Confusion over MD National Guard BAH decision highlights
complex Title 32 COVID-19 rollout
3 hours ago
"Friday afternoon, Maryland National Guard officials told Miltiary Times they would not be authorizing increased housing allowance payments for troops responding to the coronavirus crisis. Hours later, however, they said the increase would merely be delayed.
The difference, they say, has to do with the swiftly evolving nature of how the Guard was authorized to receive federal funds to respond to the pandemic.
“The primary cause in the delay [is] tied to both funding and authority,” Army Brig. Gen. Adam R. Flasch, Maryland National Guard director of joint staff, said in an email to Military Times Friday night.
When President Donald Trump signed a memorandum Tuesday essentially giving full health care and housing allowance benefits to National Guard troops on the front lines of the fight against COVID-19, it seemed a major inequity was addressed.
But implementing that order has proven a bureaucratic nightmare.
It all has to do with how the changes were rolled out. Trump initially authorized National Guard troops in three states to receive Title 32 status, which provides federal funding to National Guard units operating under state control. Trump sweetened the deal by having the federal government pick up the full tab instead of the usual 75 percent.
About 11,000 of the nearly 28,000 National Guard troops currently deployed in the COVID-19 fight are under Title 32 orders, which are now in effect in 21 states, two territories and Washington D.C., said Air Force Gen. John Lengyel, Chief of the National Guard Bureau.
The move to Title 32 status was lauded by National Guard leadership and others because in addition to the federal funds, it gives National Guard troops healthcare, housing allowance benefits, and leave equal to active duty troops."
moar:
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/coronavirus/2020/04/10/confusion-over-md-national-guard-bah-decision-highlights-complex-title-32-covid-19-rollout/