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53–434 2010

UPDATE ON THE STATE OF THE 

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON VETERANS’ AFFAIRS 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

OCTOBER 14, 2009

Serial No. 111–49 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs 

( 


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COMMITTEE ON VETERANS’ AFFAIRS 

BOB FILNER, California, Chairman 

CORRINE BROWN, Florida 

VIC SNYDER, Arkansas 

MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine 

STEPHANIE HERSETH SANDLIN, South 

Dakota 

HARRY E. MITCHELL, Arizona 

JOHN J. HALL, New York 

DEBORAH L. HALVORSON, Illinois 

THOMAS S.P. PERRIELLO, Virginia 

HARRY TEAGUE, New Mexico 

CIRO D. RODRIGUEZ, Texas 

JOE DONNELLY, Indiana 

JERRY MCNERNEY, California 

ZACHARY T. SPACE, Ohio 

TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota 

JOHN H. ADLER, New Jersey 

ANN KIRKPATRICK, Arizona 

GLENN C. NYE, Virginia 

STEVE BUYER, Indiana, Ranking 

CLIFF STEARNS, Florida 

JERRY MORAN, Kansas 

HENRY E. BROWN, JR., South Carolina 

JEFF MILLER, Florida 

JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas 

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California 

DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

VERN BUCHANAN, Florida 

DAVID P. ROE, Tennessee 

MALCOM A. SHORTER, Staff Director 

Pursuant to clause 2(e)(4) of Rule XI of the Rules of the House, public hearing records 

of the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs are also published in electronic form. The printed 

hearing record remains the official version. Because electronic submissions are used to 

prepare both printed and electronic versions of the hearing record, the process of converting 

between various electronic formats may introduce unintentional errors or omissions. Such occurrences are inherent in the current publication process and should diminish as the process 

is further refined. 


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C O N T E N T S 

October 14, 2009 

Page 

Update on the State of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs ....................... 1 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Chairman Bob Filner ............................................................................................... 1 

Prepared statement of Chairman Filner ........................................................ 38 

Hon. Steve Buyer, Ranking Republican Member .................................................. 3 

WITNESSES 

U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Hon. Eric K. Shinseki, Secretary ............ 5 

Prepared statement of Secretary Shinseki ..................................................... 39 

SUBMISSION FOR THE RECORD 

Mitchell, Hon. Harry E., a Representative in Congress from the State of 

Arizona, statement ............................................................................................... 45 


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UPDATE ON THE STATE OF THE 

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS 

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 14, 2009 

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON VETERANS’ AFFAIRS, 

Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in Room 

334, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Bob Filner [Chairman of 

the Committee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Filner, Brown of Florida, Snyder, 

Michaud, Herseth Sandlin, Hall, Halvorson, Perriello, Rodriguez, 

Donnelly, McNerney, Space, Walz, Adler, Nye, Buyer, Moran, 

Brown of South Carolina, Boozman, Bilbray, Bilirakis, and Roe. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN FILNER 

The CHAIRMAN. Good morning. Welcome to the Committee on 

Veterans’ Affairs hearing today. 

Mr. Secretary, we are glad to see you and we appreciate the job 

you are doing. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. I ask unanimous consent that all Members may 

have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks. Hearing no objection, so ordered. 

Mr. Secretary, we were very glad when you were selected and 

confirmed and our confidence in you has not waned. We believe you 

are doing a great job. I know you were called a soldier’s soldier 

when you were in the Army and now we are calling you a veteran’s 

veteran. We thank you for all the work you have done. 

I am going to quote a former presidential candidate, Adlai Stevenson, who said patriotism is not short outbursts of emotion, but 

the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime. I think that applies to our servicemembers and veterans who have proven their 

dedication, and it also applies to you, Mr. Secretary. 

America must continue to show this tranquil and steady devotion 

to the heroes that have fought on the battlefields and have returned home. The way in which we treat our veterans has a direct 

impact on our ability to recruit men and women in the future and 

is a reflection of the values and ideals we hold as a Nation. 

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) oversees what is 

the largest integrated health care system in the country and operates a vast array of benefit programs meant to support and salute 

our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines. Together, Mr. Secretary, 

we have taken great strides in this 111th Congress to provide our 


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veterans with the quality health care and services that they required and that they have earned. 

I share your goal to build better lives for America’s veterans and 

their families and survivors. We made a contract with our veterans 

and we must keep it. 

I would like to thank you, Mr. Secretary, for requesting veterans’ 

funding levels that appropriately reflect the needs of our veterans 

more than any other budget requested by a President since I have 

served on this Committee. 

The House approved a funding bill that adds $14.5 billion over 

the current fiscal year and this is the third straight budget to exceed the request of the Independent Budget. In fact, in the 3 years or the 3 budgets that we have overseen 

together, we have raised the health care budget 60 percent or more 

than $20 billion. I think that is something to be really proud of. 

Although this year’s funding bill has not yet been enacted, I am 

proud that we have put forward a budget that is worthy of the 

service and sacrifice of our veterans. 

I am also grateful, Mr. Secretary, for your leadership in working 

with Congress to establish a historic new approach to providing 

adequate and timely funding for veterans’ health care. 

Last week, the House passed and last night, the Senate passed 

a bill that responds to late budgets by allowing Congress to fund 

VA health care 1 year in advance. The bill is, of course, a top priority for veterans service organizations (VSOs) because it will make 

sure we are not subject to delays and uncertainty in the political 

process and will finally allow sufficient time to plan how best to deliver health care. 

This is almost a revolutionary way of dealing with this issue, Mr. 

Secretary, and the bill is on its way to the President for his signature. 

We know that the VA has faced the issue of caring for our returning servicemembers and the veterans of previous conflicts. We 

have the dual challenge of meeting both needs, especially in the 

areas of traumatic brain injury (TBI), musculoskeletal conditions, 

post-traumatic stress disorder treatment, and maintaining excellence in specialized service and addressing access to care issues. 

These are challenges that we are working on together and challenges we must meet as a Nation. 

Mr. Secretary, across the Nation, veterans who applied for benefits under the Post-9/11 GI Bill are experiencing problems. This bill 

was a proud accomplishment of this Congress, but we have been 

told that payments are being delayed because of overwhelming 

problems in the universities and at the Department of Veterans Affairs. 

Although you have taken the lead in issuing emergency $3,000 

checks to students, many veterans still say they do not know when 

they are going to get their full payments. We hope that ongoing implementation will catch up with the demand. Of course, we are 

looking forward because I think these veterans will be able to take 

part in the economic recovery of our Nation. 

We are also faced with the issue of providing benefits earned by 

veterans in a timely fashion. The VA must address the growing 

backlog of claims filed by those that served in uniform. We must 


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tackle this issue that stymies our wounded veterans from receiving 

the benefits they earned and deserve. 

Mr. Secretary, we are looking forward to hearing your views on 

the successes and the challenges that face us and our veterans. We 

are anxious to hear how we can help you address these issues. We 

are grateful to you as well as the devoted employees in the VA for 

the dedication to veterans that you demonstrate day after day. 

No matter where we stand on the current conflict as a policy 

issue, we are here today because we must be united in seeing that 

our brave servicemembers are welcomed back with all the compassion this grateful Nation can bestow. 

Mr. Secretary, again, welcome to the hearing. 

I will recognize Mr. Buyer for an opening statement. 

[The prepared statement of Chairman Filner appears on p. 38.] 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. STEVE BUYER 

Mr. BUYER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate your comments and I associate myself with your comments this morning. I 

appreciate the words that you have spoken today. 

The CHAIRMAN. You want me to have a heart attack? 

Mr. BUYER. I would like—well, I almost did. But I am okay now. 

I like it. Colonel, you did a good job with those remarks this morning. 

I do not know. General, you might want to get us right now. 

Good morning. And I welcome everyone to today’s hearing and I 

would thank all the Members for their attendance. It is a pleasure, 

Mr. Secretary, for you to be back. 

And I am not going to apologize. I guess sometimes I prefer to 

call you a General because I look at you as a soldier and I think 

a lot of the judgments that you make on behalf of veterans, you do 

it through the prism of a soldier. So when I may refer to you as 

General, I do not mean any disrespect for your present title as Secretary. 

These first few months that you have taken over have been challenging, but I want to congratulate you in how you have formulated 

your staff and the way you have also been a pretty good student. 

Too often I think Americans are open to the criticism that we get 

so eager to move toward solutions that we do not pause to thoroughly understand the problems. 

And so you have come in to put your own eyes on some of these 

challenges throughout the Department, all departments, and I 

want to compliment you for doing that. 

There is no shortage of critics when it comes to the VA and there 

are a lot of people who are very anxious to tell you how to do your 

job. And you have stepped forward to provide strategic guidance 

and to do the very best you can. And for that, I extend my compliments and gratitude. 

The challenges that you have stepped into is almost a runaway 

train and so how do you stop that train? Do you get in front of the 

tracks? Do you try to derail? Do you try to slow it down? 

And some of those challenges deal with the backlog of disability 

claims that continues to expand. And the 64,000 veterans that have 

enrolled for classes and the fact that only 41,500 have received the 


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payments under the new GI Bill, you have taken some corrective 

action, but the challenges remain. 

The discoveries of egregious medical errors hamper the Veterans 

Health Administration (VHA) and it continues over time. I have 

been on the Committee for 17 years and every Secretary after Secretary after Secretary continue to provide maintenance to a health 

system that continues to have quality assurance and risk management issues. Every health system seems to have them. So it is a 

job that never seems to end. 

I know you realized, even prior to your confirmation, that you 

were taking on these enormous challenges. What has become evident, what I find encouraging is that you are a man of principle 

who is forthright about the areas of the VA programs that require 

improvement. 

I had learned in my work with you when I served on the Armed 

Services Committee that you embrace military values and that you 

apply these values when you face these challenges. That is why I 

think I prefer to call you General. 

We will strive to help you in any way we can and we view you 

as a partner in our efforts. This requires taking a hard look at 

where we are and charting the course ahead. So I look forward to 

our frank discussions. And you have been very candid with me in 

private discussions as we seek to provide cures. 

To start, though, is the troubling problems surrounding the everexpanding backlog of claims for disability benefits. Since January, 

the backlog has ballooned by 14 percent. The current data indicates 

now that 36 percent of the VA’s claims inventory exceeds the strategic target of 125 days. 

You and I are both aware that the only real solution to correcting 

this tremendous disservice to our veterans must include the development of an adjudication system that reduces the errors and is 

based on advanced technology that is electronic and paperless. And 

you brought that up the other morning at a breakfast. 

I am curious and I would like for you to share with us that after 

months and months of efforts in selecting a private contractor capable of performing such a large-scale integration, the VA had canceled that contract. And we were not informed of it. 

So if you could let us know as to why that contract was canceled, 

I think it would be helpful to us because I do not want there to 

be criticism then that says, well, you canceled a contractor and, 

therefore, does that mean that we went back to square one and we 

have got another year or more before such development can begin 

to take place? What did that, in fact, contribute to the backlog? 

And I want you to have the opportunity to explain that. 

I also believe Congress should accept some of the blame for creating such a complex and difficult benefit to administer. The burden, though, I will acknowledge that we created this challenge and 

the burden lies upon you to supervise and find a way to prevent 

the delays that are causing the financial difficulties for veterans 

whose sole focus should be on their studies with regard to the new 

GI Bill. 

I applaud your recent action and that is why I associate myself 

with the Chairman’s comments regarding the emergency payments 

that enable veterans to pay rent and eat regularly. All of us on the 


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Committee, I think, have had to deal with these complaints and 

concerns coming from veterans from our Congressional districts 

who are now trying to obtain the GI benefit. We need to fix the program and I am here to offer you whatever assistance we can provide. 

You and I had a conversation about technical legislative corrections, that there are some corrections that you can do through your 

executive powers, but there are other corrections that maybe need 

to be legislative. So I look forward to working with the Chairman 

and Members of the Committee and Ms. Herseth Sandlin and Dr. 

Boozman on moving a way forward to do that. But we need to hear 

from you. 

I would suggest a few items that may make the VA’s job a little 

easier such as making an initial stipend payment to the veterans 

for all title 38 education programs for 2 months that would be recouped over the academic year or delaying payments to schools 

until later in the semester to avoid over and underpayments of tuition and fees due to changes in the veteran’s schedule. 

Another idea would be to require veterans in the new program 

to verify their status on a monthly basis just as in the Montgomery 

program as a means to lessen overpayments. 

It is also time, and I will throw this on the table for consideration, I think it is time to standardize the rules across the chapters, Chapters 30, 32, 33, and 35. It makes no sense to continue 

the varia of the administrative procedures across all of those programs. In my view, as you are trying to move toward an information technology (IT) solution, there should be one set of rules for 

everyone. And I hope the Department will work closely with the 

Committee to accomplish a consolidation of the programs. 

Another area of concern is the patient safety. It was reported 

back in March that the VA potentially exposed 300 veterans to 

endoscopes that were not properly disinfected. That number now, 

I think is now, the pool, risk pool is in excess of 10,000. And I know 

this is a great challenge that you face and you are off your heels 

and on your toes to make corrective actions. Any updates you can 

provide us on that would be helpful. 

I read your statement last night and so I see where you have addressed the patient safety issues, but it is an area of great concern 

and requires your continuous maintenance and forethought. 

I appreciate you being here today and we look forward to your 

testimony. 

With that, I yield back to the Chairman. Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Buyer. 

Mr. Secretary, the floor is yours. 

STATEMENT OF HON. ERIC K. SHINSEKI, SECRETARY, U.S. 

DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member 

Buyer, distinguished Members of the Committee, thank you for this 

opportunity to report on the state of the Department of Veterans 

Affairs. 

I apologize to the Chairman and Members of the Committee for 

the late arrival of my written testimony to this Committee, but I 

ask Mr. Chairman that it be allowed to be included in the record. 


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The CHAIRMAN. It shall be. Thank you. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I appreciate this Committee’s longstanding 

support and commitment to veterans. And I mean that sincerely. 

It comes through rather clearly on all of our engagements, but it 

is demonstrated once again by your passage of the advance appropriations measure for VA. And I will add my comments here to the 

Chairman’s and Ranking Member’s—this is a tremendous opportunity for VA and I thank this Committee very much for its support. 

As the Chairman pointed out, I understand the measure is on its 

way to the President. And so, once again, I congratulate the Members of this Committee on behalf of veterans. 

Let me also express my thanks to the Congress and the President for a 2010 budget that has provided the Department an extraordinary opportunity to begin transforming itself. We are determined to provide a return on that investment, a return that veterans deserve and that you, on this Committee, expect. 

I would like to acknowledge the presence of representatives from 

some of our veterans service organizations who work with us quite 

closely. They help us meet our obligations to all veterans. 

In the last 8 months, I have learned a lot. I have learned from 

veterans I have engaged individually, collectively, in groups as I 

have encountered them, learned from Members of this Committee, 

from the VSOs, we have worked with the major ones, from my own 

employees who come to work every day to serve veterans. And I 

thank the Chairman for his remarks about our workforce. 

