemic Breakdown in the Adjudication of VA Claims It was to be expected that the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) would have some difficulty accommodating itself to judicial review under the Veterans' Judicial Review Act of /1/ It takes time to reform any bureaucracy, especially one that had been exempt from judicial supervision for more than five decades. However, it is now clear that the VA's claims adjudication system -- highly decentralized, staffed at the origination level by non-attorneys, and handling hundreds of thousands of claims a year -- was fundamentally unprepared for change. The VA's current problems are worse than difficult. The agency's claims system is in crisis, with a backlog of 39,000 cases at the Board of Veterans' Appeals (BVA) /2/ and long delays in claim adjudications at the regional offices (which serve as the agencies of original jurisdiction, or AOJ, for veterans' benefits claims). In February 1993, it took 185 days to adjudicate an original compensation claim; in February 1994, it took 216 days. /3/ Contrary to statutory requirements, two types of errors -- the BVA's failure to provide reasons and bases for its decisions /4/ and the regional offices' failure to assist claimants properly in the development of their claims /5/ -- are known to have contributed to a relatively high proportion of the claims being remanded by the United States Court of Veterans Appeals (CVA) to the BVA and by the BVA to the regional offices. These remand rates remain near 50 percent. Some observers (with the exceptions of Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jesse Brown, VA General Counsel Mary Lou Keener, BVA Chairman Charles L. Cragin, and a few others) think that VA has not fully accepted the fact of judicial review. As a result, recent cases show the same errors as early cases, and considerable time and resources are wasted in repeated correction. Senator Jay Rockefeller, chair of the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs, noted this past March that the CVA "has repeatedly held that VA has not fulfilled its duty to assist the claimant in the development of the claim, has often failed to give the claimant the benefit of the doubt, and has failed to provide claimants with an adequate explanation for its denials." /6/ The nature of these mistakes -- they contravene explicit statutory duties and require a fair amount of effort to repair -- points to serious flaws in the adjudication process at the regional office level. The BVA has therefore altered its practice; it is now critically examining appealed claims in light of the CVA's precedents and remanding unlawfully decided claims to the regional offices. Although this should help educate VA adjudicators on the need to meet the VA's legal duties to claimants, it will not ease the claims backlog at the BVA or the long adjudication delays in the regional offices. However, there have been efforts to do both. For example, in July 1994, President Clinton signed the Board of Veterans' Appeals Administrative Procedures Improvement Act of

4 1994. /7/ The act lifts the current limit (65) on the number of BVA members, changes the minimum number of panel members from three to one, and adopts other reforms intended to make maximal use of the BVA's resources. Under continued pressure from Congress, VA managers have taken a number of steps to try to reduce claims backlogs in the regional offices. It is clear that some of these efforts are sincere attempts to avert a gathering crisis; others seem prompted by desperation. The New York regional office, for example, has been experimenting with a work-team approach (akin to case management) to claims processing, but so far the experiment has not seemed successful -- workload has apparently gone up and production down. /8/ Regional VA directors have also redirected claims away from the most seriously overburdened offices and encouraged regional offices to rate on only partial evidence of record, to defer issues in need of further development, and to suspend quality reviews; that is, essentially, to stop checking the accuracy of individual adjudicators' work. /9/ To many veterans' advocates, this emphasis on quantity and disregard for quality is all too familiar; it is, in fact, one of the problems that the CVA was founded to correct. Current pressures on VA are unlikely to be reduced any time soon. VA has promised the Office of Management and Budget to improve the time it takes to adjudicate a variety of claims; for example, it has promised to reduce the time needed to adjudicate an original compensation-benefits claim from 181 days in 1993 to 106 days by This commitment was part of an agreement that cleared the way for a $200 million appropriation to VA for new computer equipment to speed claims handling. In March 1994, Representative John Conyers noted that the time it takes to adjudicate claims has gone up, not down, and asked for a General Accounting Office (GAO) investigation. /10/ GAO has begun an inquiry that was continuing at the time this article was written. It is clear that the VA claims adjudication system is floundering. In its closing days, the 103rd Congress passed the Veterans' Benefits Improvement Act of 1994, /11/ which will, among other measures, set up an independent commission to study the VA claims adjudication system. Further legislative attention can be expected once the results are in. II. Challenges to Prior, "Finally" Denied Claims As detailed in last year's annual review of poverty law, /12/ the VA claims adjudication system contains several significant exceptions to the general rule that a claim for veterans' benefits that has been finally denied by the VA cannot subsequently be relitigated and granted. /13/ One of the exceptions to this finality rule involves previous final administrative denials that contain clear and unmistakable error (CUE). This exception is contained in a long-standing VA regulation that provides disappointed claimants with the right to file at any time a claim for revision of a previous final VA denial on the ground that the final denial contains CUE. /14/ This regulation requires VA to consider the CUE allegation on the merits, and, if VA concludes that CUE exists, it must revise the final denial to correct the error.

