I 

108TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION H. R. 4399

To establish certain conditions on the Secretary of Veterans Affairs implementing any recommendation of the CARES Commission that would 

have the effect of eliminating or severely reducing any medical service 

provided to veterans throughout the United States at Department of 

Veterans Affairs medical facilities. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

MAY 19, 2004

Mrs. KELLY introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 

Committee on Veterans’ Affairs 

A BILL

To establish certain conditions on the Secretary of Veterans 

Affairs implementing any recommendation of the CARES 

Commission that would have the effect of eliminating 

or severely reducing any medical service provided to veterans throughout the United States at Department of 

Veterans Affairs medical facilities.

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Securing Access to 

5 Vital Entitlements for U.S. Veterans Act’’ or the ‘‘SAVE 

6 US VETS Act’’.
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1 SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 

2 Congress makes the following findings: 

3 (1) Veterans have sacrificed tremendously on 

4 behalf of their Nation and deserve the best quality 

5 health care and benefits that were promised to them 

6 by their country. 

7 (2) The Veterans Equitable Resource Allocation 

8 (VERA) formula, established by the Department of 

9 Veterans Affairs pursuant to section 429 of the fis10 cal year 1997 VA/HUD appropriations Act (Public 

11 Law 104–204; 110 Stat. 2929), has proved to be an 

12 ineffective means of allocating veterans medical care 

13 dollars fairly across the 22 national service regions, 

14 known as Veterans Integrated Service Networks 

15 (VISNs), of the Department of Veterans Affairs. 

16 (3) A study by the General Accounting Office 

17 released in February 2002 found weaknesses in the 

18 Department’s implementation of VERA, such as the 

19 omission of about 20 percent of VA’s workload in 

20 formulating each network’s allocation and VERA’s 

21 lack of accounting for the cost of differences among 

22 networks resulting from variation in their patients’ 

23 health care needs as well as it could, which ‘‘com24 promise VERA’s ability to allocate comparable re25 sources for comparable workloads’’. 
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1 (4) The same General Accounting Office study 

2 found that failure to implement the General Ac3 counting Office’s recommendations has resulted in 

4 the misallocation of $200,000,000 annually by the 

5 Department and $920,000,000 that would otherwise 

6 have been awarded to veterans health care facilities 

7 in the northeast and was instead granted to the 

8 south and southwest. 

9 (5) In May of 2004, the Secretary of Veterans 

10 Affairs announced the Secretary’s decision with re11 spect to implementation of recommendations of the 

12 commission established by the Secretary on Decem13 ber 22, 2003, known as the Department of Veterans 

14 Affairs Capital Asset Realignment for Enhanced 

15 Services Commission (or the CARES Commission). 

16 (6) That May 2004 decision of the Secretary of 

17 Veterans Affairs would diminish veterans’ health 

18 care options by breaking promises and pushing de19 serving veterans away from the veterans health fa20 cilities designed and built to provide care and treat21 ment to the veterans who have suffered on the bat22 tlefield. 

23 (7) The CARES Commission failed to include 

24 mental health as part of its criteria during its com-
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1 pletion of its February 2004 report to the Secretary 

2 of Veterans Affairs. 

3 (8) The May 2004 decision of the Secretary of 

4 Veterans Affairs to move acute and long-term psy5 chiatry beds, without proper and sufficient data on 

6 mental health of the affected veterans, is premature 

7 and ill-conceived. 

8 (9) The consolidation of services, closing of hos9 pitals, and removal of services, which the Secretary 

10 of Veterans Affairs claims will ‘‘enhance patient 

11 care’’, will only worsen and decrease services avail12 able to the Nation’s veterans.

13 SEC. 3. LIMITATION ON THE SECRETARY OF VETERANS AF14 FAIRS IMPLEMENTING CERTAIN REC15 OMMENDATIONS OF THE CARES COMMIS16 SION. 

17 (a) LIMITATION.—The Secretary of Veterans Affairs 

18 may not implement any recommendation of the CARES 

19 Commission described in subsection (b) until the health 

20 care funding allocation system for the Veterans Health 

21 Administration in effect on the date of the enactment of 

22 this Act, known as VERA (Veterans Equitable Resource 

23 Allocation), is replaced with a new, more equitable formula 

24 for the allocation of funds appropriated to the Department 

25 of Veterans Affairs. 
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1 (b) COVERED RECOMMENDATIONS.—This section ap2 plies to any recommendation of the CARES Commission 

3 that is contained in the report of that commission dated 

4 February 2004 and that would have the effect of elimi5 nating or severely reducing a medical service provided to 

6 veterans throughout the United States at Department of 

7 Veterans Affairs medical facilities. 

8 (c) CARES COMMISSION.—In this section, the term 

9 ‘‘CARES Commission’’ means the commission established 

10 by the Secretary on December 22, 2003, known as the 

11 Department of Veterans Affairs Capital Asset Realign12 ment for Enhanced Services Commission.

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