Nebraska County Veterans Aid Fund

Nebraska runs two veterans emergency aid funds and the second one is almost invisible outside the counties that administer it. Section 80-102 gives every county a veterans aid fund of its own, raised by its own levy and spent by its own committee. The mechanism. The county veterans service committee meets at least once a year, or on the call of the chairperson or any three members, and determines the amount it considers necessary for aid. It certifies that amount to the county board, which reviews it in making a levy for an aid fund. Section 80-102(2) authorises the county board to levy annually as needed, not exceeding one cent on each one hundred dollars of taxable value of all taxable property in the county. Any unexpended balance stays in the fund at year end without reappropriation. What it buys is the same list as the state fund: food, shelter, fuel, wearing apparel, medical or surgical aid, or funeral expenses. Who it reaches is defined in 80-102(1)(b) and (c). Persons in need who served in the armed forces of the United States and were discharged or separated with a characterization of honorable or general under honorable conditions, or who died in service or as a direct result of that service. Also husbands and wives, surviving spouses, and minor children under eighteen of such veterans. And the expenses of last illness and burial where such a person dies leaving no next of kin. The residency test is the sharpest difference from the state fund. Section 80-102(1)(b)(iii) requires legal residence in Nebraska for not less than one year and in the county where the application is made for not less than six months. The state fund under 80-403 asks only for legal residence on the date of application with no minimum period. A veteran who moved to Nebraska three months ago is inside the state fund and outside the county one; a veteran the state fund has already paid this month can still apply to the county. The decision maker is different too. The committee or a majority of it fixes the amount paid to each claimant, subject to what is in the fund, and disburses promptly. The county clerk issues a warrant on the county treasurer as the committee directs. There is no appeal to the state, and no statewide standard: what a county pays depends on what it levied and how its committee reads need. That local discretion is the practical reason to know this fund exists. It is not a fallback that opens only when the state fund closes. The two are independent, they have different tests, and a veteran working with a county veterans service officer should ask about both by name. Accountability runs through the county board. The committee makes a detailed report of its transactions at the end of each year, with vouchers for all money disbursed. Section 80-101 sets up the committee itself, and 80-407 requires it to appoint a county veterans service officer, subject to confirmation by the county board, from applicants the Director of Veterans' Affairs has certified as eligible. Two or more counties may join in appointing one officer for an area and share the expense, and an officer may be part time where the work does not require forty hours a week. Members of the committee cannot serve as the service officer. That officer is the entry point to almost everything in this file, and the service is free.