5 Although the CVA has defined CUE narrowly, so that it is relatively difficult to win such a claim, /15/ it is nevertheless a valuable right for the millions of veterans and their dependents whose claims for benefits have been finally denied by VA over the past decades. Success on a CUE claim can require VA to pay decades worth of retroactive VA benefits. /16/ In 1994, the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit dealt past VA claimants a blow by limiting the types of final VA decisions that are subject to challenge on grounds of CUE. Reversing an interpretation of the VA's CUE regulation to which the CVA had earlier agreed en banc, /17/ the Federal Circuit concluded that prior final decisions of the BVA are beyond the reach of the CUE regulation. /18/ This means that only prior final decisions of the agencies of original jurisdiction (in most cases, the VA's regional offices) can be revised based on CUE. Claimants who have received prior final BVA decisions still retain an avenue for changing these prior decisions through a motion with the BVA for reconsideration. This motion can be filed at any time after the final BVA denial /19/ and the grounds for reconsideration include one, an obvious error of fact or law, /20/ which is similar to CUE. However, as the Federal Circuit pointed out, the BVA is not obligated to reach the merits of any claim of obvious error contained in a motion for reconsideration. /21/ Equally significant is that judicial review is rarely available if a motion for BVA reconsideration based on obvious error is rejected. /22/ III. Equal Access to Justice Act The past year saw a continuation of the CVA's unwillingness to award attorney fees to prevailing parties under the EAJA. /23/ Although it has been two years since Congress amended the EAJA to make clear that it applies to CVA cases, the court has yet to award EAJA attorney fees in a single case. In the most significant EAJA case of the past year, the CVA held that VA administrative proceedings on remand from the Court are not part of the civil action pending in court, and thus representation in such proceedings is not compensable under the EAJA. /24/ The same case held that whenever a CVA appellant obtains a court-ordered remand, EAJA's "prevailing party" requirement is satisfied. The CVA has also provided some guidance as to when it will consider the position of the United States to be "substantially justified," adopting a test that echoes the one adopted by the Supreme Court in Pierce v. Underwood. /25/ In addition, the veterans' court has noted that the requirements for adjudication of VA claims have gradually become more stringent as a result of judicial review. It has suggested that it will not find VA unreasonable when it fails to follow requirements that had not been established at the time of a BVA decision. The court has also suggested that it will not find VA unreasonable if it makes a good-faith argument in a case of first impression, even if the court rejects VA's argument. /26/ There were two other significant EAJA decisions by the CVA during the past year. In Cook v. Brown, the court held that nonattorney practitioners who represent claimants in the CVA without attorney supervision may not recover fees under EAJA. /27/ Addressing retroactivity, the CVA also

6 held in Jones v. Brown that the 1992 law applying the EAJA to the CVA does not cover cases that had been decided on the merits, with only an attorney fee application pending on the 1992 law's date of enactment. /28/ IV. Agent Orange In 1994, Vietnam veterans and their survivors began receiving significant amounts of retroactive and prospective benefits for disabilities and deaths that VA now recognizes to be connected with exposure during military service in Vietnam to herbicides containing dioxin, the toxic contaminant in Agent Orange. First, VA amended its regulations to add seven diseases to the list of illnesses that VA will presume are service connected due to exposure to dioxin: multiple myeloma (a cancer involving the bone marrow and skeletal system); cancer of the lung, larynx, trachea, or bronchus; Hodgkin's disease; and porphyria cutanea tarda (or PCT, a liver illness). /29/ These regulations provide that if a veteran who served in Vietnam develops multiple myeloma or Hodgkin's disease, no matter how many years have expired since discharge from military service, the veteran qualifies for service-connected disability compensation if the disease is disabling to a degree of 10 percent or more. Vietnam veterans also qualify for service-connected disability payments if they develop cancer of the lung, bronchus, larynx, or trachea to a degree of 10 percent or more within 30 years after the date of the last exposure to herbicides while in military service. With regard to PCT, a veteran will qualify for benefits if the illness develops to a degree of 10 percent or more within one year after the date of his or her last exposure to herbicides while in military service. Survivors