I visited VA facilities across the country, large, small, rural, 

urban, and received detailed briefings from each of the 21 Veterans 

Integrated Services Network (VISN) directors, dedicated time for 

them to talk to me about their requirements, tell me about their 

priorities, talk to me about how they measure performance and 

quality and safety inside their operations, and then listened to 

them talk about their resourcing, what they have been able to do, 

what more they want to get done, resources in terms of people, 

money, time. 

I thank the Ranking Member for his comments about my previous profession. I am very proud of that time and my opportunities to work with the Congress. 

I am a soldier and a veteran. I would just say that I have stood 

on lots of ranges watching good organizations challenge themselves 

to get better. Not unlike those organizations, I find myself right 

now standing on a range with the VA, a VA that is deeply committed to veterans, and challenging itself to be better. I intend to 

help them get there. 

When I first appeared before this Committee this past February, 

I provided three vectors that I intended to begin to focus on to 

begin the transformation of VA. These were not visionary. These 

were just tried and true rules that I have carried with me for a 

while—people-centric, results driven, forward looking. Those vectors remain unchanged. 

As proud as I am of what we have accomplished overall in the 

last 9 months, there have been, as both the Chairman and Ranking 

Member have pointed out challenges, missed opportunities, and 


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gaps in providing the quality care and services veterans deserve 

and expect. 

In recent months, I have discussed with Members of the Committee VA’s shortfalls in timely delivery of Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits, localized lapses in medical quality control, erroneous 

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) diagnosis letters, and IT programs that were not meeting our expectations. 

We have aggressively disclosed these issues when we have discovered them to establish high standards and accountability and 

transparency. We will continue to do that. 

Most of the shortcomings were discovered by our own staff and 

then publicly disclosed. In each case, we notified the Congress, 

VSOs, veterans, and the public. Forthrightness was the right thing 

to do and transparency, I am convinced, will ultimately result in 

a higher level of trust and the quality and the safety of VA’s services. 

Complications in implementing the Post-9/11 GI Bill required VA 

to make advanced payments to affected veterans to cover their expenses and to relieve their uncertainty and stress. There are many 

reasons for those complications, but the delays were unacceptable. 

Advanced payments remain in effect. That is the emergency procedure we put into effect 2 weeks ago. Advanced payments remain 

in effect as we mature our IT tools to assure timely delivery of 

checks in the future. And I am hopeful that in early November we 

will have the phase three automated tool for our use. 

VA’s IT issues, the third of those topics, are significant. Many 

projects are challenged by the inability to meet costs and scheduled 

performance measures. So we implemented a program called 

PMAS, Program Management Accountability System, this past 

June to address those problems. We expect to bring all IT projects 

under PMAS within the next year. 

The first 47 programs were placed under PMAS in mid July because of our concerns. We paused 45 of them. Many of them were 

over a year behind schedule. Over the last 60 days, 17 of those 

projects were committed to near-term dates and 15 met those committed dates. Thirteen projects were replanned and have been restarted. Fifteen projects have been stopped or reduced in funding. 

Likewise, more broadly at VA, we have a strategic management 

process in place now. It has just been put into place. It is a fledgling effort here to manage our assets at the strategic level. This is 

designed to improve the quality and the accessibility of care and 

services, to increase veteran client satisfaction with the health care 

and benefits we provide, to raise readiness in providing services 

and protecting people and assets during crises, and to improve internal customer satisfaction with support services. 

Every day 298,000 people come to work at VA to serve veterans. 

Their dedication and their good work are the driving force behind 

successful innovations and effective collaboration that is accomplished inside the VA. 

Employees in our Office of Information and Technology (OI&T) 

and the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) collaborated with 

the White House to solicit original ideas from VA employees and 

participating VSOs ranging from improving process cycle times to 

improving veteran satisfaction with the claims process. Over 3,200 


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process improvement ideas have been received in this effort, and 

all of them are under review. 

Last Friday, a long-term collaborative effort between VA, the 

U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), and the Congress came to fruition and legislation formally establishing the Federal Health Care 

Center in North Chicago (FHCC), a collaborative effort of both departments, the DoD and VA, and the Congress that results in the 

FHCC, the Federal Health Care Center, merging two entities, the 

Great Lakes Naval Hospital and VA’s North Chicago Medical Center, a hugely difficult task, two cultures, many different processes 

and systems. The result is a model for the future in how we provide care to our veteran, active duty, Reserve component clients 

and their families. 

Three weeks ago, VA employee, Dr. Janet Kemp, received the 

2009 Federal Employee of the Year Award from the Partnership for 

Public Service. Under Dr. Kemp’s leadership, and the innovation of 

her team, VA created the National Suicide Prevention Hotline to 

help veterans in crisis. In just over 2 years, the hotline has received more than 185,000 phone calls, an average of 375 per day, 

and interrupted over 5,200 potential suicides in progress. 

In the last year, the dedicated professionals of our National Cemetery Administration, the NCA, provided honors and final resting 

places to over 107,000 veterans. NCA consistently meets the needs 

of interring our heroes and exceeds the expectations with regard to 

care and compassion for their surviving families. 

We are determined to move forward in 2010 with critical new initiatives for veterans, everything from reducing homelessness to 

providing better rural health care, developing programs to better 

serve women veterans, raising our quality and safety standards in 

health care, and improving our infrastructure. 

Our mission is to serve today’s veterans and prepare for tomorrow’s veterans by increasing access to VA benefits and services providing them the highest quality and best value available in health 

care. 

Informing veterans about their choices and earning their confidence in our insurance, our health care, education, home loans, 

and counseling programs will allow VA to be a provider of choice 

and serve as an example of good governance for others seeking 

similar outcomes. 

Our Nation’s 23.4 million veterans deserve consistent, timely, 

high-quality delivery of benefits and services. They put themselves 

on the line for our safety and our well-being. Young men and 

women continue to do so today and we must anticipate, develop, 

and deliver the benefits and services they will require as they leave 

military service in the years ahead. 

Again, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee, thank you 

for this opportunity to appear here today. I look forward to your 

questions. 

[The prepared statement of Secretary Shinseki appears on p. 39.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

I will give the opportunity to all Members to interact with you. 

Ms. Brown. 

Ms. BROWN OF FLORIDA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 


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And thank you, Mr. Secretary, for coming here today. First of all, 

let me thank you for participating in the Congressional Black Caucus Annual Legislative Conference. It was well received. We had 

standing room only, 12 former generals, so you can see there is a 

great interest in the VA and its policies. It was interesting and informative. 

I appreciate the announcement you made yesterday adding Parkinson’s and some other service-connected presumption, disease relating to Agent Orange. Thank you very much. This common sense 

and compassionate decision will make life easier for many of our 

veterans. 

I also want to thank you for helping to move along the Orlando 

hospital that has been in the making for over 25 years. It is just 

unacceptable that it takes 25 years from the planning until we actually implement a hospital that is greatly needed. 

In addition, we have been having lengthy discussions for over 3 

years discussing the medical clinic in Jacksonville. I want to thank 

you for your intervention and I hope this project will move along. 

Last, I want to mention that 5:00 yesterday morning I was 

watching television and they discussed the VA and the GI Bill. 

They clearly do not have it correct. I think it is important that we 

all inform the news media as to the process. It is a process that 

includes not just the students, the VA, but also the institutions. 

They have a responsibility to verify that the student is enrolled 

and in good standing and have not dropped and added so they can 

receive the funds. So it is a partnership. And the news media and 

the veterans and the institutions need to understand the process. 

And I think we need to do a better job in educating the community. 

So thank you again for being here. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Ms. Brown. 

Ms. BROWN OF FLORIDA. May he respond. 

The CHAIRMAN. Yes. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Congresswoman Brown, thanks for the comments on both medical centers. I have assured you and I will do 

it again here that the Jacksonville clinic has my attention. I am 

still working through some of the what I will call delays, because 

I do not know, I cannot categorize them any other way. But at 

some point, it is my intent to bring all parties together. And if you 

are willing and able, you and I will hear the issues out and make 

sure this moves forward. My intent is to have this move forward. 

It has languished long enough. 

And then a follow on to that. There, I think, is a requirement to 

provide another health care entity that services another group of 

veterans that lives on the outskirts to the west and north of downtown Jacksonville. We have that in planning and it is our intent 

to put that in the queue as well. 

Ms. BROWN OF FLORIDA. Thank you. 

And can you discuss the GI Bill, this wonderful program that we 

are having some challenges with, but it is a win-win for the veterans, and for the community, especially in these hard times. The 

opportunity to go back to school and retrain is a win-win. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Yes. I have been very clear about how important this program is not just to the VA but to me personally. 

It is, you know, an aspect of myself coming back from Vietnam and 


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having an opportunity to go back to do graduate schooling. I understand the importance of this program. 

But it is even more important to the country. The potential that 

will come out of this if we go back and look at what happened after 

World War II, what that program provided to our country in terms 

of leadership for the second half of the 20th century, that is what 

we are about to realize here. And the VA has an important role to 

make sure this happens. 

I would just, for those in the Committee who share a little experience with me about things military, we do a lot of planning. The 

first paragraph in most military plans is listed as assumptions. We 

do that because we know we do not know all the facts. And when 

it comes time to execute a plan, we must reroll each assumption 

and if they do not bear out, we have to do something about it. 

And so that in a simplistic way describes what happened here. 

A plan was written, very quickly put together, very short timelines. 

I am looking at the certificates of eligibility being processed on 1 

May, enrollments 6 July, checks having to flow 3 August, a very 

compressed timeframe. And in order to do that, we essentially 

began as I arrived in January putting together the plan, reviewing 

the plan that was there and trying to validate it. 

I will be frank. When I arrived, there were a number of people 

who told me that this was simply not executable. It was not going 

to happen. August 3rd was going to be here before we could have 

everything in place. I consulted an outside consultant, brought in 

an independent view, same kind of assessment. Unless you do some 

big things here, this is not possible. 

To the credit of the folks, the good folks in VBA, they took it on 

and they went at it hard. We hired 530 people to do this and had 

to train them. We had a manual system that was computer assisted, not very helpful, but that is what they inherited. 

And we realized in about May that the 530 were probably a little 

short and so we went and hired 230 more people. So in excess of 

700 people were trained to use the tools that were coming together 

even as certificates were being executed. 

We were short on the assumption of how many people it would 

take. We based our numbers on the Montgomery GI Bill which is 

about a 15-minute procedure. The Chapter 33 procedures, about 1 

hour on average, maybe 1 hour and 15 minutes. So right off the 

bat, we had some issues with assumptions. 

We are still receiving certificates of enrollment. This week alone, 

we received 3,600 certificates of enrollment coming from schools 

who are working through the process and we put them into the 

process of providing those checks, three checks. 

The great thing about a good organization is when you do not get 

the assumptions right, you react and the reaction was students 

needed to be in school. We needed to get checks to them. In a week, 

the VBA put together a plan and we paid a number of veterans 

who were in need of help. 

As I look forward, and to the Ranking Member’s questions about 

what could we do differently, of course, we will look hard at the assumptions for at how many more people we should have for the future. 


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But one of the things that has tied up the process is right now 

we have to wait for the certificate of enrollment to come from a 

school before we can make all three payments, a tuition payment 

to the school, a housing payment to the student, and a book payment to the student. 

If we can decouple that, and I may need the help of the Committee on this, if we can decouple that, I am more than willing to 

pay, as has been suggested, housing and books separately in advance and then let the tuition follow the normal course at the rate 

that the colleges and universities are comfortable with. 

Barring that, I am prepared to do an emergency exercise probably in January for the spring semester and we are capable. We 

have learned a lot and we will be better at it. So we are prepared 

to not have the pinch that we had here in September. But, again, 

we adjusted to the assumptions that did not bear out and we 

learned from it. We will make improvements in the future. 

Other things we are doing is we have the phase three automated 

tool coming out in November. I expect that will clear up all the 

backlog that may exist in all of our educational programs, not just 

the Post-9/11 GI Bill, and we will enter the spring semester with 

no backlog. 

Ms. BROWN OF FLORIDA. Thank you so much and thank you 

again for your leadership. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Boozman. 

Mr. BOOZMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Again, we appreciate your service. You are a very talented guy 

and you could be doing lots of different things and yet you have 

chosen to serve veterans. 

I think we can all be very, very proud of the new GI Bill. I mean, 

that is a tremendous thing for our men and women in uniform and 

it is just great, and for our veterans. I think we do have some problems. You know, it is not the VA’s fault. You guys have been working very, very hard to get this done. But the bill, the way that we 

set it up, and, again, you do not realize unintended consequences 

sometimes until you get into things, this is a big deal, but I do 

think the decoupling, you know, some of the things that you mentioned, you know, that we are pushing on the right track in that 

regard. 

And certainly I know I am committed. I think Ms. Herseth 

Sandlin and I are committed to whatever it takes and our leadership on the Committee to, if we need a legislative fix, to get that 

worked out. 

This is a little thing, but one of the things that I get a lot of mail 

about, and perhaps, you know, VA can help, is there is a lot of anxiety right now among veterans that somehow they are going to be 

caught up in the new health care system and be folded into that. 

And I think that you know that is not going to happen and anything that VA can do in putting out your statements and things, 

I think it would be helpful to reassure veterans that the VA system 

is going to continue. When I am around my Legion halls and things 

like that, there is just real concern among our seniors that again 

somehow that is going to happen. 


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The other thing is that, you know, right now I am a guy that 

thinks all of us every day needs to wake up and think what are 

we going to do to create jobs, you know, what are we going to do 

to protect pension plans and things like that. With this economy, 

again really focusing your efforts, and I am not saying that we are 

not doing a good job of doing this, but I do think that VA right now 

really needs to really focus in helping to put our veterans back to 

work. 

These men and women coming back from overseas, it is very, 

very difficult right now. And I would just encourage and ask, you 

know, that that be a real focus so that we do not get behind in that 

regard. It is just very, very tough in the economy as you know. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Thank you for those comments. 

I share your concerns. All of us are focused on entry into the college environment on the front end of the Chapter 33 Post-9/11 GI 

Bill. 

I have told the young veteran students I have met with all of us 

are excited about this. I am focused on graduation rates. There is 

no return on this unless you graduate and then we help you be positioned in the workforce. 

So it is a broader look for me as I look at this. And so much effort has put into making sure we get the front door open so we 

have students in school. And I have sort of deferred the second 

piece and that is looking at the graduation process and then jobs 

after that. 

In the meantime, I do know that college is not necessarily a 

choice for every veteran coming home and we need to give them options that allow them to get vocational training that they want, administrative training that they need to move them very quickly in 

the workforce and not at the low skill level but at an appropriate 

level given their leadership skills, their operational experience, the 

kinds of decision-making they have been doing in uniform for 3 or 

4 years. That needs to be part of the calculation when we assess 

their capabilities. 

Mr. BOOZMAN. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Michaud. 

Mr. MICHAUD. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

And I want to thank you, Mr. Secretary, for all the work that you 

are doing for our veterans and thanks for coming here this morning. 

I have a couple of questions and appreciate your willingness to 

also focus on issues that affect veterans in rural areas. My couple 

of questions are, one, a number of years ago, this Committee and 

Congress established an Office of Rural Health to focus on rural 

veterans’ issues. I know that the position is open, I believe, now for 

the Office of Rural Health. 

