[House Hearing, 113 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
RHETORIC V. REALITY: INVESTIGATING THE CON-
TINUED FAILURES OF THE PHILADELPHIA VA
REGIONAL OFFICE
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON DISABILITY ASSISTANCE AND MEMORIAL AFFAIRS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON VETERANS' AFFAIRS
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 3, 2014
__________
Serial No. 113-88
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs
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COMMITTEE ON VETERANS' AFFAIRS
JEFF MILLER, Florida, Chairman
DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine, Ranking
GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida, Vice- Minority Member
Chairman CORRINE BROWN, Florida
DAVID P. ROE, Tennessee MARK TAKANO, California
BILL FLORES, Texas JULIA BROWNLEY, California
JEFF DENHAM, California DINA TITUS, Nevada
JON RUNYAN, New Jersey ANN KIRKPATRICK, Arizona
DAN BENISHEK, Michigan RAUL RUIZ, California
TIM HUELSKAMP, Kansas GLORIA NEGRETE McLEOD, California
MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado ANN M. KUSTER, New Hampshire
BRAD R. WENSTRUP, Ohio BETO O'ROURKE, Texas
PAUL COOK, California TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota
JACKIE WALORSKI, Indiana
DAVID JOLLY, Florida
Jon Towers, Staff Director
Nancy Dolan, Democratic Staff Director
SUBCOMMITTEE ON DISABILITY ASSISTANCE AND MEMORIAL AFFAIRS
JON RUNYAN, New Jersey, Chairman
DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado DINA TITUS, Nevada, Ranking Member
GUS BILIRAKIS, Florida BETO O'ROURKE, Texas
MARK AMODEI, Nevada RAUL RUIZ, California
PAUL COOK, California GLORIA NEGRETE McLEOD, California
DAVID JOLLY, Florida
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.
C O N T E N T S
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Friday, October 3, 2014
Page
Rhetoric v. Reality: Investigating the Continued Failures of the
Philadelphia VA Regional Office................................ 1
OPENING STATEMENTS
Hon. Jon Runyan, Chairman........................................ 1
Prepared Statement........................................... 31
Hon. Dina Titus, Ranking Member.................................. 2
WITNESSES
Ms. Kristen Ruell, J.D., Authorization Quality Services
Representative, Pension Management Center, Philadelphia
Regional Office, VBA, U.S. Department of Veterans' Affairs..... 3
Prepared Statement........................................... 32
Ms. Linda Halliday, Assistant Inspector General for Audits and
Evaluations, Office of Inspector General for Audits and
Evaluations, Office of Inspector General, U.S. Department of
Veterans' Affairs.............................................. 5
Prepared Statement........................................... 33
Accompanied by
Ms. Nora Stokers, Director, OIC Bay Pines Benefits
Inspection Division, Office of Audits and
Evaluations, Office of Inspector General
Mr. Al Tate, Audit Manager, Atlanta Audit Division,
Office of Audits and Evaluations, Office of Inspector
General
And
Mr. Jeffrey Myers, Benefits Inspector, San Diego Benefits
Inspection Division, Office of Audits and
Evaluations, Office of Inspector General
Ms. Diana Rubens, Director, Philadelphia Regional Office, VBA
U.S. Department of Veterans' Affairs........................... 7
Prepared Statement........................................... 37
Mr. Walter Tafe, Director, Department of Military and Veterans'
Affairs, Burlington County, New Jersey......................... 18
Prepared Statement........................................... 41
Mr. John Dorrity, MSW, CVA, Bureau of Veterans Services, Ocean
County, New Jersey............................................. 20
Prepared Statement........................................... 43
FOR THE RECORD
Hon. Michael Fitzpatrick......................................... 44
RHETORIC V. REALITY: INVESTIGATING THE CONTINUED FAILURES OF THE
PHILADELPHIA VA REGIONAL OFFICE
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Friday, October 3, 2014
U.S. House of Representatives,
Committee on Veterans' Affairs,
Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs,
Washington, D.C.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 11:08 a.m., in
the Geraldine Clinton Little Theater, Building 601, Pemberton
Campus, Burlington County College, 601 Pemberton Mills Road,
Pemberton, New Jersey, Hon. John Runyan [Chairman of the
Subcommittee] presiding.