of Vietnam veterans who qualify for compensation under these rules and die of the service-connected disease are entitled to service-connected death benefits. Second, VA agreed to highly favorable rules regarding entitlement to retroactive benefits. To implement the final stipulation and order in Nehmer v. U.S. Veterans Administration, /30/ VA issued a circular providing that for all diseases based on herbicide exposure that VA has now accepted as presumptively service connected, /31/ payments will generally be made retroactive to the date of the claim, or the date of the disability or death, whichever is later. /32/ The new retroactivity policy applies to claims filed after, or pending on, September 25, the date on which the regulations successfully challenged in Nehmer went into effect. Only claims filed and finally denied before September 25, 1985 are excluded from these favorable retroactivity rules. VA estimates that over the next five years more than $350 million in disability and death benefits will be distributed based on exposure to Agent Orange. On the other side of the ledger, the Secretary of Veterans Affairs (Secretary) officially determined, in a Federal Register notice on January 4, 1994, that 20 conditions will not be presumptively service connected based on exposure to dioxin-containing herbicides. These conditions are: prostate cancer; peripheral neuropathy; hepatobiliary cancers; bone cancers; female reproductive cancers; renal cancers; testicular cancer; leukemia; abnormal sperm parameters and infertility; cognitive and neuropsychiatric disorders; motor/coordination dysfunction; metabolic and digestive disorders; immune system disorders; circulatory disorders; respiratory disorders (other than lung cancer); nasal/nasopharyngeal cancer; skin cancer; gastrointestinal tumors; bladder cancer; brain tumors; and "any other condition for

7 which the Secretary has not specifically determined a presumption of service connection is warranted." /33/ The Secretary determined that the conditions listed above did not meet the standard for presumptive service connection provided for in the Agent Orange Act of /34/ That standard requires that "the credible evidence for the association [be] equal to or outweigh the credible evidence against the association." /35/ In response to the Federal Register notice, a Vietnam veteran and the widows of three Vietnam veterans, all represented by the National Veterans Legal Services Project, filed a petition for review in the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In Lefevre v. Secretary of Veterans Affairs, the petitioners challenge the Secretary's decisions on several cancers: prostate cancer (the prostate is a chestnut-shaped body that surrounds the beginning of the male urethra), hepatobiliary cancer (cancer of the liver and the bile or biliary ducts), and nasal or nasopharyngeal cancer (cancer of the nose or nasal cavity and the pharynx, which is the upper expanded portion of the digestive tube). /36/ V. LSC's Pro Bono Program at the Court of Veterans Appeals Since the CVA opened its doors, appellants have had a problem securing advocates to represent them before the court. During fiscal year 1990, 769 (or 61 percent) of the 1,261 VA claimants who filed a notice of appeal did not have a representative when their appeals were initiated. The percentage of appeals filed by appellants without a representative has increased with time, leaping from 67.4 to 75 percent between fiscal years 1991 and During fiscal years 1993 and 1994, the pro se rate increased even further, to 82.5 percent and 80.0 percent, respectively. /37/ Although the number of members of the court's bar has steadily increased (there were 1,006 attorneys and 47 nonattorney members as of May 31, 1994), relatively few of these advocates regularly accept cases for representation before the court. /38/ Since 1992, LSC has come to the rescue of these unrepresented appellants by organizing and administering a comprehensive pro bono program. /39/ This program, known as the Veterans' Consortium Pro Bono Program, has proven to be a great success. Volunteer attorneys were trained and assigned to represent 229 appellants in fiscal year 1993 and 187 appellants in fiscal year Congress recently appropriated funds for a third year of operation. The program has two components. The outreach and education component recruits attorneys to represent pro se appellants on a pro bono basis and provides free training to volunteers. /40/ A fullday training program is periodically held in Washington, D.C. /41/ When a case is placed, the volunteer is provided with a free copy of the National Veterans Legal Services Project's Veterans Benefits Manual. The case evaluation and placement component screens cases for financial eligibility and relative merit and then places those that satisfy these criteria with attorneys. /42/ Each referral is accompanied by a case-screening memorandum that discusses the facts and one or more of the legal issues.