How soon do you intend to fill that position as well as what type 

of individual will you be looking to fill the position for the Office 

of Rural Health? 

The other question I have is, Mr. Moran and I were able to pass 

legislation dealing with four pilot projects nationwide to help address some of the issues in rural areas. It is my understanding that 

it has been slow in getting started. 


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I wanted to know what implementation problems do you see as 

it relates to the four VISNs’ pilot projects moving forward at a 

more rapid pace than what it has in the past. 

And my last question is, you mentioned you met with the VISN 

Directors to talk about some of their needs. One of my concerns 

dealing with VISN Directors is how it might filter down in rural 

areas. 

For instance—I will use Maine as an example—it takes over 8 

or 9 hours to get to the—you know, from one end of Maine to Boston. When you look at the VISN office in Boston, they are concerned that VISN might not be the same as in Maine when you 

look at the whole issue under the Capital Asset Realignment for 

Enhanced Services (CARES) process where they recommended several community-based outpatient clinics (CBOCs). 

The problem that we ran into over the years serving on this 

Committee is that a CBOC’s funding comes out of the operating 

budget cost for the VISN. So you might have a VISN Director 

whose funding for that VISN might not be adequate. Therefore, 

they are not going to move more aggressively as they should on the 

CBOCs to really address some of the rural health care issues. 

I want to know what you have done to look at how the funding 

for the CBOCs is dealt with as it relates to the VISNs. 

Thank you. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Thanks, Mr. Michaud. 

This is an area that I have not quite figured out. I know that 

in our geographical definitions of where the VA sees itself located, 

and I have shared with this Committee urban, rural, highly rural, 

so two-thirds of our definitions have rural associated with it and, 

yet, when I go and look at our processes, they are very heavily focused on the large medical centers and primarily urban settings. 

And while there is outreach to the rural areas, I am yet to be 

convinced that it is to the point where I can say that a rural veteran living in location X gets the same access to quality health care 

as someone in the Bronx. I just cannot say that right now. 

Part of this hesitation on my part is to try to figure out how the 

money flows through this process and that is part of the reason 

why I had 21 VISN Directors come in, share with me their priorities. And I will say that while rural care came up, it was not high 

enough on the discussion point either on my part or theirs and I 

need to go back and do more work. 

Following those 21 VISN Directors, I have asked for a cross-cutting review of a number of programs. Women’s program is one. 

Rural health is another. Telemedicine is a third. So that I have an 

appreciation for what you are asking me, is how does this fit out 

there. 

In a progression of delivering health care from medical center 

centric through an outreach effort, through CBOCs, through outreach clinics, through mobile clinics that try to address the needs 

of veterans where they live and the longest reach for veterans as 

you describe in a rural area. I do know that four VISNs were engaged in this pilot. I was not aware that we were lagging in execution. I will make it a point to look into this and I am happy to provide you a report on what I find regarding them. 

Mr. MICHAUD. What about the Office of Rural Health? 


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Secretary SHINSEKI. The Office of Rural Health is established. In 

fact, the cross-cutting 3-hour briefing that I received was provided 

to me by the Director of that office. And in her presentation, she 

had VHA present, Members of VBA present so that the discussion 

was indeed cross-cutting across VA. 

Mr. MICHAUD. My question was, it is my understanding that that 

position is vacant or will be coming vacant very quickly and what 

type of—how quickly will you be able to fill that position and what 

type of individual will you be looking—— 

Secretary SHINSEKI. It may be coming vacant. That I need to 

verify. But I will assure you that we will fill that expeditiously if 

it is, in fact, being vacated. 

[The VA subsequently provided the following information:] 

Question 1: Is there, or will there be, a vacancy for the Director of the Office 

of Rural Health? What will VA look for in a person to lead that office? 

Response: Yes, there is a vacancy for the Director of the Office of Rural Health 

effective November 7, 2009, and recruitment efforts have already begun. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is looking for a candidate with the following 

knowledge, skills and abilities: 

1. Knowledge of the issues facing rural Veterans in accessing VA health care; 

2. Demonstrated skills in administering a complex program of existing services, 

and the ability to develop new services in response to Veterans’ needs; 

3. Experience leading a program in an organization as complex as VA, along with 

the ability to work effectively with multiple internal and external stakeholders; 

4. Demonstrated ability to keep abreast of major changes in trends or advances 

in rural health care and to assess the impact of proposed changes, legislative 

or programmatic, on the VA health care system; 

5. Knowledge of the mission, organization, program, policies, and procedures used 

in the VA health care system and related Federal (Centers for Medicaid and 

Medicare, Department of Defense, Indian Health Service) and private sector 

health systems would be desirable; and 

6. A clinical background to understand the health needs of Veterans and the 

health care delivery system would be highly desirable. 

Question 2: Please provide a status update on the rural health pilot project required by section 403 of Public Law 110–387. 

Response: VA continues to work through complex issues associated with implementing the pilot programs, such as transferring medical information and ensuring 

Veterans receive quality and coordinated health care. There are two issues that 

have impacted timely implementation of the pilot program: first, the definition of 

highly rural areas, and second, the statute’s provision that VA develop regulations 

defining ‘‘hardship.’’ The first issue developed because the legislation defines highly 

rural areas differently than VA does, so our analysts had to reconfigure data systems to determine what areas are highly rural based upon distance from VA medical facilities, as the statute requires, rather than drive time, as VA has historically 

done. VA notes Congress is considering legislation that would resolve these issues, 

but in the mean time, VA is developing an implementation plan for the statute as 

written. 

To date, VA has: 

• Determined which VISNs meet the statute criteria (VISN 1, 6, 15, 18, and 19); • Established an interdisciplinary work group to examine the cross-cutting issues 

associated with implementing these pilot programs; • Investigated acquisition, clinical, communication, evaluation and oversight 

issues, among others; • Communicated closely with appropriate stakeholders, including staff from the 

House and Senate Veterans’ Affairs and Appropriations Committees and staff 

from Congressman Moran’s and Congressman Perriello’s offices; • Analyzed and addressed complex issues associated with reconfiguring data systems to evaluate Veterans’ eligibility for participation in the pilot program, developing a participation form for Veterans and drafting a potential definition for 

the statute’s hardship provision; and • Developed an implementation plan currently undergoing internal review 

In the coming months, VA will assess which Veterans will be potentially eligible 

to participate and finish coordinating the implementation plan and begin addressing 


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pre-implementation items. VA will keep the Committee informed of further 

progress. 

Mr. MICHAUD. Thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Michaud. 

I would just like to point out, Mr. Secretary, that you are the 

first cabinet Secretary in the history of this republic to say that 

you have not figured that out yet. I thank you for your candor. 

Mr. Roe. 

Mr. ROE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

First of all, the GI Bill, I am very appreciative because I was able to use the GI Bill and I remember the $300 a month that I 

got was very helpful at that point in time as a student. And I am 

very grateful to the VA for that. 

And I think that these problems in the GI Bills we talked about 

last week in your office are manageable problems. I think these are 

fixable and it is a learning curve. There is no question about that. 

And you have gone to some extraordinary circumstances to try to 

solve this problem. 

And you are absolutely correct. What will happen is this will create the next group of leaders in our country. There is no question 

that will happen. 

Just a couple of things. On the rural, one of the problems with 

rural medicine or the CBOCs, they are not glamorous. We, as doctors, like to work in big hospitals and we call them the mother ship 

where everything, all the equipment and all that is. But the real 

care goes out in these outpatient clinics. That is where you can prevent the use and it is a very inexpensive way to provide care and 

preventive health care. So I think we ought to encourage that. But 

what Mike said is something that we ought to really work at big 

time. 

One of the questions I have, and we talked about it the other day 

somewhat, is homelessness among veterans. It is a real tragedy in 

America that we have the richest Nation in the world and we have 

veterans who served this Nation and who are homeless. So just a 

couple of comments from you on that. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Let me just touch the comments on rural 

health. I agree with you. And I would say that this a concept of 

delivery of health care that probably began about 10 years ago, 

maybe a little longer in VA, and that was the movement from the 

medical centers to provide delivered health care where 80, 90 percent of your day-to-day requirements are being taken care of in 

CBOCs and then outreach clinics and so forth. 

What that has done for us is to provide great emphasis on primary care practitioners and allowed us to get into the prevention 

health care model that veterans only go to the mother ship, as you 

call it, when they have to for acute care or tertiary care. 

And for our own purposes, when they go there, they are exposed 

to lots of things we would rather they not be exposed to. So taking 

care of business locally has other benefits as well. 

The next step, I think, in this delivered health care for the rural 

environment and maybe even the chronically ill patient is our investment in telehealth, telemedicine. It will allow us to provide 

that quality of care and contact with a health care professional, 

specialist in a way that will provide better day-to-day monitoring 


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rather than waiting for someone to feel badly enough to come in 

for help, that the chronically ill can have their vital signs monitored day to day. 

On the issue of homelessness, if I can move to that, I think I 

have mentioned that 131,000 veterans is the estimate who live on 

the streets of our country, sleep on the streets of our country every 

night. VA is committed to taking 131,000 veterans off of our streets 

in the next 5 years, a big task that we have taken on, but not doing 

it lightly, doing it with the intent to address all the other things, 

the missed opportunities that result in homelessness, jobs, education, mental health issues, dealing with depression, substance 

abuse, providing safe housing for veterans, getting them off the 

streets. 

It is more than just the issue of getting 131,000 people off the 

streets. That is sort of a physical challenge. If we are going to do 

this and sustain the gains we intend, we have to address all the 

other issues here and do better at job counseling. And we are working with Secretary Solis and the folks at the Department of Labor, 

working with Education, working with small business, and trying 

to raise the competitiveness of veterans either as workers or as 

owners of small businesses. 

In the VA, we have a veterans first contracting process and I am 

happy to report that we have done quite well in getting veterans 

competitive in that environment. The reason it is important for us 

is that our track record shows that veterans hire veterans. They 

know what they are getting. They are comfortable. They are not 

unknown quantities. So in a sort of larger discussion here stemming from homelessness to our priorities for giving veterans and 

veteran-owned businesses the opportunity to compete, I think all of 

it is in the discussion. 

Mr. ROE. Thank you, General. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Hall. 

Mr. HALL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Buyer. 

I would like to associate myself with both of your remarks and 

those of many other Members here in thanking and congratulating 

you on your work so far and at the same time not ending the 

daunting task you still have before you. 

I was impressed when we met last week and you said that the 

message you are trying to communicate down through the 290,000 

some people who work at the VA can be summed up as the answer 

is yes when the veteran is sitting across the desk. When a veteran 

comes in for help, asking for a solution to their problem, the answer is yes. Now let us figure out how to define the question and 

how to get there. 

And that is so much appreciated. I have repeated that a couple 

times to veterans in my district and they are cheering for you. 

We had, last week in my district, a job fair at the Castle Point 

veterans complex that was jammed packed and featured private 

sector and public sector folks who were there to talk about what 

jobs were available, who was hiring, what training was being offered. And there were many veterans taking advantage of it. I hope 

that is something that is, and I assume that is, something that is 

going on across the country and not just in our district. 


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The clinic in Goshen, by the way, the outpatient clinic, is new 

and running like clock work. The Director of Hudson Valley 

Healthcare gave me a brief tour. Every examining room was full. 

The ophthalmologist was seeing somebody. The dermatologist was 

seeing somebody. The general practitioner was seeing somebody. 

The cardiologist was seeing somebody. There were two people in 

the waiting room. And he said that their goal is not to have anyone 

wait longer than 5 minutes. 

And as Dr. Roe was saying, this is where you can really do, especially in these, not necessarily—of course, you need the big hospitals and certain things only can be done at the large hospitals. 

But if our more rural outpatient clinics can be run as this one is 

run, then I think VA is an example of how, as the Director himself 

said, how government actually can run health care efficiently. 

I have a couple of questions specifically. As you know, we passed 

a bill last year, the ‘‘Veterans Benefits Claims Modernization Act,’’ 

which required VA to submit in reports examining the effectiveness 

of various practices of the VA, in particular the work credit system, 

fully developed claims, hiring medical professionals at the VBA, 

and an evaluation of work training programs. And I was wondering 

if you could tell us what is the status of those reports. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I am not quite sure the status of the report, 

but let me just provide you a sense for what we are looking at in 

terms of claims processing. I think this is the focus of the report. 

We have three initiatives underway right now, one in Little 

Rock, which endeavors to relook our entire business process and 

make sure we have that right. We have another pilot underway in 

Providence that attempts to take information technology and apply 

it to our business processes to see what kind of benefit we get out 

of that. And in March of next year, we are standing up a virtual 

Regional Office that is going to be entirely IT focused in Baltimore. 

And between these three projects, we hope to get the kind of momentum in dealing with the backlog and claims processing that to 

this point have been basically incremental. 

At a time when we close out 85,000 claims and get in 89,000 new 

ones, it suggests that this is not just a numbers game. This is a 

bigger set of challenges. 

We have also opened up innovation discussions with the White 

House, with VBA, and OI&T and turned to the workers in VBA, 

the folks that do the claims processing, and asked them for good 

ideas on how to reengineer this process. 

We right now, in 10 days, have 3,200 recommendations and a 

quick review, that is 3,200 good ones of what came in. So we are 

putting all of this together and we hope to have some solutions for 

the challenges we have been struggling with here, at least for the 

9 months I have been here. And we will try to put this in some 

form to meet the reporting requirements that you have outlined. 

Mr. HALL. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I have other questions I 

will submit in writing. 

And thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

[No questions were submitted.] 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Hall. 

Mr. Walz. 

Mr. WALZ. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. 


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And, Mr. Secretary, as always, thank you for your service and 

your continued service and to your family for having you here. I 

know how much time you put in. 

A couple special thank yous and to Chairman Filner on this. The 

ruling on Parkinson’s this week was wonderful. And I know Chairman Filner was out in my district, in Rochester, Minnesota when 

the Grahams came to him and a lot of our folks out there are 

thankful for that. 

And I think the process worked right there. We heard from veterans. We waited for the data. We let it be a data-driven, scientific 

process. We came to a conclusion and we did not waste time. We 

made a decision. So I thank you for that. 

I would also like to say, as Dr. Roe said, the GI Bill for my father 

and myself were the reasons we had college degrees and moved us 

through the middle class. And so having that expanded is something that all of us take very, very personally. 

And I would have to say I appreciate your references, Mr. Secretary, on assumptions and being on a range. As a fellow red leg, 

you and I both know that firing that howitzer is not the most important thing. Hitting the target is the most important thing. 

And I will tell just a quick story. We, as we started to hear a 

little bit of the issues on the GI Bill, got a hold of our VBA folks 

in Minneapolis, sent them down a team of three to Winona State 

University last Friday, had all 34 of our veterans down there, 17 

had been paid, the other 17 knew exactly where the status of their 

claim was and when it would be taken care of. And all 34 left with 

a great appreciation. And those VBA folks were there to say yes 

and to figure it out. So you are adjusting just well on this one and 

I think that is what is really critical. So I thank you for that. 

Again, I sure do not want to sound like the broken record, but 

I am convinced and I think you maybe share this concern, Mr. Secretary, of getting at the systemic problems, whether it is claims 

backlogs, whether it is jobs as we heard Mr. Boozman talk about. 