Members present: Representatives Runyan and Titus.
OPENING STATEMENT ON CHAIRMAN JON RUNYAN
Mr. Runyan. Good afternoon, everyone, and I welcome this
oversight hearing, and the Subcommittee on Disability
Assistance and Memorial Affairs will now come to order.
Usually, when we hold DAMA subcommittee hearings, we are in
Washington. Today, I am honored and happy to be here with all
of you at Burlington County Community College, here in my home
district, not too far from my home in Mount Laurel. Although we
are far away from the normal hearing room in--on Capitol Hill
and further away from the CSPAN cameras, this is still an
official congressional oversight hearing of the House Veterans'
Affairs Committee, and hearing rules on conduct apply here.
Today's hearing will focus on the Philadelphia Regional
Office. In July, the full House Committee on Veterans' Affairs
held a hearing that revealed disarray and data manipulation at
the Philadelphia Regional Office. Accordingly, today's hearing
will seek an update on the situation at the regional office,
including concerns on mismanagement and manipulation to make
the backlog of claims appear smaller, and exceptional low
employee morale.
A regional office employee from another part of the Nation
recently shared an impression that he said that the regional
office structure has a--has an excess of management, and with
a--and a complete void of leadership. I think this observation
is telling when we look at what has been going on in the
Philadelphia Regional Office. Ms. Rubens is here today as the
new director of this regional office, and I hope that she will
develop this needed leadership at the regional office, because,
up to this point, I am convinced that the change is neither
desired nor sought by some complacent management in the
Philadelphia regional office.
Thus, this morning's hearing will also address whether the
Philadelphia regional office director has the appropriate
measures to address the failures that have recently been heard
about, and whether the director is prepared to act swiftly and
appropriately in response to the VA OIG's forthcoming report.
Continued claims of misunderstanding are simply not
believable. Even if they were, it would show such a level of
gross incompetence and disciplinarian action that would be
necessary, and nobody is fooled.
I would look forward to hearing from the regional office,
as well as the Office of the Inspector General, and the input
of various interested individuals and organizations that will
speak here today.
[The prepared statement of Jon Runyan, Chairman appears in
the Appendix]
Mr. Runyan. Also, as a matter of formality, I note that
Congressman Fitzpatrick has submitted a statement for the
record, and I ask unanimous consent that it be admitted into
the hearing record.
Hearing no objections, so ordered.
Mr. Runyan. And with that, we will begin introductions.
Seated at the witness table, we will have the first panel;
Ms. Kristen Ruell, Authorization Quality Services
Representatives, at the Pension Management Center; Mrs. Linda
Halliday, the Assistant Inspector General for Audits and
Evaluations, Office of Inspector General; accompanied by Ms.
Nora Stokes, Director of the Bay Pines Benefits Inspection
Division, Office of Audits and Evaluations; Mr. Al Tate,
Office--Audit Manager of the Atlanta Audit Division, Office of
Audits and Evaluations; and Mr. Jeffrey Myers, Benefits
Inspector with the San Diego Benefits Inspection Division,
Office of Audits and Evaluations. Panel one also features Ms.
Diana Rubens, Director of the Philadelphia Regional Office.
Once concluded, we will move on to Panel Two, which will
consist of Mr. Walter Tafe, Director of the Burlington County
Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, and Mr. John
Dorrity with the Bureau of Veterans Services, Ocean County, New
Jersey.
I thank all of you for being with us today, and I now yield
to the Ranking Member, Ms. Titus, for her opening statement.