8 Upon placement of the case, volunteer attorneys are provided comprehensive advisory services. They are assigned a veterans law specialist from the case evaluation and placement component and a mentoring attorney from the outreach and education component. Services include assistance with the court's procedures and rules of practice, advice on researching veterans' law, help in formulating the best litigation strategy, sample briefs and other pleadings, review of draft briefs and motions, and assistance in preparing for oral argument. For VA claimants who have been denied complete relief by the BVA, the Veteran's Consortium Pro Bono Program, in effect, may be the last resort for securing representation. During the 120-day judicial appeal period, the program will not assist claimants seeking a representative to prosecute an appeal before the court. If a claimant subsequently files a notice of appeal without a representative, the court immediately sends the pro se appellant a list of the members of the court's bar, without reference to the pro bono program. This gives appellants an opportunity to engage a member of the court's bar. If an appearance has not been filed within 30 days from the date the notice of appeal was received, the court sends the appellant a notice describing the pro bono program and the forms necessary to request a pro bono representative. These requests are returned by the appellant to the case evaluation and placement component, which will respond only to requests for a pro bono representation that are generated from the court's notice. However, because there is no guarantee that the pro bono program will determine that a particular appeal satisfies financial eligibility and relative merit criteria, VA claimants cannot safely assume that their claims will ultimately be assigned to a volunteer attorney. VI. Compensation for Persian Gulf Veterans Approximately 700,000 U.S. troops served in the Persian Gulf war. Although few troops died on the battlefield in Southwest Asia, significant numbers of veterans have suffered a range of poorly explained symptoms since its end. The most frequent include chronic fatigue, joint pain, respiratory ailments, memory loss, rashes, hair loss, and gastrointestinal disorders. There has been no definitive diagnosis (or diagnoses) as of this writing for the complex of symptoms that has come to be known as Persian Gulf syndrome. Because Persian Gulf veterans were exposed to a variety of possibly or probably toxic substances, including the fumes and smoke from oil-well fires, paint, pesticides, depleted uranium, chemoprophylactic agents, vaccines, and conceivably chemical or biological warfare agents, there may be no single disease or syndrome, but rather multiple illnesses with common symptoms and multiple possible causes. Although diagnosis remains elusive, many veterans are clearly in need of both medical treatment and compensation for their disabilities. Medical and epidemiological research into Persian Gulf Syndrome is also needed if veterans are to receive adequate medical treatment. Congress has undertaken several legislative initiatives in response to these needs. Pursuant to the Persian Gulf War Veterans' Health Status Act, /43/ VA has established a Persian Gulf registry. A Gulf war veteran's name is to be added to the registry whenever he or she requests VA health benefits, compensation benefits, or a VA medical examination. Additionally, VA is required to provide these veterans with a medical examination and counseling on the results of such an

9 examination. VA is also charged with actively encouraging veterans to join the registry and with informing them of significant research developments on the health consequences of military service in the Persian Gulf. By the end of July 1994, the Persian Gulf registry contained 24,000 names. In 1993, Congress passed a law that requires VA to provide hospital and nursing home care on a priority basis to Persian Gulf veterans who the "Secretary finds may have been exposed while serving on active duty in the Southwest Asia theater of operations during the Persian Gulf War to a toxic substance or environmental hazard," even though "there is insufficient medical evidence