I am still convinced we can do a better job of seamless transition, 

a better job of transitioning our warriors to veterans. 

And I know the first step is the virtual lifetime electronic record 

(LVER) and we are getting there. I do believe it is the first step. 

I think there is an ability here to be more collaborative as you 

talked about in Chicago. We can squeeze efficiencies out of the system like we ask families and businesses. We can deliver services 

better at less cost by not being duplicative. 

So I just have a couple of questions on this. The Offices of Seamless Transition in DoD and VA, what is the status of those, Mr. 

Secretary? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. The Interagency Program Office, the IPO, 

my understanding is that we have a Director appointed. VA is to 

provide the Deputy and we have a candidate that is in the process 

of being interviewed right now. And I am hopeful that very shortly 

we will have a Deputy Director for that position as well. 

In fact, our position was filled by an acting individual who was 

tremendous, did a great job in that position, fully acceptable to everyone except there was a certain rank required for that position, 

which this individual did not have and unfortunately we could not 


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nominate him. We would have been very happy to nominate that 

individual. 

Barring that, we have a candidate that is acceptable to both DoD 

and VA and we hope to have that person in place shortly. 

Mr. WALZ. Mr. Secretary, I am appreciative of that, of where we 

are going. I spoke with Secretary Gates last week out at the Pentagon on this and he is, of course, incredibly supportive of understanding that as we use our warriors, we are going to have veterans and it makes sense to seamlessly get them there. 

Are we doing a good enough job here in Congress of trying to 

meld this together, of trying to actually get to that? And do you 

think it would be helpful if we did something unprecedented and 

had you and Secretary Gates setting side by side to talk about this? 

Is it important enough to warrant that? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Mr. Walz, we would be more than happy. I 

think I am comfortable speaking for Secretary Gates as well. I 

think we would be happy to respond to the request. 

But on the other hand, I also know that a tremendous amount 

of work on his part and on my part has gone into standing up and 

getting real progress here. 

This all began when he and I were standing in line on the 21st 

of January, each of us waiting to be sworn in, and just a personal 

discussion about we need to do better here, had four and five meetings between us, and to a point now where in April, the President 

acknowledged that this was a major project and he charged both 

of us to develop a virtual lifetime electronic record. 

And we have some major products out there. Out in San Diego, 

we have a VA hospital and a civilian entity now exchanging data 

electronically, Kaiser Permanente and a VA hospital out there. So 

we have with this effort to create VLER made some real progress 

in 9 months. I expect that there will be more. But, again, we are 

happy to provide the reports in whichever format. 

Mr. WALZ. I absolutely agree. And, Mr. Secretary, and I recognize and I think many do and I think the VSOs recognize it, I 

think, in fact, you have made so much progress and you are being 

so up front about leading this, there is a sense of, this might finally 

happen after all these decades. 

So if there is a kind of a sense of urgency or kind of a sense of 

that we are wanting more, there is actually a sense of optimism in 

the room that this is a real big leap forward. So I appreciate that 

and all the work you have done on it. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. We have to do this. Sir, we have to do this. 

You know, on the one hand, we talk about the backlog issue. I 

mean, that is what happens if we do not put this in place. 

Mr. WALZ. I agree. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Youngsters who do not get benefits on time 

or do not get processed on time, this is the result of our not doing 

this. We have got to do this. 

Mr. WALZ. Well, I appreciate your focus on this. 

I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Walz. 

Mr. Moran. 

Mr. MORAN. Mr. Chairman, thank you. 

Mr. Secretary, thank you for joining us. 


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I appreciate the gentleman from Maine’s comments about and 

his questions about rural aspects of veterans’ care. 

I wanted to focus on a point in your testimony about Priority 8 

veterans, Mr. Secretary. You indicate in your testimony that a 

major initiative is to expand—the President has made a decision to 

relax the thresholds that were established in 2003 and you indicate 

in your testimony that up to a half a million new Priority 8 enrollees will be added to the VA system, health care system over the 

next 4 years. 

It is my understanding that all that has happened to date is that 

there has been a ten percent change or a change of 10 percent in 

the threshold and that we have now enrolled another 20,000 Priority—what were formerly Priority 8 veterans. Twenty thousand 

and half a million is a significant difference. 

What is the Department’s plan over the next 4 years and if we 

enroll a half a million—how many veterans are in Priority 8 today 

that are not accessing health care? If we enroll another half a million, is that all the Priority 8 veterans or what remains of that 

group? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. You know, one of the questions I have out 

is what is the size of the Priority Group 8 population. And there 

are some estimates. I do not have a good number for you today. 

But the 500,000 target by 2014 was seen as a major effort to bring 

Priority Group 8s into the inventory. 

You are correct. We opened registration on 15 June and to this 

point, 20,000 have applied. We set an estimate of 266,000 in the 

first year out through 2010. So we are early in that process. Some 

of this may be outreach and informing people, so we have doubled 

up our effort to make sure people understand that this is available 

to them. 

I expect the ramp will go up. But at this point, 20,000, you know, 

projected to the end of 2010 does not put us at 266.000. So I share 

your concerns. 

But I would also tell you I have asked folks to go and take a look 

at all the other categories, 5 and 7 primarily. Priority Group 5 is 

up 89 percent. Prior Group 7 is up 149 percent. And what I am trying to sort of figure out is whether these were potential Priority 

Group 8 folks who met a qualification elsewhere or whether these 

are truly 5 and 7 category veterans who because of the economic 

pressure have decided to come to us. 

There has been an increase in our ranks. That is clear. Priority 

Group 8s has not got off to the start we thought we might see, but 

it is still early in the process, the first month of the year. This 

could change over the course of the next 9 months. 

Mr. MORAN. Mr. Secretary, what is the change in criteria that allows what you estimated to be 260 some thousand to be able to enroll in the current time frame and then what changes in criteria 

do you anticipate making that then would enable the total of a half 

a million to be enrolled within the next 4 years? What are the incremental steps that the Department is taking? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Well, the criteria has had no real change. 

That is the criteria that goes along with Priority Group 8, which 

is primarily economically based, qualification in terms of their—— 


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Mr. MORAN. But you must be loosening that criteria in order to 

get more people eligible. And my question is, have you loosened the 

criteria and in what ways do you anticipate less restrictions, loosening the criteria to get to the full half a million? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Well, I can tell you that we have not loosened the criteria. The criteria was always there. I mean, it is defined in our Priority Group 8 descriptions, veterans eligible for enrollment noncompensable, veterans eligible for enrollment nonservice-connected. So those do not change. 

But it has to do with the economic conditions. At the time they 

were suspended, they were just taken out of consideration. Now 

that they are put back in, these criteria are not changed. They are 

the same criteria. 

Mr. MORAN. Well, what causes then people to be eligible today 

that were not eligible before? Their income? Maybe that is the answer. Their income went down just due to economic conditions, so 

it is no policy change at the Department? It is just difficult economic times? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Veterans with income and/or net worth 

above the VA national income thresholds and the VA national geographic income thresholds who agree to pay a co-pay. That is the 

Priority Group 8 category. 

And then within that category, veterans eligible for enrollment 

noncompensable, zero service-connected, and then various subcategories, then veterans eligible for enrollment nonservice-connected, 

veterans not eligible for enrollment, veterans not meeting the criteria above. So that is sort of the three criteria that describe the 

Priority Group 8. But, again, it goes back to income and/or net 

worth at or above national income. 

Mr. MORAN. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I will pursue this a little 

further with you or your Department. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I am happy to do that. 

[The VA subsequently provided the following information:] 

In 2009, VA opened enrollment to Priority 8 Veterans whose incomes exceed last 

year’s geographic and VA means test thresholds by no more than 10 percent. Our 

most recent estimate is that 193,000 more Veterans will enroll for care by the end 

of 2010 due to this policy change. 

In 2011, VA will further expand health care eligibility for Priority 8 Veterans to 

those whose incomes exceed the geographic and VA means test thresholds by no 

more than 15 percent compared to the levels in effect prior to expanding enrollment 

in 2009. This additional expansion of eligibility for care will result in 99,000 more 

enrollees in 2011 alone, bringing the total number of new enrollees from 2009 to 

the end of 2011 to 292,000. 

Mr. MORAN. I appreciate your service and appreciate your attendance today. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Moran. 

Mr. Rodriguez. 

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Mr. Secretary, let me thank you very much for 

your hard work. I know in the short period of time that you have 

been there, you have had a chance to run across the country and 

visit, so I want to personally thank you. And also, in all honesty, 

I also want to thank you for serving our country the way you have 

and continue to serve as Secretary of the VA. So I personally want 

to thank you for those efforts and I feel real comfortable that you 


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are serious about getting things done and having to deal with the 

bureaucracy that we also have to deal with. 

I know you have made some comments as it deals with rural veterans and ask you to continue, encourage you to move in that direction in seeing how we can best respond to those. I know that 

there is a pilot program that created four centers and wanted 

maybe later on for you to comment as to where we are at on that 

particular piece of legislation that created those pilot programs in 

trying to make something happen and whether we need mobile 

units to go out there. 

I have 20 counties, 800 and something miles through the border. 

I make those counties quarterly and still come up here during most 

of the week. And so I would hope that maybe through some kind 

of mobile units or other responses, and I know that there are some 

efforts out there, but we need to continue to work on that. 

I wanted to, and you might want to comment about that, but I 

want to comment about a couple of things. One, the suicide and 

congratulate you what has happened there. But I am hoping that 

as we not only talk to them over the phone that we go beyond that 

because if we have 300 and something calls a day that we actually 

maybe have caseworkers that reach out to those individuals, 

whether they might be suicidal or homicidal, and that we see what 

we might be able to do throughout the country. If we can prevent 

one suicide, I think it would be—I know it has been successful because I am sure it has done that already or at least one homicide. 

So I would ask you to comment about that. 

But before I finish, I also want to move, because we deal with 

some 7 or 8 million veterans and there are 23 million out there, 

most of the focus has been by the veterans organizations, and for 

good reason, on helping the veteran. And the veterans organization 

focus has been on that. But as you well know and as you go 

through there, we have some great people out there that are ready 

to do other things. 

In the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in Federal 

Emergency Management Agency, we have a sector there that funds 

programs for volunteerism and who better than during a natural 

disaster or a manmade disaster having veterans participating in 

helping out when a tornado hits, when there are floods. 

And I think the VA, in conjunction with Homeland Security, 

could come up with some unique programs where we have veterans 

ready and they have been trained, they know how to act during 

those disasters and how to best respond, and we could maybe go 

a little bit beyond that and do some things there where we could 

get our veterans engaged in responding. Fires, I mean, we could 

easily come up with units that are well-trained to go out in the forest fires and other types of examples. 

I also wanted not only that, but also with the DoD since you 

came from that, they spend millions of dollars in recruitment. Who 

better to recruit than the VA? And the DoD, I know, expends a lot 

of resources on advertisement. They could be engaged with reaching out to our veterans in helping in recruitment as well as the 

Homeland Security. 

And I know that there are other agencies out there like the 

Criminal Justice System, that are out there reaching out to some 


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of our veterans, especially those Vietnam veterans that find themselves incarcerated because, for example, when they try to selfmedicate since we were not doing what we should have been doing 

and now I know we are sincerely working at trying to meet those 

needs. 

I would ask you to see if you might comment on those comments 

that I have made. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Mr. Rodriguez, the mobile units are a concern of mine also. I know that as much outreach as we try to provide, there are still those very highly rural areas that we do not 

quite get what is needed. And the mobile units, clinics become crucial in being able to reach veterans wherever they live. So I have 

paid attention to this. I will look at it again to make sure. 

And I think you are talking about your own personal experience 

there in the San Antonio, down through the valley, that part of the 

country. I will look at that to see what kind of coverage we have. 

On suicides, I mentioned that this National Suicide Hotline, 

there have been 5,200 potential suicides in progress that were intervened and which literally people in the midst of crisis, authorities walked in and were able to help them. So the reason I think 

we are successful at this when someone calls the National Suicide 

Hotline, the person who answers it is a mental health professional. 

It is not just someone answering the phone. It is a mental health 

professional who is sensitive to, is listening for cues, recognizes 

some danger signals, and some of these interventions have been in 

progress. 

So we appreciate your concern about caseworkers and having 

professionals involved in this process. And we are expanding the 

numbers that we have in our inventory to accomplish that. 

I had not thought about volunteerism with DHS, but I will go 

take a look at that. You know, in the VA, we have a tradition of 

volunteerism. Many of our veterans come and donate their time in 

our hospitals and in some cases even in our regional offices to help 

make the best case for and help take the best care of veterans who 

come for services and benefits. 

But in terms of responding to disaster relief, I will consult with 

DHS there and see what is possible. 

You mentioned Vietnam veterans, incarcerated veterans. I think 

you know this. Every year, 40,000 veterans are released from our 

prisons. This is part and parcel of this larger discussion about 

homelessness. Some of them are there for being on substances and 

petty crimes that lead to incarceration. 

If we are going to address the whole issue, it is homelessness and 

all the things I talked about. It is jobs. It is education. It is mental 

health, depression, substance abuse, and also dealing with our incarcerated veterans and providing them an opportunity when they 

leave to have something to do, skills and be on a track that is going 

to keep them from taking a turnstile back to prison. 

And so this is also part of our discussion as we deal with how 

to take better care of our veterans. It is a very broad charter, very 

broad discussion, not just our hospitals, but it is caring for the veterans wherever they live and in whatever condition they find themselves today based on their histories. 

Mr. RODRIGUEZ. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 


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And I know that the VA has been about providing a service, but 

I know that a lot of our veterans also continue to serve our country. 

And these would be good programs, I think, that they are, you 

know, well experienced and who best to be out there. 

So thank you. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mr. Brown. 

Mr. BROWN OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being here today and particularly 

for that good exchange we had the other day up in your place. 

But my question is, in your testimony, you highlight and you 

evolve a VA model of health care that would expand VA’s partnership with local teaching hospitals for inpatient care. And I certainly applaud this vision. 

Public Law 109–461 authorized VA to enter into an agreement 

for the planning and design of a collocation, located joint use medical facility in Charleston, South Carolina, with the Medical University of South Carolina. To date, VA has not appropriated any 

funds to carry out the project. 

And could you give us an update on the status of this particular 

project. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Mr. Brown, I should have been smart 

enough to have some detailed notes on this. I promised you that 

I would give you an update. If I may, I would like to do that for 

the record. 

Mr. BROWN OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Okay. Thank you very much. 

This is something we have been working on for a good number 

of years and we feel like it is a good, workable solution to bring 

a higher quality of health care to our veterans. And so we were 

hoping, you know, that we could proceed with this model since we 

had some authorization back about, I guess, two sessions ago. 

And we feel like because of the, I guess, construction going on 

now in that area, this would be the ideal time to be able to jointly 

design something that would be more efficient for the VA patients. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. As I indicated to you when we discussed it, 

I owe you an answer here and I am doing some research now. I 

just do not have the—I am not satisfied that I have all the information. I would like to provide that to you. 

