Another Focus on SSA's Challenges

Tomorrow, Tuesday, March 24, 2009, the Committee on Ways and Means, Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support will hold a joint hearing on Eliminating the Social Security Disability Backlog. The hearing will focus on the Social Security Administration’s (SSA’s) large backlog in disability claims and other service delivery declines, including backlogs in program integrity activities. The entire announcement, which we have excerpted from below; can be found at this link.

In the past, “program integrity” in SSA parlance, has been a vague concept, including quality control, fraud and review of recipients' benefits. This hearing should at least be interesting, as the statistics will be flying. Discussion will include decision delays with, “[m]ore than 1.3 million Americans currently awaiting a decision on their case…...the problem is particularly severe at the hearings level, where the backlog has more than doubled since 2000 – from about 310,000 to more than 765,000 – and the average waiting time is now almost 500 days.”

In the course of waiting 500 days, disabled claimants often exhaust their limited resources. Many lose homes, housing, hope, friends, family and their health worsens. It would be particularly interesting if this hearing additionally focused on the other levels in the disability process such as the local SSA Field offices, which are understaffed, and the initial and early appeal process in the state agencies, which are inconsistent in program application and fraught with error. The state agencies proffer the first determinations of disability. An initial and reconsidered denial is the starting point for the long wait to appear before an administrative law judge.

The agency resources and solutions are both dwindling. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently reported that the backlog is now so severe as to warrant a slot in its biennial “high risk” list of federal programs. Clearly, demographics are at play as the population ages and more disability and retirement claims are filed while more skilled agency employees exit. The hearing will discuss provisions involving increased access to professional representation for disability claimants and changing how claimants give consent to release medical records.

Co Chairman Jim McDermott noted that, congress, “[h]as responded to this crisis by providing the Social Security Administration with increased funds in order to begin to actively address this problem, but it is time for the agency to take more action to significantly reduce the waiting period ….also ensuring the integrity of the process.” McDermott allowed that he looked forward to, “[h]earing about the initiatives that the agency is taking to address this problem and what additional steps Congress can take to help.”

The challenge is not so much gaining a focus on the problems. Congress has done this for years and increasingly since 2000. What is needed is a clear view of the agency's and advocates’ proposed solutions. Meanwhile, the wait continues for 1.3 million claimants who simply want their disability cases heard.