OPENING STATEMENT OF DINA TITUS, RANKING MEMBER
Ms. Titus. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for
holding today's hearing. It is nice to see you on your home
turf as opposed to just in Washington. I also want to thank the
Burlington County College for their hospitality. This is a
beautiful campus, and as the fall hits and leaves start to
turn, it is a very nice place to be. I am from the desert of
Las Vegas so it is quite a nice change.
Today, we are going to be looking at, as the chairman said,
the work of the Veterans Benefits Administration at the
regional level. The chairman came and joined me in Las Vegas,
and I thank him for that, where we held a hearing on our
regional office located in Reno. It was one of the worst in the
country in terms of the backlog, so it was important that we
heard what some of those problems were and how we could address
them. So I am looking forward to hearing from the veterans and
the offices that are serving you here in southern New Jersey.
Chairman Runyan and I have worked closely for the past 2
years to ensure that all veterans have the benefits that they
deserve and that they have earned, and we have conducted
extensive oversight in a number of hearings, and so we know
well the challenges that these regional offices face when it
comes to trying to deal with and eliminate the significant
backlog. I am glad to say that the VA is making progress on
meeting its goal for 2015, and they need to get credit for
that. Despite the problems, good things are happening.
I thank Ms. Rubens for joining us today, and I hope you are
settling in to Philadelphia. So I thank your employees too
because you have to address every single kind of problem that
must exist out there, and I know you are charged with
fulfilling every type of demand. But as the chairman also
pointed out, we know that more needs to be done.
As we continue to address this problem, I have a couple of
concerns that I hope will come out in the discussion today. One
is the VBA's focus on all or nothing when it comes to
eliminating the backlog. That is important, but I am afraid
that that focus comes at the expense of other VA
responsibilities, and that includes the appeals process. You
don't want to rob Peter to pay Paul, or fix one problem by
creating another. If we focus too much on the original claims
process, I hope we are not building a big backlog when it comes
to appeals.
The second concern I have is that the VA seems to be
focused on just two metrics, and those metrics are average days
pending and claims accuracy. Now, that is important, but we
have seen that when you become overly focused on the numbers,
sometimes you suffer from the ecological fallacy; you can't see
the forest for the trees. We have got to remember that these
numbers represent real veterans, real people, and so let us
look at that from that standpoint, not just from some formula
on a chart somewhere. So I hope we can discuss that.
So, again, I thank the chairman for having this hearing. I
look forward to hearing from his constituents. We are going to
miss him very much in Washington. I am sorry that the chairman
has decided not to return to Congress. It has been a pleasure
working with him, and I can tell you that you have been well
served by his position on this committee. He has looked out for
all of the Nation's veterans, and you owe him a debt of
gratitude. So thank you.
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, Ms. Titus. And thank all of you too.
At this time, I want to formally welcome our first panel to
the witness table. Your complete and written statements will be
entered into the hearing record.
And, Ms. Ruell, you are now recognized for 5 minutes for
your testimony.
STATEMENT OF KRISTEN RUELL
Ms. Ruell. Thank you, Chairman. My name is Kristen Ruell. I
testified July 14, 2014, in Washington, DC, regarding gross
mismanagement and violations of law occurring at the
Philadelphia Regional Office. I want to thank you for the
opportunity to be heard today regarding the Philadelphia
Regional Office, and regret to inform you that things have not
changed, and accountability is greatly lacking for the
management officials involved in the alleged illegal behaviors
previously reported.
As a result of a preliminary OIG investigation, Fast Letter
13-10 was rescinded. The practices of data manipulations have
continued at the Philadelphia Regional Office. Instead of
creating an end product with an altered date of claim, there
are many instances where claims are in the computer and have no
dates of claims, as if we never received them from a claimant.
These veterans are worse off because before they had a false
altered new date of claim, and now they have no date of claim.
If the claim is old, I am seeing many instances where it is not
placed under control at all, which affects the VA's average
days pending.