[The VA subsequently provided the following information:] 

The Charleston VA Medical Center and the Medical University of South Carolina 

have worked together to identify potential collaborative and sharing opportunities 

over the last several months. Areas of mutual interest include high cost equipment, 

parking, road issues, shared utilities, and administrative and clinical space. Collaborative efforts with various work groups have concluded that it is not feasible to pursue a co-located joint medical facility. This conclusion reflects our continued efforts 

through the Collaborative Opportunities Steering Group and the Collaborative Opportunities Planning Group, both of which have reviewed potential sharing and collaboration efforts between the two facilities. These groups have concluded it is not 

feasible to pursue a co-located joint medical facility. A replacement medical facility 

for Charleston is not currently a VA major construction priority. 

Mr. BROWN OF SOUTH CAROLINA. Well, thank you very much. 

Thank you for your service too. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Brown. 

Mr. Donnelly. 

Mr. DONNELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 


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And, Mr. Secretary, thank you so much for your service from the 

veterans of northern Indiana. I have spoken to them and they want 

you to know how grateful they are for the hard work you are putting in and for the changes that you are making. 

In regards to traumatic brain injury, and you were kind enough 

to spend some time at your office with me on this issue, in the 

transition that occurs from when these soldiers are active to being 

part of the veterans system, we have approximately four Centers 

of Excellence on TBI treatment throughout the country. 

But if a veteran comes out and they are some distance from one 

of those four centers, which are located throughout the country, 

what is your perception of where this is going to go in terms of providing treatment for that veteran who may be hundreds of miles 

from one of those facilities but needs care on a more regular basis 

or needs to have some medical assistance? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Well, I would just point out that though we 

focus on the four and soon to be five polytrauma centers for care 

of our TBI, that is really just a starting point. There is a network 

of other medical facilities that take over once that initial diagnosis 

and treatment has started. 

As the veteran migrates from that polytrauma center closer to 

home, we have second and third tier TBI capable polytrauma support entities in the network that looks after the continuing care, 

continuity of care that those veterans need and deserve. 

As they get closer to their final destination, home, wherever that 

is, the intent is to have something available to them close by. So 

that is the reason for that maintenance of treatment at second and 

third tier facilities. They are not polytrauma centers, but they do 

not need to be at this point if treatment has been successful. 

But it is just more than four polytrauma centers and it is a network of care that because of our electronic health records, there is 

great sharing of information amongst the treatment facilities so 

that veterans are, in fact, visible as they move through this process. 

I was looking for some data here. As of August of 2009, we have 

conducted TBI screening of veterans coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan. We do not get all the veterans, but the ones who enroll 

with us, we have screened over 330,000 veterans. Sixty-two thousand have screened positive for the initial evidence of some form 

of mild TBI or otherwise requiring a follow-up. 

As I say, 62,000 of them screened positive and consented to a follow-up. Forty-three thousand have completed that follow-up evaluation, so we have got some yet to be completed. And of that, 

22,000 we have confirmed as having a diagnosis of TBI. Roughly 

7 percent of the population we started with. 

So once we have them, there is a registry. We track them. And 

so even though we think they are okay for now, if there is some 

degradation in their condition, we have a history here that we can 

look back to. 

Mr. DONNELLY. Do you receive any type of registries from the 

DoD of soldiers who are coming out who have had, for instance, an 

improvised explosive device (IED) incident where they have been in 

a vehicle or been very, very close to an IED explosion so that you 


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know even though TBI can strike others, here are folks who are 

very likely to be in that category? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I know we get some information. I do not 

know if it is complete. Clearly for the serious incidents where you 

have some evidence of physical injury and then hospitalization in 

a DoD facility before they transition to us, very clearly we have terrific records. 

But as we know, when we talk about the mild TBI, there are 

folks who are treated locally and remain on operations. We are not 

as good at that. And this is part of the reason that the virtual electronic record process that we are trying to create between DoD and 

VA is so very important, so that all of this is captured, whatever 

that unit was doing, wherever this individual was located is part 

of his personnel record. You know, our intent is to have that so 

that we get to what you are describing and that is that seamless 

reporting. 

Mr. DONNELLY. And, finally, I just want to thank you and your 

staff for your efforts in regards to the South Bend Health Center, 

for moving that along, and for keeping it on schedule. It is an extraordinary positive for our area and also is not going to cost any 

additional money to the VA. So we want to thank you for your efforts in that. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. DONNELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I yield 

back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Mrs. Halvorson. 

Mrs. HALVORSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being here. What a pleasure 

and thank you for all your help. 

And, you know, out of all my advisory Committees, my Veterans 

Advisory Committee is the busiest. And, you know, I appreciate all 

the help that you have done and all the things that they have 

brought to you. 

But we have spoken about this before, but I have a hospital in 

my district, Silver Cross Hospital, and they are vacating their 

emergency room because they have outgrown it. And the community and the surrounding area would like to convert it to a VA 

medical facility because the lease on their current CBOC facility is 

not only up, but it is also way too small. They have grown out of 

it. 

And you and your staff are familiar with it and I know I had the 

Chairman out. In August, he saw it. And I appreciate the guidance 

that you have given on it. It is not only a beautiful facility, but it 

is really already state-of-the-art. It will be empty soon. And even 

Chairman Filner had bigger ideas than I even did for it because 

I know that one of your big issues are eliminating homelessness for 

the veterans community. 

But as you mentioned, you have got a lot of ideas, but Silver 

Cross also presents a lot of opportunities in that the facility can be 

used for a lot of the other programs that you talk about. And I also 

bring Silver Cross in a larger context that I believe that the VA 

should have a long-term perspective when presented with unique 

opportunities like this. 


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So when there is a smart opportunity in front of us that fits our 

needs like this facility, I think that we need to continue to talk 

about the need of the VA to be agile enough to be able to seize on 

opportunities like this. So we just have to remember we cannot 

allow bureaucracy to get in the way of great opportunities. 

One of the other things I want to talk about before you comment 

on Silver Cross is the backlogs. Now, I really commend you for 

wanting to make this another one of your top priorities and I am 

really happy to hear that in July, there was a record 92,000 claims 

that were closed. 

However, I hate to say this, but I look at that number with a 

very skeptical eye because we have heard of these cases time and 

time again, that I hear it is so much easier just to deny a claim 

than to go through and properly fix it in the first place. 

And I know that there are so many better ways to just go 

through, fix it properly the first time instead of denying it and then 

having to come back after someone says that they are going to appeal. 

So we have got to do something about the culture. We have got 

to put somebody’s name to a claim, not just a number because I 

think that we need to address these veterans as people and not 

numbers. And I am a military family. You know, my father is a 

veteran, my husband, and my son, so we have got to really do 

something about that. 

And then again, I just want to talk a little bit about the advanced appropriation and how much I appreciate that we are going 

to be doing something so that people know a year in advance. 

So with that, if you want to comment first of all on my big pet 

project, the Silver Cross Hospital, and then anything on the backlogs. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. May I start with the backlog? 

Mrs. HALVORSON. You sure can. You are the Secretary. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. It may be easier. You know, we are all referencing Mr. Hall’s comments. It is culture. And I am asking that 

we and my entire organization, the workforce, take on advocacy for 

veterans. 

That may just sound like a word, but what I mean by advocacy 

is when Shinseki walks in and says I would like to put a claim in, 

my intent is to help him put together the very best claim that will 

pass through the system the first time with a very high probability 

of success. And that takes a little different relationship. 

Whatever is there right now is what we are addressing. And this 

change in culture, change in attitude, it is going to take a little bit 

of time to get all the way down to the lowest level, but we will get 

there. Any good organization is able to do this and this is a good 

organization. I have got the right leaders in place. We are beginning that process. And we will change the culture. I assure you of 

that. 

You bring up a good point. A number of these claims, although 

less than I expect, are reopened claims. And so I take that this has 

to do with the level of trust and I am responsible for improving 

trust between veterans and this organization called the Department of Veterans Affairs. And I take that on and I am working on 

it. I will continue to work on it. 


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Once we get better processing standards, we will be able to demonstrate that kind of trust more clearly. Right now it is not the 

best of situations, but even there, we have put people to work in 

trying to facilitate and to be more productive without the easy outs, 

but be more productive on behalf of veterans. 

On Silver Cross, I think we started down the path thinking there 

was going to be one kind of arrangement. I think it was we thought 

it was going to be a donated cost-free facility and when that 

changed, we have had to go back and regroup. And we are doing 

that. I hope to have some better answer on exactly what the 

timeline is here for a decision. I am happy to come and provide 

that to you. 

Mrs. HALVORSON. Great. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I regret that we had to double back on this 

decision. But be that as it may, we will follow through and I am 

happy to come and report out. 

[The VA subsequently provided the following information:] 

The Department of Veterans Affairs continues to explore opportunities for use of 

the Silver Cross Hospital in Joliet, Illinois. The Edward Hines, Jr. VA Hospital is 

developing plans for the relocation of the Joliet CBOC that would allow VA to provide expanded outpatient services. VA officials from both Veterans Integrated Service Network (VISN) 12 and the Hines facility have met with representatives from 

the Silver Cross Healthy Community Commission, and local congressional Members. 

During these discussions and a tour of the emergency department of the existing 

Silver Cross Hospital, the parties determined that the building (approximately 

60,000 square feet) could be re-purposed for expanded outpatient services. 

However, it appears that the terms of the hospital-issued bonds place restrictions 

on the donation of any property and limit the Hospital’s ability to transfer it to only 

501(c)(3) non-profit entities, a designation for which VA does not qualify. VA’s General Counsel continues to research alternative arrangements that may honor the 

contractual limitations while still offering Veterans an opportunity for additional 

services. VA has begun exploring options to purchase the property in the event the 

donation is not feasible. Because this work continues, VA is not able to provide a 

timeline concerning when a decision will be made. 

Mrs. HALVORSON. Thank you. 

I yield back. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Ms. Halvorson. 

Mr. Snyder. 

Mr. SNYDER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Secretary Shinseki, it is good to see you again. When you were 

talking about when Shinseki arrives and you start asking questions on a certain topic, it had been years since I thought about 

this, but I worked in several areas in refugee camps overseas and 

I guess it was in the spirit of the leadership of General Shinseki. 

When I would arrive at a refugee camp, the first thing I would ask 

for in order to send the right message is show me the latrines. And 

I had put those images out of my mind until this very moment, 

Secretary Shinseki. It was just some terrible photographs I have 

got of those latrines they showed me in those tours of refugee 

camps. 

The CHAIRMAN. So the Secretary reminds you of latrines? 

Mr. SNYDER. Yeah, that is right. 

Sorry I was late getting here. I was at the Armed Services Committee, a hearing on Afghanistan. 

I wanted to ask about the GI Bill and some of the delays that 

we have had. I am going to talk about Stephanie Herseth Sandlin 

since she is not here. But I remember the day we passed the bill 


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on the House floor and nobody has been more committed to that 

bill than she has in her role as the Chairman of that Subcommittee. But she said to me it is not ready yet. We need a few 

more hours. We need a few more days. We have got some technical 

issues there that we have got to work out. It is going to cause problems when they try to implement it. 

And, of course, the legislative process is sometimes, you have to 

go when it is time to go and get the bill passed. But that was one 

of the things I thought about when I first started reading the press 

reports. 

And then the other is the discussion. I sat in some of the Subcommittee hearings, you know. And the Chairman was there, too, 

and the discussion about information technology. And I know this 

is still a work in progress, but my impression is that the challenges 

that you had were not personnel ones, that you had the right people and very good people. Is that a fair statement? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. That is true. 

Mr. SNYDER. And that the issue was the, you know, what pops 

up on computer screens, that it was a different kind of program 

than the previous GI Bill because previously the only thing they 

had to know was who I was and was I eligible. My benefit was the 

same essentially. But you now have a benefit that varies State to 

State. 

Would you describe the differences in the needs of the information technology? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Well, what I can describe is the Chapter 33 

Post-9/11 GI Bill requirements to provide the very best option to 

veterans State by State, school by school, tuition and fees as two 

critical pieces of information. 

In order to advantage veterans, we did not go to one school and 

take tuition and fees and set that as a standard. We went to the 

in-State institution that had the highest fees and then highest tuition and we took the top category so that when we put them together in favor of the veteran, there was going to be a good outcome. 

And so the veteran is given maximum flexibility on choice of 

course work. 

Mr. SNYDER. Now, when the veteran goes and sits down and goes 

online to try to figure this out, the technology you have is still pretty out of date; is it not? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. For the application—— 

Mr. SNYDER. For the application. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. The application is better than the technology 

we are using to issue certificates of eligibility and paying. The important part here is paying those fees and tuition which requires 

multiple screens, different States, different rates, different courses, 

and so forth. 

It is a combination of many steps. And right now the manual system, augmented by computer—I mean, the fact that we do it on a 

computer says there is some automation, but it is essentially a 

manual process inside that computer. There is no opportunity for 

information to be populated automatically, to be manipulated. 

And so it is a manual process and there are nine steps when my 

guess is that the other education bills probably two to three steps. 


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Mr. SNYDER. Do you anticipate that, say, a year or 2 or 3 from 

now that you will have a much more streamlined IT process both 

for the applicant but also from your side of things for doing the 

payments? 

Secretary SHINSEKI. We would like to have a much more powerful, much more robust option than we have today. We have not entered into that process. We were required to do some in-house 

work. So we have a contract with SPAWARs who are going to deliver to us in early November a phase three of this series of computer-assisted programs. 

And the phase three will allow us greater flexibility than we 

have today. And that process with phase three will be much better 

than what we have today. It will solve many of the time-consuming 

steps we are dealing with today and may get to the Ranking Member’s questions about standardizing a lot more than we have. 

The long-term solution is to get something robust that is probably available out there commercially that we can probably employ 

pretty quickly. That is the long-term cure. 

Mr. SNYDER. That is my understanding. I think the Chairman already issued the invitation for you to let us know if there is anything you need from us to help that along. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I am very happy to do that. And, in fact, I 

would say this. Although it is not the best solution for the longterm, phase three that we get in the first week of November or 

early November, I am told will solve all of our current sort of 

backups that we are dealing with. But it is still not the long-term 

approved solution. We have got to work at both. We intend to. 

Mr. SNYDER. Right. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Snyder. 

Mr. Buyer. 

Mr. BUYER. Mr. Secretary, Chairman Hall and Ranking Member 

Lamborn held a hearing, and I applaud their leadership, whereby 

they had testifying the Assistant Secretary of the Army for I believe it was Personnel that has oversight over Arlington. And we 

also had Mr. Cleland with the Battle Monuments Commission. We 

had testimony from the VA, Department of Memorial Affairs, and 

then we also had testimony from Katherine Stevenson who is the 

Assistant Director for Business Service at the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. 

So early on, I think even before you were sworn in, we had a conversation about the multiple standards with regard to our cemeteries. So I read your comments with regard to that last night, not 

about the multiple standards, but what you were doing. 

I wanted you to know, though, from the testimony, Ms. Stevenson brought up when she was asked if there was anything that we 

felt that she needed to help raise the standards within the Department of the Interior, you had received a commitment just like I 

have from Secretary Salazar to work on this issue, and they have 

a report that is going to be coming out here fairly soon, she said 

quote, this is her quote, ‘‘Actually, fairly recently, I think in 2004, 

an Interagency Committee was established and we looked very 

much forward to working with that Interagency Committee, but 

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solved and we would like to see the Committee reconstituted so 

that we can discuss some of these issues of mutual concern.’’ 