to conclude that the disability may be associated with such exposure." /44/ Veterans are also entitled to reimbursement for any monies that had been paid to the United States for health care as a result of exposure to a toxic substance or environmental hazard. /45/ As part of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1995, signed by President Clinton on October 5, 1994, the Secretary of Defense is required to conduct several health studies, including epidemiological and clinical research, of Persian Gulf veterans and their families. /46/ The studies are being done in order to determine the nature of the illnesses suffered by these veterans and their family members, assess the extent to which they can be attributed to service in the Persian Gulf, and to identify appropriate medical treatment. The final action of the 103rd Congress with regard to Persian Gulf veterans was to authorize VA to pay disability benefits to Persian Gulf veterans suffering from a chronic disability resulting from an undiagnosed illness or combination of illnesses. /47/ This legislation was a reaction to the position taken by Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jesse Brown -- that although he himself empathized with Persian Gulf veterans, VA had no legal authority to compensate those who suffered from undiagnosed illnesses. Under the Persian Gulf War Veterans' Benefits Act, Secretary Brown is required to prescribe regulations in 1995 that identify the illnesses for which compensation will be paid and set the latency period (after discharge from military service) within which each qualifying illness must become manifest if the veteran is to be entitled to disability compensation. Footnotes /1/ Veterans' Judicial Review Act of 1988, Pub. L. No , 102 Stat /2/ BVA Chairman Charles L. Cragin gave this figure at a meeting with veterans' service representatives on January 13, See Growing BVA Backlog Will Delay Many Appeals, The Veterans Advocate (National Veterans Legal Services Project (NVLSP), Washington, D.C.), Jan. -- Feb. 1994, at 46. /3/ Memorandum from George Wolohojian, Director of Budget and Finance, to the Associate Deputy Secretary for Budget, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (Apr. 15, 1994). /4/ 38 U.S.C. Sec. 7104(d). /5/ 38 U.S.C. Sec. 5107(a).

10 /6/ Transcript of remarks accompanying the introduction of S. 1904, S. 1905, S. 1906, S. 1907, and S. 1908, 140 Cong. Rec. S2503 (daily ed. Mar. 8, 1994). /7/ Board of Veterans' Appeals Administrative Procedures Improvement Act of 1994, Pub. L. No , 108 Stat /8/ Veterans Benefits Admin., U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs, New York Analysis: FY 1994 (1994). /9/ See Claims Backlog Puts VA in Crisis, 5 Veterans Advocate 94 (1994). /10/ Id. /11/ Veterans' Benefits Improvements Act of 1994, Pub. L. No , 108 Stat /12/ See Veterans' Law Developments, 27 Clearinghouse Rev. 1113, (Jan. 1994). /13/ The general rule is set forth at 38 U.S.C. Secs. 7104(b), 7105(c), and 38 C.F.R. Sec.3.104(a). /14/ See 38 C.F.R. Sec (a). /15/ Caffrey v. Brown, 6 Vet. App. 377 (1994); Fugo v. Brown, 6 Vet. App. 40 (1993), review and reconsideration denied, 6 Vet. App. 162 (1994); Russell v. Principi, 3 Vet. App. 310 (1992) (en banc). /16/ See, e.g., Bentley v. Derwinski, 1 Vet. App. 28 (1990) (finding CUE in a final VA decision rendered 30 years earlier, resulting in three decades of retroactive benefits). /17/ See Russell v. Principi, 3 Vet. App. 310 (1992). /18/ Smith v. Brown, 35 F.3d 1516 (Fed. Cir. 1994). /19/ See Perez v. Derwinski, 2 Vet. App. 149, 150 (1992); Rosler v. Derwinski, 1 Vet. App. 241, 249 (1991); 38 C.F.R. Sec (b). /20/ 38 C.F.R. Sec /21/ Smith, 35 F.3d /22/ The jurisdiction of the Court of Veterans Appeals (CVA) is limited to review of BVA decisions that are preceded by a "notice of disagreement" that was filed on or after November 18, U.S.C. Sec note. When a motion is filed for reconsideration of a final BVA decision rendered before November 18, 1988, the notice of disagreement will necessarily have been filed before November 18, See generally Michael E. Wildhaber, et al., Veterans Benefits Manual: An Advocate's Guide to Representing Veterans and Their Dependents Sec.6.4 (1991 ed., Supp.