The duplicate record problem has not changed. I was
informed that eventually VSOs will be able to create dates of
claims, which are creating--which will be creating duplicate
records. E-benefits is creating duplicate records as well. A
colleague of mine, Ryan Cease, has reported this to the VA
central office but, to date, has heard nothing regarding a
policy change.
On July 14, 2014, I testified to boxes of claims that were
processed in 2011, and were not scanned into Virtual VA, the
veterans virtual claim file system in place at the VA.
Management scanned the 60-something boxes of thousands of
claims into the system, but did nothing to rectify the veterans
denied for not having information that was sitting in the boxes
for nearly 4 years. There is no way to track people affected by
the management decision to let those claims sit for years.
The return mail that was boxed up with the claim and
stamped, cannot ID, were thoroughly reviewed, and most
employees that were on the project informed me that a majority
of the claims could be identified within a few minutes of
attention to detail, and some claimants were getting
retroactive benefits as a result of papers labeled cannot ID,
and had this not been reported, these boxes would have been
shredded after being held the required 1-year time frame.
Employees also reported to me that they were given
timelines to complete a box, when the timeline was not
reasonable. One employee resigned after the project because he
told me he felt extremely stressed and rushed. I have received
spreadsheets from concerned employees that are afraid to speak
up regarding the return project. One employee went back and
checked his spreadsheet, and noticed that a number of the cases
he marked, required action, have still not been tested and no
action has been taken, although management stated that the
project is finished.
I have seen a reasonable accommodation process get worse
for employees with disabilities. I feel as though the
management team in the Pension Management Center should not--
should be removed from the process altogether because they are
creating liability on behalf of the Agency due to their
inability or overt actions to fail to follow EEO laws. There is
no reason for them to follow the law because the Agency uses
taxpayer monies to pay off employees that have been wronged
and, at best, sends the management official to a training, for
them to return to the office and target their next victim, with
no consequences.
I have not seen any accountability for the managers
responsible for the violations that were investigated by the VA
OIG. This concerns me because they are still entrusted with
making decisions with our taxpayer monies and on behalf of our
Nation's veterans, when they have admitted they cannot
understand a simple Fast Letter language, and have left
thousands of pieces of veterans' claims, dating back to 2008,
in white boxes with no action taken to grant or deny benefits.
There is no training that can instill morals in these managers.
They seem to be playing by a different set of rules and using
our taxpayer dollars to have free legal representation, when
they are failing to provide timely accommodations for disabled
employees, and benefits to the veterans that put their lives on
the line for our Nation.
Employees repeatedly say to me that nothing is going to
change here, and refuse to report wrongdoings because they feel
that there is no accountability, and they will end up being
targeted by the people they reported. It is my sincere hope as
a citizen of the United States of America that the Department
of Veterans Affairs holds management accountable for
retaliation toward whistleblowers, and any alleged wrongdoings
that are substantiate in the upcoming report from the VA OIG.
[The prepared statement of Kristen Ruell appears in the
Appendix]
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, Ms. Ruell.
And with that, we will recognize Ms. Halliday. You are now
recognized for 5 minutes for your testimony.
STATEMENT OF LINDA HALLIDAY
Ms. Halliday. Chairman Runyan, and Representative Titus,
thank you for the opportunity to discuss the OIG's recent
oversight at the Philadelphia, PA, VA Regional Office.
Since June 2014, the OIG team members with me today have
spent considerable effort reviewing allegations at the
Philadelphia VARO, covering a broad range of issues such as
cooking the books, which refers to data manipulation, mail
mismanagement, duplicate payments, and inappropriate reprisals
against whistleblowers. To examine these issues, we began by
conducting an unannounced visit to the VARO on June 19, 2014,
then expanded our review to access the merits of over 100
complaints and allegations of gross mismanagement and potential
wrongdoing. The allegations include shredding and destroying
military and returned mail, hiding mail within the VAROs,
cherry-picking appealed claims, and failing to respond to
approximately 32,000 electronic inquiries from veterans and
their beneficiaries.
