Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) has introduced a bill designed to ensure federal treatment to veterans who also are farmers and in need of health care services. The legislation would change the way in which the Department of Veterans Affairs determines a farmer-veteran’s eligibility for health services.

Now the VA uses a monetary guideline to determine assets that includes farm holdings and equipment, and that, says Grassley, can disqualify a farmer-veteran even when he or she "is in desperate straits with little or no income."

Current law holds that the government is supposed to require such sales only when they can be made at "no substantial sacrifice" to the veteran. But, he added, in practice, the VA has not recognized the harmful effect of selling off the sole source of livelihood in a farm and is unlikely to change its approach without direction from Congress.

The bill would exclude the value of real property of a veteran or a veteran’s spouse of dependent in determining how a veteran’s eligibility for health care from the VA is classified. Under current law, land values puts them in a Category 7 which means "they have to pay co-payments even if they don’t have a dime of income," says Grassley.

That would mean they would be ineligible if Congress or the administration did not provide enough money to continue providing care for Category 7 veterans. The bill would take these veterans out of that situation.