11 ). Accordingly, the CVA will not have jurisdiction over denials of motion for reconsideration of BVA decisions rendered before November 18, 1988, as well as some BVA decisions rendered after that date. /23/ 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2412(d). /24/ Stillwell v. Brown, 6 Vet. App. 291 (1994), reconsideration denied, 6 Vet. App. 516 (1994). /25/ Pierce v. Underwood, 487 U.S. 552, 565 (1988) (Clearinghouse No. 18,186). /26/ Stillwell, 6 Vet. App. at 303. /27/ Cook v. Brown, 6 Vet. App. 226 (1994). /28/ Jones v. Brown, 6 Vet. App. 101 (1993). /29/ See Disease Associated with Exposure to Certain Herbicide Agents, 59 Fed. Reg (June 9, 1994) (amending 38 C.F.R. Secs , with regard to multiple myeloma and cancers of the lung, bronchus, larynx, and trachea); Disease Associated with Exposure to Certain Herbicide Agents, 59 Fed. Reg (Feb. 3, 1994) (amending 38 C.F.R. Secs , with regard to Hodgkin's disease and PCT). /30/ Nehmer v. U.S. Veterans Admin., Civ. No. C (TEH), (N.D. Cal. May 20, 1991) (Clearinghouse No. 44,691). Nehmer was a class action litigated by the NVLSP in which a California district court struck down the VA's Agent Orange compensation regulations. See 712 F. Supp (N.D. Cal. 1989). /31/ These diseases are the seven illnesses identified above, plus chloracne (a skin condition) and two additional cancers -- soft tissue sarcomas and non-hodgkin's lymphoma. /32/ Veterans Benefits Administration, U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs, Circular (Feb. 15, 1994). /33/ Disease Not Associated with Exposure to Certain Herbicide Agents, 59 Fed. Reg. 341 (Jan. 4, 1994). /34/ Agent Orange Act of 1991, Pub.L. No , sec. 2(a)(1), Sec.316, 105 Stat. 11 (codified at 38 U.S.C. Sec.1116). /35/ Disease Not Associated with Exposure to Certain Herbicide Agents, 59 Fed. Reg. at 342. /36/ Lefevre v. Secretary of Veterans Affairs, No (Fed. Cir. Mar. 7, 1994). /37/ U.S. Ct. Vet. App. Caseflow Rep. (Sept. 30, 1994). /38/ U.S. Ct. Vet. App. Caseflow Rep. (May 31, 1994).

12 /39/ In 1991, the CVA requested that Congress transfer to the LSC part of the court's fiscal year 1992 appropriation so that LSC could administer a grant program to provide pro bono representation of some limited-income pro se appellants. Congress quickly enacted legislation to accomplish this result. Pub. L. No , ch. II, 105 Stat. 1702, 1710 (1992). Subsequent appropriations authorized the expenditure of the funds originally transferred to LSC through September 30, Pub. L. No , tit. V, 106 Stat. 1117, 1129 (1992). In September 1992, in order to implement this legislation, LSC entered into a grant agreement with a consortium of four organizations -- the American Legion, the Disabled American Veterans, the NVLSP, and the Paralyzed Veterans of America -- to operate the pro bono program. /40/ The offices for Outreach and Education are located at 2001 S. Street, N.W., Suite 510, Washington, D.C (Phone: 202/ ). /41/ A videotape of the training is available to attorneys who are unable to attend. /42/ The offices for Case Evaluation and Placement are located at 601 Indiana Avenue, N.W., Suite 1010, Washington, D.C /43/ 38 U.S.C. Sec. 527 note. /44/ 38 U.S.C. Secs. 1710(a)(1)(C), 1710(e)(1)(c) (as amended by Pub. L. No , secs. 1(a), 1(c)(2), 107 Stat. 2496, 2497 (1993)). /45/ 38 U.S.C. Sec note (Reimbursement of veterans for prior care). Veterans may be reimbursed for payments made under sections 1710(f) or 1712(f) for hospital or nursing home care, and for outpatient services, if they were incurred prior to December 20, Id. /46/ Pub. L. No , Secs. 721, 722, 108 Stat (1994). /47/ Veterans' Benefits Improvements Act of 1994, Pub. L. No , tit. I, 108 Stat