We considered complaints regarding the VARO's potential
misapplication of guidance contained in VBA's Fast Letter 13-
10, a high risk to data integrity and the financial stewardship
of veterans' claims. VBA's longstanding policy states the date
of claim is the earliest date of claim that is received at a VA
facility. In contrast, the Fast Letter guidance required claims
processing staff to apply current dates to older, unadjudicated
claims that were newly found or discovered in claims folders.
As we reviewed a sample of actions completed, we found the
guidance was used inappropriately at the Philadelphia VARO to
manage mail backlogs, and to re-establish canceled claims using
current dates. Further, the VARO did not comply with the Fast
Letter requirements to identify the discovered claims in the
electronics system, and to notify the compensation service in
central office after the claims were completed. VBA uses dates
of claims to control and manage its inventory. Incorrect
application of claims processing actions compromises the
integrity of the data on the time it reports that it takes to
report a veteran's claim. We also learned that some VARO staff
took exception to adjusting dates of claims, since the mere
application of the guidance results in misrepresenting the time
a veteran waits.
We concluded the Fast Letter guidance was inherently
contrary to VA's core values of integrity and accountability
for reporting accurate information to veterans. In response to
our management advisory of these concerns, the Under Secretary
for Benefits issued a moratorium on Fast Letter 13-10, while
VBA determines the appropriate way to move forward.
During our onsite work, we found mail bins in the VARO full
of claims and associated evidence since 2011 that had not been
scanned into the Virtual VA for electronic processing. We
became concerned that claims processing staff may be making
decisions without all required evidence. We also identified
serious control weaknesses involving electronic date stamps
used by the Pension Management Center staff at the intake
processing center to record dates of claim on documents
received. Each claims assistant was maintaining a key that
allowed access to the mechanism inside the date stamp where
they could adjust the electronic date used. As such,
opportunities existed for staff to alter and misrepresent dates
of veterans' claims. The Under Secretary for Benefits took
immediate action to prioritize scanning the claims in those
mail bins and associated evidence, and identified and
restricted the access to the keys to electronic date stamps.
While we previously reported weaknesses in the VARO
management in 2013, we had discontinued our mail management
reviews to allow time for VBA to fully transition and implement
its Intake Processing Center business model, but by 2014, VBA
had begun using its third business model, a centralized mail
model. Effective mail management is crucial to control workflow
at the veteran service centers. We are concerned that the
implementation of 2 new business models over a short period of
time has impeded the regional offices' nationwide ability to
accurately control and manage mail. We expect to continue to
provide oversight of mail management.
As we looked at duplicate records, we considered that VA
has a fundamental responsibility to be an effective steward of
taxpayer resources. However, we found the Philadelphia VARO
managers had failed to prioritize claims processing actions
required to initiate the consolidation and merging of duplicate
records. Because VARO staff did not timely request
consolidation, some beneficiaries received duplicate payments
to which they were otherwise not entitled. In spite of some
VARO action to correct the situation, more attention is needed
to strengthen the controls and make improvements in this area.
We also became aware of facility conditions at 1,400,
please excuse this, Wissahickon----
Mr. Runyan. Wissahickon.
Ms. Halliday [continuing]. Avenue. Multiple complaints were
also received regarding the work environment within that VARO
building located close to the main VARO. Physical conditions
were adversely affecting employees' health, morale and
productivity. This facility holds two of VBA's major call
centers. We identified several areas that violated VA's
Occupational Safety and Health Standards, resulting in the OIG
issuing a management implementation notification to the Under
Secretary for Benefits on July 23, outlining our concerns.
