The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) recently issued Revenue Procedure 2012-41 which set forth inflation-adjusted revenue items for 2013. Among other things, the IRS announced that the annual gift tax exclusion amount will increase in 2013 to $14,000 made by a taxpayer to any person who is not the taxpayer’s spouse. Married couples can combine their annual exclusion amounts.. read more →
The settlement of Jimmo v. Sebelius, Docket No. 11-cv-17 (D.Vt., January 18, 2011), a nationwide class-action lawsuit, has resulted in a significant change in Medicare coverage rules. Under the settlement, Medicare will scrap a decades-old practice that required beneficiaries to show medical or functional improvement before Medicare would pay for skilled nursing and therapy services… read more →
In a landmark ruling released on Thursday, June 28, 2012, the United States Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“Affordable Care Act”), President Obama’s health care overhaul passed in 2010. National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, 567 U.S.___ (2012). Congress enacted the Affordable Care Act in order to.. read more →
The Social Security Administration (SSA) recently revised four sections of the Program Operations Manual System (POMS). The POMS is a primary source of information used by Social Security employees to process claims for Social Security and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits. Most of the changes to the POMS sections were administrative in nature. However, the.. read more →
Bill No. 1388 was recently introduced in the New Jersey Senate with an identical, companion bill, Bill No. 685, also introduced in the Assembly. This bill amends New Jersey Statute 2A:34-23, concerning child support and alimony, to provide that an obligor’s child support or alimony payments may be modified when an obligor’s income is diminished.. read more →
New Jersey legislators are now considering passage of the Uniform Adult Guardianship and Protective Proceedings Jurisdiction Act (“UAGPPJA”). This uniform law, promulgated by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws in 2007, already has been adopted in 19 states and the District of Columbia, and is pending in the legislatures of 13 other.. read more →
In a recent Federal Register Notice, the Social Security Administration (SSA) required lawyers who represent claimants on SSA disability appeals to file appeals electronically. According to the Notice, beginning on March 16, 2012, lawyers must use the SSA Internet Disability Appeals web portal at www.socialsecurity.gov to file reconsiderations or hearings on medically denied Title II.. read more →
Currently, the value of assets passing to heirs upon the death of a U.S. citizen free of federal estate taxes, called the federal estate tax exemption amount, is $5.12 million dollars per person. This federal estate tax exemption amount is valid through the end of 2012. In the past, upon the death of the first.. read more →
Earlier this year the New York State Legislature, prompted by the Governor’s Medicaid Redesign Team, amended Section 369 of the Social Services Law to increase New York’s right to recover money from the estate of a deceased Medicaid recipient. The amendment expands the definition of the term “estate” in the Medicaid Law to include non-probate.. read more →
At the time of the Court’s decision, Marie Fecoskay was an 87 year old woman who had been admitted to the hospital because of an infection. A few days after admission, Mrs. Fecoskay went into cardiac arrest, became comatose as a result of oxygen deprivation and was placed on a ventilator with feeding tube. The.. read more →
Same-sex domestic partners are closer to receiving the spousal protections that opposite-sex married couples get when they receive long-term care through Medicaid — that is, the healthy partner soon may be able to keep some of the ill partner’s money and remain in the same-sex partners’ home. In New Jersey like most states, nursing-home residents.. read more →
The Veterans Benefits Act of 2010, Public Law 111-275, made a few relatively minor changes in veterans’ benefits laws that might be of interest to readers. None of the changes in the law go into effect until October 1, 2011. A few of the changes in the law follow: 1. There will be a cost-of-living.. read more →
A recent amendment to Section 369 of the Social Services law expands the list of assets which are considered to be in an individual’s “estate,” against which Medicaid could make a claim for recovery, to also include jointly held property, retained life estates, interests in trusts and any other property in which the individual has.. read more →
(The 13th Annual Elder and Disability Law Symposium was held on September 29, 2010 at the New Jersey Law Center, in New Brunswick, NJ. This year I was asked to give the case law update at the opening session, summarizing the most significant legal developments over the past year in the areas of elder and.. read more →
Many third-party and self-settled special needs trusts (SNTs) contain “termination on ineligibility and distribute to family members” clauses. These clauses, called “early termination provisions”, are common trust provisions. When used in special needs trusts, the “early termination provisions” cause the trust to terminate before the death of the disabled beneficiary in order to prevent the.. read more →
As many readers know, Medicaid applicants are subject to the imposition of a penalty, or a period of ineligibility for Medicaid, when gifts, called “transfers for less than fair market value” in the regulations, are made at any time during the five year period prior to the date on which the Medicaid application is filed,.. read more →
The Treasury Department and the four major benefit agencies, the Social Security Administration, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, the Office of Management and Budget, and the Railroad Retirement Board, are jointly releasing new rules which prevent banks from seizing Social Security and other federal benefits from customers facing debt collectors. The new rules would.. read more →
A North Carolina appeals court recently held that assets owned by an incompetent Medicaid recipient which were discovered by her family after she had been receiving Medicaid benefits for several years were countable and that the family must repay the benefits already paid on the Medicaid recipient’s behalf. Ella Mae Cloninger suffered from Alzheimer’s disease.. read more →
Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski (D) has proposed a bill that would eliminate the use of the word “retarded” in all federal programs. The new bill would replace the phrase “mental retardation,” which is used in many important pieces of federal legislation like the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and the Rehabilitation Act, with the term.. read more →
New Jerseyans with an autism spectrum disorder gained two laws recently which, it is hoped, will give them a better chance to lead meaningful, productive and independent lives. The first of the new laws, A-4226, expands New Jersey’s anti-discrimination law, the Law Against Discrimination, to ensure that no one who has autism and related neurological.. read more →
An amendment to a military act gives spouses of military personnel new residency rights, creating income and estate tax planning opportunities for military families. Because military families move, on average, every three years, the families often have to pay taxes in a new state or locality and lose the right to vote in the place.. read more →
Starting January 1, 2010, New Jersey joins 42 other states by requiring continuing legal education for every lawyer licensed to practice in the State, including judges, law school professors and in-house counsel. Under a newly adopted court rule, Rule 1:42, New Jersey lawyers must take a minimum of 24 hours of continuing legal education courses.. read more →
Funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has been late in getting approved by Congress in 20 of the last 23 years, which has affected the planning of veterans’ health care programs. This month, the President signed into law H.R. 1016, an act entitled The Veterans Health Care Budget Reform and Transparency Act of.. read more →
Gov. Jon Corzine recently signed into law new legislation that requires fiduciaries of estates for developmentally disabled individuals to post bonds in Superior Court as a safeguard against theft and other improper conduct. The bill, S-550 , sponsored by Sen. Stephen Sweeney, D-Gloucester, goes into effect in 60 days. S-550 requires that the amount of.. read more →
The House has voted to give the disabled, as well as gays and lesbians, federal protection from hate crimes. The new legislation also makes it a new federal crime to attack U.S. service members because of their sexual orientation. With passage by the Senate expected, federal prosecutors will, for the first time, be able to.. read more →
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