Description:
As ordered reported by the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs on July 11, 2012
H.R. 5747 would reduce direct spending by extending for one month an expiring provision of law that limits pensions paid to certain veterans who are receiving Medicaid coverage in a Medicaid-approved nursing home.
The bill also would delay foreclosures on mortgages of certain military servicemembers, retirees, and surviving spouses of servicemembers who die on active duty. Because some of those mortgages are guaranteed by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), implementing that provision would increase both direct spending and spending subject to appropriation.
The bill would impose new civil fines, which would increase revenues. In total, CBO estimates that enacting H.R. 5747 would have an insignificant net effect on the deficit over the 2013-2022 period. Implementing the bill would increase spending subject to appropriation by $1 million over the 2013-2017 period, assuming appropriation of the necessary amounts.
Pay-as-you-go procedures apply because enacting the legislation would affect direct spending and revenues.
The bill would impose intergovernmental and private-sector mandates as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA) by adding and expanding protections for servicemembers under the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA). CBO estimates that the costs to public and private entities of complying with the mandates would be small and would not exceed the thresholds established in UMRA for intergovernmental and private-sector mandates ($73 million and $146 million in 2012, respectively, adjusted annually for inflation).