So I guess what I am going to ask of you is, is if you could ensure 

that this Interagency Committee is established between VA, DoD, 

and the Department of the Interior and maybe it also could include 

the Battle Monuments Commission so that they can work together 

on these mutual issues with regard to making sure of the standardization with regard to the internments. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Mr. Buyer, I am happy to do that. You and 

I have discussed the issue. I have made myself and our assets 

available to provide support, recommendations, and advice. 

Mr. BUYER. Okay. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. And that offer is still good. 

Mr. BUYER. All right. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I will follow up on this. 

[The VA subsequently provided the following:] 

National Cemetery Interagency Operational and Management Activities 

At the October 14, 2009, House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs (HVAC) State of 

VA Hearing, HVAC Ranking Member Buyer, voiced concern for conditions at Department of Interior (DOI)/National Park Service (NPS) national cemeteries, and 

suggested the Secretary reconvene the ‘‘Interagency Task Force on GovernmentIssued Headstones’’ composed of Department of Defense, American Battle Monuments Commission, NPS and National Cemetery Administration (NCA) representatives. The interagency Committee’s primary objective was the maintenance and 

preservation of stone headstones and markers, and it convened from December 2003 

through September 2004. One outgrowth was a headstone-cleaning study, funded by 

NCA and undertaken by NPS. The study commenced in 2004, and is slated to be 

complete in fiscal year 2010. 

At the hearing, the Secretary committed to providing assistance to DOI national 

cemeteries. As a follow-up, on November 10, 2009, Acting Under Secretary for Memorial Affairs, Steve Muro, wrote to the NPS Director, Jonathan Jarvis, offering 

NCA’s assistance, participation in a revived interagency Committee, and access to 

NCA Operational Standards and Measures. NCA staff has been actively collaborating with NPS staff on the following operational and management activities: 

NPS Nationwide Cemetery Preservation Summit 

NCA staff participated in a 3-day summit in October 19–22, 2009, organized by 

the NPS National Center for Preservation Technology & Training. Presentations on 

national cemetery standards, maintenance and operations, historical preservation, 

etc., were provided to 110 attendees (including staff from 7 of 14 NPS national 

cemeteries, and NCA staff). NCA provided a hands-on tour of VA Nashville National 

Cemetery and all aspects of its operations, including headstone raising and realigning operations. 

VA Advisory Committee on Memorials and Cemeteries 

At the November 18–19, 2009, Advisory Committee meeting, NPS Superintendent 

Brad Bennett, Andersonville National Historic Site and National Cemetery, serving 

as an ex-officio Member, provided an overview of cemetery site conditions and will 

present a progress report at the May 17–18, 2010, VA Advisory Committee meeting. 

NPS National Cemetery Summit, Greeneville, TN 

NCA staff participated in a follow-up NPS Summit on December 16–17, 2009, 

with NPS National Cemetery Directors and staff. The Summit focused on updating 

and revising the NPS policy document, Director’s Order # 61, which covers NPS 

cemetery operation and management policy and procedures, and discussions on national cemetery ‘‘best practices.’’ Following the Summit, teams continue to collaborate on ongoing assignments, which are due in mid-February. Participants also received a tour of the Andrew Johnson National Cemetery, where maintenance procedures were demonstrated. Approximately 26 representatives from 12 of the 14 NPSmanaged national cemeteries and 3 related NPS offices attended. 

Planned Future Collaborative Actions 


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• NCA has extended an invitation for individual NPS National Cemeteries to establish a ‘‘cemetery buddy’’ with a VA National Cemetery in their region to 

share management and operational expertise relevant to geographic challenges. 

• NCA will participate in the NPS Quarterly Conference Calls (3rd Wednesday 

of month: Feb. 2010, May 2010, Aug. 2010, Nov. 2010, etc.) 

• NCA staff will participate in the NPS National Cemeteries Annual meeting, 

May 2010 (NPS Poplar Grove National Cemetery, Petersburg, VA) and in May 

2011 (NPS Little Big Horn National Cemetery, Montana). 

• NPS national cemetery staff will be invited to attend NCA annual and regional 

quarterly conferences, which include hands-on training, best practices and policy discussions. 

• NPS staff will be invited to participate in management and operations training 

provided NCA and State Veterans Cemeteries staff at the NCA National Training Facility in St. Louis, MO. 

Mr. BUYER. Please do. 

The other is, it was not in your statement, but I want to work 

with you and work with Members of the Committee with regard to 

procurement reform and follow through with our conversations. 

The other is I look forward to working with you with regard to 

legislative technical corrections with regard to the GI Bill and work 

with other Members of the Committee. And I would ask that you 

work closely with, have your staff work closely with Ms. Stephanie 

Herseth Sandlin and Dr. Boozman. They and their staff have great 

levels of expertise and have worked with your staff in the past. 

And we would like to work on those technical corrections to put you 

in the best stead as you move forward into the spring. 

The other is Dr. Boozman brought up the issue with regard to 

the health bill as it moves through the Congress and through the 

Senate, making sure that we are able to protect the VA as a Health 

Department. There have been some amendments to do that. There 

have been some commitments, but I would like for your oversight 

to ensure that veterans will not be taxed that 2.5 percent tax. And 

I think that is being corrected and I acknowledge your public comments. 

The other is with regard to the IT, I would like to applaud you. 

Chairman Filner and I and Members of the Committee, we all supported unanimously the efforts to centralize the IT. And we had 

recognized that a lot of money had been spent over the years on 

a full menu of IT systems that had never been launched. And so 

I applaud your scrutiny of those programs. 

And in February, you had testified that, ‘‘That any more IT is 

very much integrated in those, meaning health activities, and that 

we should be sure that it is also how we parse that to ensure that 

is included so that our plans to provide services, health services 

and community-based outpatient clinics or open new CBOCs are 

not hindered by an inability to have that kind of flexibility.’’ 

So I, with regard to advanced appropriations, tried to make sure 

that your request that IT also be covered in advanced appropriations, even though it passed the House, it did not end up in the 

advanced appropriation. And, you know, I was the lone vote 

against the advanced appropriation. I felt that us not providing 

what you needed was wrong. 

And so as we move forward into the following budget cycle and 

you come back in a year, if you feel you need that budget and flexibility, please work with the Budget Committee and work with Congress so that we get you the flexibility that you need because of the 


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integration of health and IT. Excluding that, I think we have given 

you some challenges. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, Mr. Buyer. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for joining us today. 

Let me just note that you promised different Members responses 

to their issues and I hope that you will provide those to the whole 

Committee. We are involved with all of them, so—— 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I will. 

The CHAIRMAN [continuing]. Please make sure that happens. Let 

me also say that you have done some incredible things in just a 

short time. I think your style, though, is to hide your light under 

a bushel. And as you say, you are not running for office, but I think 

your Department is running for office. 

The things we had to do in your first appearance here, is to 

buildup the morale not only of the VA employees but the confidence 

that veterans have in the VA. One way to do that is to make sure 

people understand the great things you are doing. 

The homeless program that you have enunciated is an incredible 

commitment. It almost came up as an afterthought in just today’s 

testimony. We need to publicize that in ways that people understand what you are trying to do. You can have a visual in a random city like San Diego and in a homeless shelter, but I think we 

need your commitment to zero tolerance. It is an important message to get out there. 

The forward funding issue is a revolutionary step that will give 

all veterans and your employees confidence that we are doing the 

right thing. I hope the President will hold a signing ceremony to 

highlight this issue. 

Even the administrative steps you took just this week in reference to the Agent Orange presumptions—that decision affects 

thousands of people in a very positive way. In fact, all of the Vietnam veterans understand the importance of the decision—if they 

knew that it had been made. It gets around by word of mouth, but 

I think you have to use your Public Affairs Office to get this story 

out in a much more public way. It is just my advice. 

The pride that we have with what you are doing should be 

spread. Again, that will help the morale of not only your employees 

but the veterans who have had problems over the years with the 

VA. I hope that we can find ways to do that. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Mr. Chairman, thanks for your confidence 

here. And I, you know, I think we can improve in this area and 

we will make the effort to. I will be sure to take your counsel here. 

The CHAIRMAN. We have got to shine that light. 

There is another area that I would like us to think a little bit 

about. I want us to think outside the box. We have some problems 

that have been presented to the VA, which may, in term, be solutions to other problems. 

As an example, we have some facilities that have been underutilized both because of demographic changes and because of a model 

switch from an inpatient to an outpatient model in the VA. 

I would hate to see any one of those facilities leased out or sold 

when they could meet the needs in other areas, such as homelessness. I visited the hospital that Mrs. Halvorson talked about and 

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cerns. Every room was set out for a patient. It would be a great 

opportunity for homeless housing. We have an opportunity here 

and there are other facilities that the VA itself is thinking of selling or leasing. I think we should look at how they can solve other 

problems. 

Keep that in mind both in terms of the homeless problem and 

the north Chicago decision that you announced earlier. I think it 

was probably the only real integration of a military hospital and 

a VA hospital. I’m sure decisions were made between VA and DoD 

to make the most efficient use of the space. 

One thing that struck me that you might think about but you did 

not list is changing the culture to accommodate our women veterans. One of the things that we have heard in testimony is that 

when women veterans come for an appointment, they may have to 

bring their child or children. We’ve heard that doctors will not see 

them in some places if they have their children. We have got to 

start thinking about child care. It should not be outside our thinking. 

When you walk into the VA section of the north Chicago facility, 

the pediatric office is right on the first floor. What happens when 

you walk into a VA facility? There are kids running around. It 

changes the whole ambience. It is not a bunch of old guys in wheelchairs. Of course, I say that with respect. But you have kids jumping in the laps of veterans. You have got the veterans playing with 

the kids. It changes everything. 

You might just think about that as we think about the needs of 

our women veterans. Maybe we should put a pediatric office in to 

serve some of those children, and that also serves our veterans. It 

changes everything. There is life and there is action and there is 

humanity there. 

Again, it is a problem from one angle, but it is an opportunity 

to really change the way we are doing things. Just a couple of 

things I think you should keep in mind. 

If I just may briefly comment on a couple of things that others 

mentioned. You said you have to do a lot of work to serve the rural 

veterans. This Committee is going to do some more work on this 

issue, as well. 

From my travels around the country, it seems to me that one of 

the easiest ways to deal with the lack of access is to use the feebase authority much more liberally. Medical directors have the authority to allow a veteran to get care in their local community. 

They do not like to use that often. I suspect there are real concerns 

about quality and cost and I understand that when you are dealing 

with a system like the VA. 

However, if a medical director is concerned that he is going to 

be evaluated on his budget surplus at the end of a year, he may 

not use that authority as often. I think they need to be encouraged 

to use it without penalty. It should be used in a way that it helps 

our veterans with access and it might solve a lot of these access 

problems that we do have in rural areas. 

There is a bureaucratic dynamic here with the budgets that I 

think may be at play, not just the real concern that we should have 

with cost and quality. Just another thought. 


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On other issues around community outreach, is the homeless initiative. I think the amount of money is a half a billion dollars for 

community programs that are helping us in this area. I think we 

have to look at the VA as welcoming this kind of help all over the 

place. 

Our budget is about a $100 billion. Well, 1 percent of that is $1 

billion. One billion dollars is a lot of money, but one percent of our 

budget. I think you should to think about not only in homelessness 

but in other areas such as mental health. Some of the issues that 

other Members brought up as an outreach program to say we welcome all the help that is available. We are not a closed body. 

Your candor, humility and your sense that we need other people 

to help can be fostered by setting up a fund in all areas. 

I have one more issue and then you will get the last word. One 

of the things that we have talked about a lot in the last few years 

is accountability. We have had some scandals over the years and 

nobody ever saw employees fired as a result. Maybe there was and 

dealing with personnel is a tricky matter. 

We have had a couple of incidents take place during your administration with either the way we were treating cancer patients or 

the endoscopic cleaning. When we talked, you assured me there 

would be some personnel consequences but I do not know that 

there have been. 

Again, it is a hard issue to balance but I think people both outside the VA and inside the VA need to see some sense that we take 

this so seriously that people maybe lose their jobs. They are serious 

enough to have lost their jobs. 

The converse of that is also in the bonus area. If there are clear 

areas where we have fallen short and then to see the people in 

charge of that shortfall get bonuses, that sends the wrong message. 

Those are the accountability issues. Maybe you could start with 

that and then comment on anything else that I mentioned. 

I really enjoy working with you, Mr. Secretary. I think everyone 

here on both sides of the aisle are committed to veterans. We know 

you are. We want to help you in doing anything we can. We are 

out there a lot, too, and we have eyes and ears that we think are 

useful for you. We look forward to deepening that partnership. 

You have as much time as you need to either respond or to address any other issues that you feel are important. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I am not sure I can respond to all of them, 

Mr. Chairman. I would just say on accountability—— 

The CHAIRMAN. I hope Joan took notes. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I am sorry. 

The CHAIRMAN. I hope Joan took notes. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. Accountability is important with me. And I 

would just very quickly in response to some of the disappointments 

that have occurred you can be assured that people have been held 

accountable. And I am happy to come and provide details of that. 

You mention bonuses. I call it performance pay. I think we are 

talking about the same thing. It is based on performance. I look at 

performance two ways. One, you know, the brilliant stroke of genius that comes in and solves a heretofore unsolvable problem. 

That is one kind of performance. 


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Another one is there is no stroke of genius and there are some 

people who come, knuckle down, and just get the work done in 

spite of the fact that there is no recognition and expectations are 

high. I would offer there is room for adjudging that kind of performance as well. 

We have a process inside the Department where there is a series 

of reviews on folks who are being nominated for performance, increase in performance pay. Ultimately it ends up with me. We have 

not gone through that process yet this year. And when we have 

done it, I am more than happy to come and show you the results. 

I think you will be satisfied that accountability does count with me 

and with the leadership I have put in place. 

You mentioned some of our available facilities for homeless. I 

have asked that we take a look at our footprint and see how it can 

be used in other ways. Homelessness is one. Long-term care for patients that are going to need our help for a long time is another. 

And we talk about child care that should include some opportunity 

for families to be part of that solution. And so we are looking at 

all of that. 

We have raised the question about child care. I know there are 

a couple of anecdotal incidents in which women veterans reported 

not being able to keep their appointments because they showed up 

with children. I can assure the Chairman that guidance has gone 

out to correct that. Women veterans showing up with children will 

be seen with the exceptions that would make sense here and the 

exceptions being those settings in ICU or mental health where it 

would not be good to have children in that environment. We would 

find other ways to take the child and care for it. 

But right now the authorities are not within the Department to 

be able to provide child care services on our own and this may be 

one of those things that we have a discussion with the Chairman 

and Members of the Committee on how we might look for some 

help here. 

Mr. Chairman, I think I will leave the comments to that. 

The CHAIRMAN. Okay. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. I will reserve for a later time the $1 billion 

outreach suggestion. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you. 

