U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge, a Lillington Democrat, wrote a letter to new Attorney General Michael Mukasey today asking him to continue recent progress on a federal law offering benefits to some deceased emergency response workers.

Etheridge is the lead sponsor of the Hometown Heroes act, which gives financial benefits to survivors of firefighters, law enforcement agents and emergency responders who die of heart attack or stroke related to their service, reports Barb Barrett.

Although the law passed with overwhelming support from Congress and President Bush, it has taken years for the Department of Justice to write regulations and begin implementing the benefits.

Etheridge wrote that former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales made progress in the past two months, and that Etheridge hopes Mukasey will make Hometown Heroes a priority.

After agitating for more than a year to see the U.S. Department of Justice fully implement his benefits plan for survivors of deceased emergency workers, U.S. Rep. Bob Etheridge was emboldened yesterday by two new memos from the agency.

Etheridge, a Lillington Democrat, was the prime mover behind the Hometown Heroes Act. The law's intent was to provide survival benefits for law enforcement officers and firefighters who die in the line of duty because of stroke, heart attack or other stress-induced ailments.

The Justice agency has taken years to implement the act and make decisions on individual cases. The agency said the law’s wording was vague, and case workers sometimes requested years of medical data to prove that, for instance, a firefighter had truly died from fighting an especially stressful blaze and not because of an underlying heart disease.

Etheridge denied that the law, passed overwhelmingly by Congress four years ago, was vague.

But this week, a Justice official sent memos defining two terms: "competent medical evidence to the contrary" and "nonroutine stressful or strenuous physical activity," reports Barb Barrett.

More after the jump.

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