In conclusion, data integrity is a significant concern
throughout VARO operations, and trust in local leadership needs
to be restored at the Philadelphia VARO. Communications need to
be open and transparent, and leadership must ensure they align
their actions with their words. The level of distrust we
observed and heard from staff is most disconcerting. Trust is
fundamental to leadership, especially during times of change,
and it is too valuable of an asset to be taken for granted. In
a healthy environment, staff should not fear bringing issues to
their management, and everyone should work together to solve
problems. In this case, everyone needs to work together to
improve the delivery of benefits to veterans.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my statement, and myself and
my team will answer any question.
[The prepared statement of Linda Halliday appears in the
Appendix]
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, Ms. Halliday.
With that, I will recognize Ms. Rubens for 5 minutes for
her testimony.
STATEMENT OF DIANA RUBENS
Ms. Rubens. Good morning, Chairman Runyan, Ranking Member
Titus. Thank you for the opportunity to discuss operations,
leadership and employee morale at the Philadelphia Regional
Office.
The dedicated employees of the Philadelphia RO are
committed to improving the delivery of benefits to veterans and
their family. At the RO, we recently asked every employee to
reaffirm the commitment to the ICARE values, integrity,
commitment, advocacy, respect and excellence, putting veterans
and their needs first.
We understand our ultimate measure of success will be how
we serve veterans, and we are determined to succeed by
regaining the trust of each veteran we serve.
Leadership at the Philadelphia Regional Office has taken
the recommendations from the Office of the Inspector General
very seriously, and we have actively and quickly worked to
address issues that have been raised.
Let me assure you, since I assumed my new duties as the
director at the regional office in July, I have been, and will
continue to be, committed to fostering an environment and
culture where employees feel safe to raise issues. I am
inviting all employees to meet with me in small groups so that
I can hear their concerns and respond. This is an approach I
will continue to take as we strengthen our leadership team,
creating a more inclusive environment for our entire workforce.
The Philadelphia Regional Office is staffed by nearly 1,000
employees, administering disability compensation, vocational
rehabilitation employment, and pension benefits. In addition,
the regional office is responsible for two of VBA's call
centers.
The Philadelphia Regional Office service center
transitioned to the new organizational model in November of
2012, and began using the new Veterans Benefits Management
System in April of 2013. Today, approximately 95 percent of our
rating inventory and compensation claims is in this new Web-
based system. We are also collaborating with our veterans
service organizations to promote e-benefits, fully developed
claims and disability benefits questionnaires, and encouraging
our veterans service representatives to utilize the stakeholder
enterprise portal, a secure Web-based connection that
complements e-benefits, and gives access to VSO representatives
and other authorized advocates so they can assist veterans in
filing disability claims electronically.
This past fiscal year, the Philadelphia Regional Office
completed over 32,000 rating disability decisions. Our 3-month
issue-based accuracy rate is currently 95.1 percent, and our 3-
month claim-based accuracy is 88.9 percent. We are not there
yet, but we are continuing to progress towards the goal of
completing disability claims within 125 days. We all have--also
have one of our seven national call centers primarily answering
calls related to compensation claims, and they answer roughly
2,400 calls a day.
Our Philadelphia Regional Office also manages one of our
three national Pension Management Centers, and this past fiscal
year, over 300,000 rating and non-rating pension claims have
been completed with an accuracy rate of over 97 percent. We
also house the only national Pension Call Center, answering
about 1,600 calls a day.
The Philadelphia Regional Office Voc. Rehab and Employment
Division is currently providing veterans services to over 2,000
veterans in Pennsylvania and Delaware, and over 140 veterans
were rehabilitated this past year.
We do understand the serious concerns and the seriousness
of the concerns about the operations in Philadelphia that have
been raised, and I want to assure you we share those concerns,
and we are quickly taking to address--action to address those
issues. Some of the issues that Ms. Ruell raised just now I had
not heard previously, and will meet with her directly so that
we can understand the details better and address them quickly.
