The 460th Space Wing commander hosted a Town Hall meeting Oct. 16 on base for all Team Buckley members to provide information on current events surrounding the recently resolved government shutdown.
Hours after the Town Hall, President Barack Obama signed legislation passed by Congress to end the shutdown, which will keep the government open until Jan. 15 and raise the debt limit through Feb. 7. Budget recommendations from a joint Senate-House committee are due Dec. 13.
Meanwhile, many services across the nation and, specifically, in the Department of Defense and the Air Force have been restored. Below is a list of recent program and service reinstatements. This list is not all-inclusive, and people are encouraged to check other DOD, Air Force and program-specific websites for information.
- All furloughed civilian employees should be returning to normal duties Oct. 17. Civilians, including those who returned to work earlier this month will be retroactively paid but are urged not to access the pay system, as mass amounts of website logins could potentially crash the system.
- As of Oct. 17, all TRICARE operations have returned to normal, and TRICARE beneficiaries should experience no disruption in their medical benefits.
- Effective immediately all Military Tuition Assistance applications for courses starting on or after Oct. 17 may be submitted. All previously approved MilTA requests for courses which began on or after Oct. 17 are reinstated. The Air Force policy for courses that started Oct. 1-16 will be distributed as soon as it is available.
- The annual Combined Federal Campaign charity drive, interrupted by the 16-day federal government shutdown, has resumed. The campaign is scheduled to last through Dec. 15. More information is available at
http://www.defense.gov/home/features/2013/0913_cfc/.
Additional information will be added to this list as it becomes available.
More than 400,000 DOD civilian employees were furloughed at the start of the shutdown Oct. 1, while all but approximately 5,000 returned Oct. 7 under the Pay Our Military Act. Pay and benefits, government travel, contracts, and non-essential operations were affected during the shutdown.
"While all of us across the department welcome the fact that the shutdown is now behind us, I know that its impact will continue to be felt by all of our people," Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said at a Pentagon news conference Oct. 17. "DOD is now operating on a short-term continuing resolution, which limits our ability to start new programs, and the damaging cuts of sequestration remain the law of the land."
For more information, visit
www.af.mil or
www.defense.gov.