Bringing in people from different parts of the country who have 

Parkinson’s and presenting them with their benefits based on decision of VA would be symbolic because there are people that many 

of us have been in contact with that have been fighting for this for 

many years. Let us show that we listened to them. Bring the veterans in, not just the politicians, they have suffered and we have 

heard them. I recommend something like that to you, Mr. Secretary. 

Incidentally, you talked about several pilots going on with the 

claims process. You started this by trying to deal with it by brute 

force, that is, hiring more and more people. I am not sure if that 

is going to work or not. 

I would urge a pilot with the so-called ‘‘Bilmes plan’’ that claim, 

if it is done with the help of a veterans service officer, be accepted 

at some level subject to audit and get the check out right away. If 


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you try that somewhere, it might be successful. Deputy Scott understands the program very well. 

When I talk about community outreach, one thing that has come 

up as a very innovative program around the country is Veterans 

Court. We have one model that is trying to be duplicated in many 

other places and could use a little seed money from the VA. 

When you have 300 homicides by Vietnam veterans, most of 

which—I am sorry, not Vietnam veterans—Iraq and Afghanistan 

veterans, most of which have been family members, you have to 

ask yourself what’s going on. These kids did not come back to kill 

their spouses or their children or themselves, so what is it that we 

are not, as a Nation, doing to prevent this. 

When these men and women are incarcerated or face the judicial 

system, it seems to a lot of people that a treatment rather than incarceration is the appropriate action. As you know, Buffalo has created the court and it is trying to be duplicated around the country. 

Some seed money from the VA to communities to get people together to include the prosecutors, the district attorneys and the parole officers would be a great, great contribution for the Nation. 

Those are just some ideas that I would line-item. 

Again, we appreciate your work. We appreciate your testimony. 

It has been a pleasure. 

I know you have reached out to every Member of this Committee 

and other Members in Congress for personal discussions and personal interaction. Everybody here appreciates it. They come up to 

me on the floor and say, I talked to your Secretary today and he 

is really great. So that has a real impact and we appreciate it. 

You have one more chance for the last word. Otherwise, we will 

be adjourned. I leave it to you, Mr. Secretary. 

Secretary SHINSEKI. No. I just would close with just thanking the 

Chairman. I always, you know, I look forward to this opportunity 

to come and present what we are doing and take the insights and, 

you know, the suggestions of Members of this Committee who have 

been at this much longer than I have. I appreciate that. I tell you 

that we take that advice and we go do something about it. And I 

intend to continue to do that. 

Thank you very much. 

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, sir. This hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:11 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 


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A P P E N D I X 

Prepared Statement of Hon. Bob Filner, Chairman, 

Full Committee on Veterans’ Affairs 

I would like to thank the Members of the Committee, Secretary Shinseki, and all 

those in the audience, for being here today. 

According to former presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson, ‘‘Patriotism is not 

short outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.’’ 

Our servicemembers and veterans have proven their dedication with their bravery 

and their sacrifice. America must continue to show her tranquil and steady devotion 

to the heroes that have fought on the battlefields and returned home. The way in 

which we treat our veterans has a direct impact on our ability to recruit men and 

women in the future, and is a reflection of the values and ideals we hold as a Nation. 

The VA oversees the largest integrated health care system in the country and operates a vast array of benefits programs meant to support and salute the soldier, 

sailor, airman and marine. Together, Mr. Secretary, we have taken great strides in 

the 111th Congress to provide our veterans the quality health care and services that 

they require and they have earned. I share your goal to build better lives for America’s veterans and their families and survivors. We have made a contract with our 

veterans that we must keep. 

First, I would like to thank you for requesting veterans funding levels that appropriately reflects the needs of our veterans more than any other budget requested 

by a President since I have served on this Committee. The House approved a funding bill that adds $14.5 billion over the current fiscal year and is the third straight 

budget to exceed the request of the Independent Budget. Although the funding bill 

has not yet passed, I am proud that we have put forward a budget that is worthy 

of the service and sacrifice of our veterans. 

I am also grateful for your leadership in working with Congress to establish a historic new approach to providing adequate and timely funding for veterans’ health 

care. Just last week, the House passed a bill that responds to late budgets by allowing Congress to fund VA health care 1 year in advance. This bill is a top priority 

of veterans service organizations because it will not subject VA to delays and uncertainty—and will finally allow sufficient time to plan how best to deliver health care. 

The VA is facing the issue of caring for our returning servicemembers, and the 

veterans of previous conflicts. The VA must rise to the challenge of meeting the 

needs of these veterans, especially in the areas of traumatic brain injury care, musculoskeletal conditions, and post-traumatic stress disorder treatment, maintaining 

its excellence in specialized services, and addressing access to care issues. These are 

challenges that we have begun to work on together and challenges we must meet 

as a Nation. 

Mr. Secretary across the Nation, veterans who applied for benefits under the GI 

Bill, have been told their payments are being delayed because of an overwhelming 

number of problems at both the Department and the schools. Although the VA has 

issued emergency checks for $3,000 to students, many veterans taking advantage 

of the program say they have not been told when or if they will be getting their 

full payments. We hope to hear today about the ongoing implementation of the Post9/11 GI Bill—which can only help our veterans become part of the economic recovery if they have access to their benefits in a timely way. 

The VA is also facing the issue of providing the benefits earned by our veterans 

in a timely way. The VA must address the growing backlog of claims filed by those 

that served in uniform. We must tackle the claims backlog that stymies our wounded veterans from receiving the benefits they earned and deserve. 

Mr. Secretary, today, we hope to hear your views on the successes and the challenges that face us and our veterans. We also are hopeful to hear how we can be 

best helpful in addressing those issues. 


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Mr. Secretary, the Committee is grateful to you, as well as the devoted employees 

of the VA, for the dedication to veterans that you all demonstrate day after day. 

No matter where we may stand on the current conflicts, we are here today because 

we must be united in seeing that our brave servicemembers are welcomed back with 

all the compassion this grateful Nation can bestow. 

f 

Prepared Statement of Hon. Eric K. Shinseki, Secretary, 

U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs 

Chairman Filner, Ranking Member Buyer, Distinguished Members of the Committee: 

Thank you for this opportunity to report on the state of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). We appreciate the longstanding support of this Committee and 

its unwavering commitment to veterans—demonstrated, yet again, through your 

support of advanced appropriations legislation for VA. Let me also express my 

thanks to the Committee and the President for a remarkable 2010 Budget that provides an extraordinary opportunity to begin transforming the Department. We deeply appreciate your confidence and the confidence of the President in building on the 

2008 and 2009 Congressional enhancements to VA’s budgets in those years. We are 

determined to provide a return on those investments. 

I would also like to acknowledge the presence of representatives from a number 

of our Veterans’ Service Organizations. They are our partners in assuring that we 

have met our obligation to the men and women who have safeguarded our way of 

life. We always welcome their advice on how we might do things better. 

Mr. Chairman, this past February, you held a similar hearing on the state of the 

Department, which allowed me to benefit from the insights and advice of Members 

of this Committee early in my tenure as Secretary. In turn, I was also able to offer 

early assessments of VA’s mission and some principles that I felt might help me 

quickly communicate my intent and direction for the Department. I have learned 

a lot in the last 81⁄2 months from some truly impressive people at VA; from veterans, individually and collectively; from the VSOs; from Members of this and other 

Committees, and from a host of other key stakeholders, who share both the Department’s interests and my personal passion for making VA the provider of choice in 

the years ahead. My current vectors for this Department remain guided by those 

principles that I mentioned in testimony in February. As I continue working to craft 

a shared Vision for the Department, one that will be enduring, we remain guided 

by our determination to be People-Centric—veterans and the workforce count in this 

Department, Results-driven—we will not be graded on our promises, but by our accomplishments, and Forward-looking—we strive to be the model for governance in 

the 21st Century. 

This testimony comprises a 9-month progress report on the state of our Department. 

We have been busy putting into place the foundation for our pursuit of the President’s two goals for this Department: transform VA into a 21st Century organization, and ensure that we provide timely access to benefits and high quality care to 

our veterans over their lifetimes, from the day they first take their oaths of allegiance until the day they are laid to rest. 

Every day 298,000 people come to work to serve veterans. Some do it through direct contact with veteran clients; others do so indirectly. But, we all share one mission—to care for our Nation’s veterans, wherever they live, by providing them the 

highest quality benefits and services possible. We work each and every day to do 

this faster, better, and more equitably for as many of our Nation’s 23.4 million veterans who choose us as their provider of services and benefits. Today, that number 

is roughly 7.8 million veterans. 

Veterans put themselves at risk to assure our safety as a people and the preservation of our way of life. Not all of them are combat veterans, but all of them were 

prepared to be. VA’s mission is to care for those who need us because of the physical 

and mental hardships they endured on our behalf, the cruel misfortunes that often 

accompany difficult operational missions, and the reality of what risk taking really 

means to people in the operational environment. 

The health care, services, and benefits we provide are in great demand—a demand which grows each year. More than four million new veterans have been added 

to our health care rolls since 2001. Some of our youngest veterans are dealing with 

the effects of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), traumatic brain injury (TBI), 

and other polytrauma injuries. We will provide them the care they deserve, even 

as we continue to improve the quality of care we deliver to veterans of all previous 


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generations—World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Somalia, Desert 

Storm, and a host of smaller operational deployments. The President’s decision to 

relax income thresholds established in 2003, which froze Priority Group 8 enrollments, has enabled many more veterans to access the excellent health care available 

through our Veterans Health Administration (VHA). It has increased VA’s workload, 

but we are prepared to accommodate up to 500,000 enrollees, who are being phased 

in over the next 4 years. While the Post-9/11 GI Bill offers serving military and our 

newest veterans expanded educational opportunities, it has challenged the Veterans 

Benefits Administration’s (VBA’s) paper-bound processes. We are moving aggressively to transform VBA from paper to electrons, even as the entire organization 

picks up the pace of producing more, better, and faster decisions both in disability 

claims and educational benefits. Finally, the honor of providing final resting places 

for our veterans remains a source of immense professional pride for the National 

Cemeteries Administration (NCA), and indeed the rest of VA. NCA consistently 

meets the demographic standards associated with veteran burials and exceeds expectations with regard to care and compassion for heroes’ families. NCA interred approximately 107,000 veterans in the past year in our 130 national cemeteries. Five 

new national cemeteries have been opened, and sixteen cemetery projects have been 

funded for expansion in the past year to address our requirements in this area. 

Our veterans have earned and deserve our respect and appreciation for their sacrifices and the sacrifices of their families. We at VA are privileged to have the mission of demonstrating the thanks of a grateful Nation. We are obliged to fulfill these 

responsibilities quickly, fully, and fairly—especially given the current economic climate. All of us, at VA, accept these increases to an already demanding workload, 

and we will meet our responsibilities at a high standard. Doing so will offer VA as 

a genuine provider of choice for those veterans who, today, choose to go elsewhere 

for insurance, health care, education loans, home loans, and counseling. To achieve 

this kind of standing with veterans, we must make entitlements much easier to understand and then far more simple to access. 

Each day, dedicated, compassionate professionals at VA do the extraordinary to 

meet the needs of veterans across a broad spectrum of programs and services. 

Among them: 

• VA is second only to the Department of Education in providing educational benefits of $9 billion annually. • VA is the Nation’s eighth largest life insurance enterprise with $1.1 trillion in 

coverage, 7.2 million clients, and a 96 percent customer satisfaction rating. • VA guarantees nearly 1.3 million individual home loans with an unpaid balance 

of $175 billion. Our VA foreclosure rate is the lowest among all categories of 

mortgage loans. • VA is the largest, integrated health care provider in the country, with 7.9 million veterans enrolled in our medical services system. • VA developed and distributed enterprise-wide, VistA, the most comprehensive 

electronic health record (EHR) in the country, linking our 153 medical centers 

to their 774 Community Based Outpatient Clinics (CBOCs), 232 veterans Centers, as well as outreach and mobile clinics. • VA received an ‘‘Among the Best’’ ranking for its mail order pharmaceutical program, ranking with Kaiser Permanente Pharmacy and Prescriptions Solutions, 

in a J.D. Power and Associates survey of 12,000 pharmacy customers. • A VA employee, Dr. Janet Kemp, received the ‘‘2009 Federal Employee of the 

Year’’ award from the Partnership for Public Service 3 weeks ago. Under Dr. 

Kemp’s leadership, VA created the veterans National Suicide Prevention Hotline to help veterans in crisis. The Hotline has received over 185,000 calls—an 

average of 375 per day—and interrupted over 5,200 potential suicides. • VA has staffed a Survivors’ Assistance Office to advocate for veteran and servicemember families. As the ‘‘Voice of Survivors,’’ its purpose is to create and 

modify programs and services to better serve survivors. • VA’s OIT (Office of Information Technology) office and VBA collaborated with 

the White House to create a program soliciting original ideas from VA employees and participating VSOs, ranging from improving process cycle times for benefits to increasing veteran-satisfaction with the claims process. Close to 4,000 

process-improvement ideas have been received. 

• VA operates the country’s largest national cemetery system with 130 cemeteries. 

• VA senior executives are accountable and responsible when these systems succeed and when they fall short. As of September 2009, VA maintained one of the 

lowest executive to employee ratios (approximately 312 career executives to approximately 298,400 employees). I have seen their dedication to serving veterans. 


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I am proud of our people and our accomplishments, but there have been challenges, missed opportunities, and gaps in providing the quality of care and services 

veterans expect and deserve. We will continue to look for and find our failures and 

disappointments; we will be open and candid with veterans, the Congress, and other 

stakeholders when we fall short; and we will correct those problems, take the right 

lessons from them, and improve the process to achieve the best outcomes. In recent 

months, we have discussed with the Committee lapses in quality control and safety 

regarding endoscopes and other reusable equipment, erroneous notifications of ALS 

diagnoses, and expensive IT initiatives that were not meeting program thresholds. 

Near-term challenges have been riveting. Since enactment, the new Post-9/11 GI 

Bill has been our top priority for successful implementation by August 3, 2009. 

These completely new benefits, requiring tools different from the ones available to 

us, resulted in massive Information Technology (IT) planning efforts on short 

timelines. Delays and setbacks required VA to exercise emergency procedures 2 

weeks ago to issue checks to veterans to cover their expenses early in program execution. Uncertainty and great stress caused by these delays were addressed through 

these emergency procedures, which remain in effect. We will mature our information technology tools to assure timely delivery of checks in the future. 

We must work short-term and long-term strategies to reduce the backlog of disability claims, even as they increase in number and complexity. In July, we closed 

out a VA-record 92,000 claims in a single month—and received another 91,200 new 

ones. We are consolidating and investing in those IT solutions integral to our ability 

to perform our mission while looking hard at those that have not met program expectations—behind schedule or over budget. In July, we paused 45 IT projects, 

which failed to meet these parameters. These projects are under review to determine whether they will be resumed or terminated. We know this is of intense concern and interest to Members of this Committee, and we appreciate your continued 

support and insights. 

In working these near-term demands, we are simultaneously addressing, in 2010 

and the years beyond, improvements to programs and new initiatives critical to veterans—reducing homelessness, enhancing rural health care, better serving our 

growing population of women veterans, and refreshing tired, and in a number of 

cases unsafe, infrastructure. 