June 20, 2014, IG issued a management advisory concerning
claims processing in Philadelphia, and the 4 recommendations at
that time included in the advisory were concurred in with the
recommendations, and we have moved to address the issues thus
far raised by the IG. We have not yet seen the final report.
In addition to the issues raised by the management advisory
during a July 14 hearing before the House Veterans' Affairs
Committee, allegations were made that mail was being improperly
shredded at the Philadelphia Regional Office. The referenced
mail included returned mail, VA-generated correspondence that
the Postal Service has returned because it was undeliverable,
and military file mail, materials that we had been unable to
associate with a veteran's records because of that lack of
identifying information.
We had become aware of these issues 2 years ago, and at
that time had initiated steps to address the problems. I would
tell you that in 2012, procedures were put in place to ensure
newly returned mail was addressed timely, and no new additional
mail had accumulated since then. The Philadelphia PMC is also--
sorry, the Pension Management Center has consolidated all of
our military file mail into a properly marked location,
incorporates review of that mail weekly with the workload
assignments within our Pension Management Center. We have
completed that work, and today, the military file mail is up-
to-date. There are procedures as we continue to go forward to
continue those reviews in an effort to identify that mail and
the veterans that it belongs to.
While the IG was at the regional office to conduct a
thorough review of operations, the IG raised a concern about
the volume of unanswered telephone and email inquiries
requesting a status of pending claims. Over the past 2 months,
we have dedicated additional resources and have significantly
reduced the number of claims that are currently pending. We are
continuing to evaluate the number of employees assigned to the
activity, to ensure the continued provision of timely
responses.
At the direction of Secretary McDonald, the Philadelphia
Regional Office also recently conducted four town hall meetings
with our veterans, including two at the Philadelphia Regional
Office, one here in southern New Jersey, and one in Delaware.
In addition to the town halls, we conducted informational
seminars and claims clinics for any veterans looking for claim-
specific information. We learned we need to improve engagement
and communication with our veterans, with our veterans service
organizations, medical centers, and National Guard and Reserve
units. We found the experience to be beneficial. We will
continue to conduct those quarterly town halls to engage and
hear from our veterans and other stakeholders. We are also
scheduling congressional seminars and VSO representative
training opportunities this fall to continue to strengthen
those partnerships as well.
We remain committed to providing the best possible service
to veterans who reside in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and
Delaware, and continue to look for ways to improve our outreach
and partnerships to provide timely, accurate and comprehensive
assistance to those we serve.
This concludes my testimony. I look forward to answering
any questions.
[The prepared statement of Diana Rubens appears in the
Appendix]
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, Ms. Rubens.
And with that, we will begin our round of questioning. I am
pretty sure we are not going to stay under the 5-minute mark,
but--Ms. Halliday, and thank you for being here today and for
your testimony, and for all the hard work you have been doing
to keep the VA accountable, and to improve the department.
When we last heard from you July 14 in the full committee
hearing, you told us that the Office of Inspector General had
received serious allegations regarding the mail management, and
manipulation of dates of claims and other data integrity issues
at the Philadelphia RO. I understand from your testimony that
the investigation remains ongoing, so the OIG was unable to
publish a final report before this hearing. We look forward to
reviewing all the findings when it comes.
In your testimony, you described some of the many
disturbing allegations of mismanagement at the Philadelphia RO,
including the Fast Letter 13-10 to a more current date,
manipulating mail and other games.
It seems to me there is nothing confusing about what is
going on there, and management was, frankly, cheating and got
caught. My understanding, you have not a final report, can you
share whether your report will contain recommendation for
action to include disciplinary action on that issue?
Ms. Halliday. Well, our work is ongoing. We intend to lay
out the facts as we saw the--see the facts in the application
of the Fast Letter.
The issues are the misapplication of that guidance. We
found it difficult to grasp that the VBA officials entrusted
with administering a broad range of benefits had such a hard
time implementing the guidance.
