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Filner: Pay living stipend for online courses

The question of whether the new Post-9/11 GI Bill should pay living stipends to people who take online college classes through distance learning programs pits the Veterans Affairs Department against a key lawmaker — and also has divided two major veterans groups.

It is a disagreement that poses a challenge for Congress as it considers whether to change the law in advance of the program’s Aug. 1 launch date.

Under current law, the new GI Bill will not pay living stipends to distance-learning students. To qualify for the stipend, a person must have at least one class in a regular classroom and carry a credit load that makes him at least a half-time student.

Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, said that approach “penalizes hard-working veterans.”

Filner is sponsoring a bill, HR 950, that would make distance learning students eligible for the stipend, just like other college students.

“I truly believe we will be doing a disservice to our rural veterans, injured veterans and veterans with family commitments by providing a distinction between those who attend a brick-and-mortar classroom versus those who study at home and take their tests on a computer,” Filner said at a March 4 hearing of his committee’s economic opportunity panel.

Under Filner’s bill, distance learning students would receive a living stipend based on the military’s basic allowance for housing in the ZIP code where the distance learning school is based. Living stipends for people attending a regular college or university would be based on the BAH for the ZIP code of the school they attend.

VA opposes Filner’s bill. Keith Wilson, director of VA’s education service, said giving a housing allowance to someone who is training at home or work “does not seem to meet the intent of a housing subsidy for veterans who travel to attend an institution of higher learning.”

Wilson said such a change also would add an estimated $20 million in 2010 and $1.5 billion over 10 years to the cost of the Post-9/11 GI Bill.

“In view of this cost and because BAH rates based on the location of a school bear no relationship to the cost of living associated with the locality where an individual may reside, VA opposes this bill,” Wilson told lawmakers.

The American Legion, the nation’s largest veterans group, supports Filner’s bill. Mark Walker, assistant director of the Legion’s economic commission, said “paying veterans a lesser benefit when they receive credit via distance learning is a concern.”

Walker noted that about 70 percent of active-duty members using the Defense Department’s tuition assistance program are receiving credit through distance learning courses, with a similar shift likely to come in veterans’ education benefits.

But Veterans of Foreign Wars, the nation’s largest group of combat veterans, sides with VA.

Justin Brown, a legislative associate with VFW’s National Legislative Service, said Filner’s bill would create an inequity by paying living stipends that are not based on actual costs that veterans would face while going to school.

“This would overcompensate veterans living in areas more affordable than the ZIP code of their school, while undercompensating veterans that live in more expensive areas relative to their school,” he said.