To embrace these priorities, we have put in place a strategic management process 

to focus our stated goals and sharpen accountability. We are close to releasing a Department of Veterans Affairs Strategic Plan, in which I look forward to outlining 

for you the strategic goals that will drive our decisions over the next 5 years, and 

potentially longer. 

I’ve now engaged in 8 months of study, collaboration, and review of as many aspects of VA’s operations with as many of our clients, employees, and stakeholders, 

as the Deputy Secretary and I could manage. I’ve visited VA facilities—large and 

small, urban and rural, complex and simple—all across the country. I’ve spoken 

with leaders, staffs, and veterans. I also invited each of our 21 Veterans Integrated 

System Network (VISNs) directors to share with me, in dedicated 4-hour briefings, 

their requirements; their priorities; their measurements for performance, quality, 

and safety; and their need for resources—people, money, and time. I’ve also received 

multiple briefings from VBA leadership on the extent and complexity of the benefits 

we provide to veterans. This has been time well-invested—invaluable. 

The veterans I’ve met in my travels have been uplifting. Many struggle with conditions inevitable with old age; others live with uncertain consequences from exposures to environmental threats and chemicals; still others have recently returned 

from Afghanistan and Iraq bearing the fresh wounds of war—visible and invisible. 

Out of my discussions with veterans, three concerns keep coming through—access, 

the backlog, and homeless veterans. 

Access: Of the 23.4 million veterans in this country, roughly eight million are enrolled in VA for health care. 51⁄2 million unique beneficiaries have used our medical 

facilities. We want to ensure that any veteran who can benefit from VA services 

knows the range of services available to them. VA will continue reaching out to all 

veterans to explain our benefits, services, and the quality of our health care system. 

A major initiative which will expand access is the President’s decision to relax the 

income thresholds established in 2003, which prohibited new Priority Group 8 enrollments. We expect up to one-half million new Priority Group 8 enrollees in the 

next 4 years. 

Another initiative to expand and improve access is the evolution of our health 

care delivery system. About a decade ago, VA decided to move toward the system 

of care being provided in the private sector by turning its focus to outpatient care 

and prevention. As a result, VA’s 153 medical centers are the flagships of our nationwide integrated health care enterprise, and the Department also provides care 


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through a system of 774 Community Based Outpatient Clinics (CBOCs), 232 Vet 

Centers, outreach and mobile clinics, and when necessary, contracted specialized 

health care locally. This fundamental change in delivery of care, means organizing 

our services to meet the needs of the veteran rather than the needs of the staff— 

veteran-centric care. 

Our next major leap in health care delivery will be to connect flagship medical 

centers to distant community-based outpatient clinics and their even more distant 

mobile counterparts via an information technology backbone that places specialized 

health care professionals in direct contact with patients via telehealth and telemedicine connections. Today, we are even connecting medical centers to the homes of the 

chronically ill to provide better monitoring and the prevention of avoidable, acute, 

episodes. This means that veterans drive less to receive routine health care and actually have better day-to-day access. It also means higher quality and more convenient care, especially for veterans challenged by long distances; and, prevention will 

mean healthier lives. 

While this new, evolving VA model of health care is less about facilities and more 

about the patient, it is also more economically efficient and a better use of available 

resources. Health care centers that provide outpatient care, including surgery and 

advanced diagnostic testing, have lower construction costs compared to traditional 

hospitals. They better serve communities, and are more cost effective, than small, 

traditional hospitals with low numbers of veterans receiving inpatient care. To provide emergency and inpatient care when needed, VA forms alliances and relationships with local civilian facilities for that care. Outreach clinics also allow us to provide health care services in communities with smaller numbers of veterans. These 

part time clinics are situated in leased space, and provide in-person care closer to 

the veterans’ homes. 

Critical to improving veterans’ access to health care is our campaign to inform 

and educate them about how VA delivers care. Using social media Web sites, including MyHealtheVet and Second Life, we are making contact with veterans, including 

our Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom veterans, who did not respond to traditional outreach—lectures, pamphlets, and telephone calls. 

All of these initiatives to improve access are conducted with assessments of patient privacy issues. Privacy is important for all veterans, but we especially want 

women veterans to know that the VA will provide their care in a safe, secure and 

private environment that is designed to meet their needs. While approximately 8 

percent of veterans are women, only about 5.5 percent of VA patients are women. 

My intent is to create an environment of care that will attract more of them to the 

VA as their first choice for care. 

The disability claims backlog: Reduction of the time it takes for a veteran to have 

a claim fairly adjudicated is a central goal for VA. The total number of claims in 

our inventory today is around 400,000, and backlogged claims that have been in the 

system for longer than 125 days total roughly 149,000 cases. Regardless of how we 

parse the numbers, there is a backlog; it is too big, and veterans are waiting too 

long for decisions. 

In April, President Obama charged Defense Secretary Gates and me with building 

a fully interoperable electronic records system that will provide each member of our 

armed forces a Virtual Lifetime Electronic Record (VLER) that will track them from 

the day they put on the uniform, through their time as veterans, until the day they 

are laid to rest. 

VA is a recognized leader in the development and use of electronic health records. 

So is the Department of Defense. Our work with DoD is already having an impact 

on the way we are able to provide quality health care to our veterans. To date, VA 

has received from DoD two and one-half million deployment-related health assessments on more than one million individuals, and we are able to share between Departments critical health information on more than three million patients. Although 

our work is far from finished, our achievements here will go beyond veterans and 

our servicemembers to help the Nation as a whole, as have many of VA’s historic 

medical innovations. 

We are working with the President’s Chief Performance Officer, Chief Technology 

Officer, and Chief Information Officer, to harness the powers of innovation and technology. In collaboration with our own IT leadership, we intend to revolutionize our 

claims process—faster processing, higher quality decisions, no lost records, fewer errors. I am personally committed to reducing the processing times of disability 

claims. We have work to do here. But we understand what must be done, and we 

are putting the right people to work on it. 

Homelessness: Veterans lead the Nation in homelessness, depression, substance 

abuse, and suicides. We now estimate that 131,000 veterans live on the streets of 

this wealthiest and most powerful Nation in the world, down from 195,000 6 years 


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ago. Some of those homeless are here in Washington, D.C.—men and women, young 

and old, fully functioning and disabled, from every war generation, even the current 

operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. We will invest $3.2 billion next year to prevent 

and reduce homelessness among veterans—$2.7 billion on medical services and $500 

million on specific homeless housing programs. With 85 percent of homelessness 

funding going to health care, it means that homelessness is a significant health care 

issue, heavily burdened with depression and substance abuse. We think we have the 

right partners, the right plans, and the right programs in place on safe housing. 

We’ll monitor and adjust the balance as required to continue increasing our gains 

in eliminating veteran homelessness. We are moving in the right direction to remove this blot on our consciences, but we have more work to do. 

Effectively addressing homelessness requires breaking the downward spiral that 

leads veterans into homelessness. We must continue to improve treatment for substance abuse, depression, TBI and PTSD; better educational and vocational options, 

much better employment opportunities; and more opportunities for safe and hospitable housing. Early intervention and prevention of homelessness among veterans 

is critical. We have to do it all; we can’t afford any missed opportunities. 

The psychological consequences of combat affect every generation of veterans. VA 

now employs 18,000 mental health professionals to address their mental health 

needs. We know if we diagnose and treat, people usually get better. If we don’t, they 

won’t—and sometimes their problems become debilitating. We understand the stigma issue, but we are not going to be dissuaded. We are not giving up on any of 

our veterans with mental health challenges, and definitely not the homeless. 

We have approximately 500 partners in nearly every major town and city across 

the country helping us get homeless veterans off the streets. With 20,000 HUD– 

VASH vouchers from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and our 

$500 million to invest in 2010 to cover safe housing and rehabilitation for veterans 

we have been able to coax off the streets, we are going to continue reducing the 

number of homeless veterans next year, and each year thereafter, for the next 5 

years. 

I know that this Committee and the President are committed to helping VA end 

homelessness among veterans. We are going to do everything we can to end homelessness among veterans over the next 5 years. No one, who has served this Nation, 

as we have, should ever find themselves living without care—and without hope. I 

know that there are never any absolutes in life, but unless we set an ambitious target, we would not be giving this our very best efforts in education, jobs, mental 

health, substance abuse, and housing. 

Education: The President kicked off our post 9/11 new GI Bill program on 3 August, 2009. Two hundred sixty-seven thousand veterans have applied and been 

found eligible to participate in this benefits program this year, and we project that 

as many as 150,000 more may apply next year. The first time we did this, in 1944 

during World War II, our country ended up being richer by 450,000 trained engineers, 240,000 accountants, 238,000 teachers, 91,000 scientists, 67,000 doctors, 

22,000 dentists, and a million other college-educated veterans. They went on to provide the leadership that catapulted our economy to world’s largest and our Nation 

to leader of the free world and victor in the Cold war. 

Slow processing of enrollment certificates by VA and slower than anticipated submission of enrollment documents by some educational institutions delayed issuance 

of checks to schools and veterans. On 2 October, VA began an emergency disbursement of moneys nationally, working with the Treasury Department to provide almost $70 million in advance payments to more than 25,000 veterans in the first 2 

days of the program. These payments continue as a way to bridge the gap until the 

veterans’ routine, monthly payments begin. We will do whatever it takes to get 

checks into the hands of veterans for their education, and we will improve the delivery system to eliminate the barriers to effective distribution of benefits in future 

years. 

Jobs: This summer, I addressed over 1,700 veteran small business owners at the 

5th Annual Small Business Symposium on 21 July. I reminded them that Veterans 

hire Veterans because they know what they’re getting. Customers and partners 

value their skills, knowledge, and attributes and are eager to work with them. Just 

last fall, in a survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management, 

over 90 percent of employers said they valued veterans’ skills, in particular, their 

strong sense of responsibility and teamwork. 

VA puts veterans first in our contracting awards because we recognize the ontime, on-budget, quality solutions they bring to our contracting needs. In fiscal year 

2008, our unique ‘‘Veterans First’’ buying program resulted in VA’s spending more 

than $2 billion on veteran-owned small businesses. That represented 15 percent of 


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our procurement dollars, up 5 percent from the previous year. One point six billion 

dollars of that amount was invested in service-disabled, veteran-owned businesses. 

At VA, our experience is that veteran-owned small businesses have a high likelihood for creating new jobs, developing new products and services, and building prosperity. Increasing opportunities for veteran-owned small businesses is an effective 

way to help address many needs during this economic downturn. 

So, education, jobs, health care, and housing: We have work to do here; but we 

have momentum, and we know where we are headed. We are positively engaged 

with the Departments of Housing and Urban Development, Labor, Health and 

Human Services, Education, and the Small Business Administration to work our 

collaborative issues. 

A transformed VA will be a high-performing 21st century department, a different 

organization from the one that exists today. Beyond the next 5 years, we’re looking 

for new ways of thinking and acting. We are asking why, 40 years after Agent Orange was last used in Vietnam, this Secretary had to adjudicate claims for serviceconnected disabilities that have now been determined presumptive. And why, 20 

years after Desert Storm, we are still debating the debilitating effects of whatever 

causes Gulf War Illness. If we do not stay attuned to the health needs of our returning veterans, 20 or 40 years from now, some future Secretary could be adjudicating 

presumptive disabilities from our ongoing conflicts. We must do better, and we will. 

VA’s mission is inextricably linked to the missions of the Departments of Defense 

(DoD) and Health and Human Services (HHS)—and closely linked to the Departments of Housing and Urban Development, Education, Labor, and the Small Business Administration. We are not an independent operator. We administer the Servicemen’s Group Life Insurance program and are prepared to deliver benefits for any 

of the 2.25 million men and women of all Services and Components, who are insured 

through it. And, together with DoD, we operate two of the Nation’s largest health 

care systems—one for health care to meet operational commitments and one to deal 

with the long-term health care effects of those operations. As a result, we are a participant with HHS in discussions of how to best deliver health care. VA’s budget requirements are largely determined by the operational missions performed by the 

courageous men and women in the DoD and the entitlements and benefits which 

accrue to them for taking those risks. Additionally, VA is uniquely positioned to 

help with ideas and a model for providing more Americans with better, more costeffective health care, something VA has long pursued on behalf of veterans. 

Largely hidden from public view is an enormous VA effort to improve management infrastructure and implement a Departmental model of management that insures significant improvement in human resources, IT, acquisition, financial and facilities management. This effort is critical to strengthening both our performance 

and accountability mechanisms across VA. 

In all our missions, VA seeks to become more transparent by providing veterans 

and stakeholders more information about our performance than ever before. We 

want veterans to have the information they need to make informed decisions. We 

will be sharing more data about the quality of VA health care than ever before. 

Using our own Web sites, we are displaying information on quality including Health 

Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEDIS) scores, wait times, and Joint Commission results. 

Another element of transparency is disclosure when mistakes are made. We have 

aggressively disclosed problems with the reprocessing of endoscopes and with 

brachytherapy at several sites. These issues were found by our own staff and then 

publicly disclosed. In each of these cases, we notified Congress, the media, VSOs, 

and the patients. While this process is at times painful, it is the right thing to do 

for veterans and the Nation and will ultimately result in greater trust and better 

quality. 

Summary 

Our mission is to serve veterans by increasing their access to VA benefits and 

services, to provide them the highest quality of health care available, and to control 

costs to the best of our ability. Our efforts will remain focused on transforming VA 

into a 21st century organization—People-centric, Results-driven, and Forward-looking, and further refinement of our strategic plan to achieve our commitments and 

provide metrics for holding ourselves accountable. We are applying business principles that make us more efficient and effective at every opportunity. 

However, transforming VA and the current pace of military operations have required new levels of resources. The care of veterans, like the sacrifices they make 

on behalf of the Nation, endure for many years after conflicts are resolved. This investment in our veterans will, over time, provide increasing returns for them, for 


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the Nation, and for VA. Providing veterans the care and benefits they have earned 

is a test of our character. 

f 

Statement of Hon. Harry E. Mitchell, a Representative in Congress 

from the State of Arizona 

Thank you Mr. Chairman. 

I would like to thank the Members of the Committee, Secretary Shinseki, and 

those in the audience, for being here today. 

The Department of Veterans Affairs was supposed to implement the much anticipated Post-9/11 GI Bill by August 1, 2009, delivering thousands of veterans their 

much deserved education benefits. 

However, we have recently been made aware of problems with the timeliness of 

payments to students and their educational institutions. I have heard from many 

of these students in my district, the frustrations of not receiving their payments in 

time. 

It has added a layer of stress to our veterans, at a time when they should be worried about their studies, not their rent. 

This is, of course, not the only issue facing the Department. I hope to hear today 

about what the Department of Veterans Affairs is doing to improve internal backlog 

of claims. With the total number of claims reaching a million, I am eager to hear 

what the Department is doing to cut bureaucratic red tape. 

With Chairman Filner’s leadership, we took a big step this year by passing a 

funding bill that not only adds $14.5 billion, but also includes $48.2 billion in advanced funding. This advance funding will help ensure timely and predictable funding for veterans’ health care, something that should never be put at risk because 

of partisan budget debates in Washington. 

But clearly we still have a lot of work to do, and that’s why I am looking forward 

to today’s hearing. 

I yield back the balance of my time. 

Æ 


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