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The authors comment on the article "Fixing the Leak: Avoiding IRA Liquidation in Crisis Medicaid Planning," by Dale M., Krause and Scott M. Engstrom, that was published in the Spring 2020 issue of this publication. Topics discussed include Medicaid planning, tax implications of individual retirement account (IRA) liquidation, and purchasing an annuity in an institutionalized spouse's IRA payable to the community spouse.

The article presents DeCambre v. Brookline Housing Authority court case which deals with issues of public benefit and housing benefit programs in the U.S. In this case First Circuit held that existing U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) program regulations for federal rent support for the financially needed local housing authorities (LHAs) to disregard distributions of principal from first-party special needs trusts.

The article reports the decision of the U.S. 8th circuit court in the case 'Draper v. Colvin' concerning the first-party special needs trust established by parents to allow their daughter to have her trust assets excluded from consideration when she applies for means-tested public benefits. Topics discussed include the U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA); Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits; and the Social Security Appeals Council.

The article looks at the decision of the New Jersey Supreme Court in "Saccone v. Board of Trustees of the Police and Firemen's Retirement System." It mentions that the Court held that the survivor benefit for the disabled child of a firefighter, Thomas Saccone, could be directed by the parent to a first-party special needs trust for the child. It mentions that the court has reversed the decisions of the board of trustees of the State Police and Firemen's Retirement System (PFRS) in the case.

The article discusses a court case of Lewis v. Alexander that was decided by the Third Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals and which the court stroked down of the decisions made by the U.S. district court based on a statute of Pennsylvania related to the restrictions imposed on the use of limited trust retention of postmortem accounts and pooled special needs trust accounts (PSNT) to 50 percent. The issues related to declaratory and injunctive relief in case of putative class action filed by several individuals are discussed. The challenges related to the comparability argument with reference to the U.S. Medicaid statutes are also discussed.