Not Paying Our Soldiers

From a North Carolina paper:

It might not sound like a lot to some people, but $1,700 would have seemed like a godsend to Anja and Bert Wray, of Summerfield, earlier this year when the power company threatened to turn the lights off on them and their baby daughter, Sydney.

The amount would have been manna from heaven for Lori and Nathan Vosler, of Archdale, as the couple, with their baby, Jocelyn, struggled to pay monthly living expenses.

Those bills continue to mount for both families, but they don't appear any closer to receiving the $1,500 to $1,700 that each says the government owes them than they were when Nathan Vosler and Bert Wray came home from Iraq in December with their outfit -- the 30th Enhanced Heavy Separate Brigade of the N.C. National Guard.

Vosler and Wray and hundreds of others members of the brigade have yet to receive thousands of dollars in expense and travel money owed them by the Department of Defense.

N.C. National Guard officials say that at least 400 troops are owed an average of $2,000 each, for a total of at least $800,000, but the numbers may be considerably higher.

In addition to their regular pay based on rank, length of service and type of duty, National Guardsmen called to active service are entitled to be reimbursed for authorized travel and living expenses they incur while traveling on official business.

State Guard officials acknowledge that they don't know how many of the about 3,500 N.C. National Guard soldiers who served with the 30th EHSB have not been paid their daily expense money, known as per diem, and their travel allowance, and they're not sure why.

Capt. Matt Handley, with the state National Guard's public affairs office in Raleigh, said a "clerical error" by the Guard apparently led to the delay. Handley, however, said that since the federal government is responsible for paying the activated troops, the answers must come from the federal government. He directed questions to the National Guard Bureau in Washington.