One of the major problems at the Philadelphia VARO is they
did not do a reporting of the exceptions to the compensation
service in VA headquarters. That compromised the audit trail to
determine exactly how many transactions were processed.
We are looking at this very closely. We will issue a
report, we will share with the department any area where we
feel that the actions have been inappropriate for VA to decide
the administrative action.
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, and we look forward to it.
You also noted that VBA is challenged in its attempts to
work through its claims backlog, while implementing the
electronic claims process, and your testimony noted that an
increase in oversight is needed at all levels.
As of the OIG's April 2013 report, the Philadelphia RO was
just 20 percent compliant with the operational area's review.
You visited many--you visit many regional offices annually; why
do you believe that this particular RO dropped so significantly
since your 2009 review?
Ms. Halliday. I believe that there were approximately 90
vacancies when we were in there that existed. That has a
serious impact on operations. I believe employee morale and the
distrust embedded in the Philadelphia VARO has a lot to
contribute to that.
Mr. Runyan. Thank you. And also the testimony commented
that when allegations of duplicate claims payments were
reviewed, it was not management's priority to address improper
payments. I think this is tremendously offensive to the
taxpayer. A balanced workload is also not a priority. We can--
as can be evidenced by inattention paid to dependency claims
and appeals.
If neither workload management nor fiscal stewardship are
priorities, what do you see as the priorities there? Just to
get it out?
Ms. Halliday. I believe what is driving this is to meet
production metrics, at the expense of making the right
decisions and processing a veteran's claim according to how it
should be processed.
Mr. Runyan. All right. I think most of us would probably
agree with that.
Next question is for Ms. Ruell. And thank you again for
coming and providing your testimony. I would say that every
time I have spoken to you, and I think Ms. Rubens has commented
on it, you shine a light on something else that needs to be
fixed. And, you know, going through that, I would wonder that
Ms. Rubens may start to have lunch with you on occasion to
figure out what the pulse of the office is.
I would say Congress and the American people are aware of
the relationship you highlighted previously. Your previous--you
previously testified that you were targeted by managers, and
your name was given to those who turned in for wrongdoing. You
were suspended, you needed reasonable expectations, and you
were denied promotion, and you were better qualified than other
candidates. As of July, the treatment of employees and veterans
by their--the management of the Philadelphia RO was a national
embarrassment, and based on the OIG testimony, the hostility of
the workplace persists without remedy.
Can you describe to me any steps that leadership in the RO
has taken to make an office place where employees can feel safe
in suggesting new practices, or blowing a whistle on
wrongdoers?
Ms. Ruell. I don't think that anybody that worked in the
Philadelphia Regional Office feels safe whistleblowing. I can
honestly say it is not a good thing, it is a terrible
experience that you have to go through because even some
employees will treat you a certain way because they are mainly
worried about getting a promotion. So Diana Rubens has had town
hall meetings with employees, however, employees, on a daily
basis, report to me and say that they don't feel like anything
is changing. So the problem is if--I believe since she has
come, she is open, if I send her an email, she responds. If I
tell her a problem, she attempts to address it, but she has
said to me, and I can see with my own eyes every day there,
that she can't micromanage the entire Philadelphia Regional
Office. So I believe that nothing is going to change at the
place that we work at until the people that we have to report
to can be trusted. I don't feel, and I am speaking on behalf of
most of the employees that are employed there, I would say, a
very high percentage, they lost faith in the managers. I would
never feel comfortable reporting anything to anybody in the
front office of the department that I work at. They have done
nothing to make any changes, and in return have come after me
for any suggestions I have made that would never benefit me,
that are for veterans and taxpayers. So I feel that it is not
realistic to have to tell the director every time there is a
problem or a suggestion, because she has to manage the entire
building. So I don't think anybody feels comfortable
whistleblowing or making any type of suggestions because the
department heads are not acting the way Ms. Rubens is acting.
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, and again, disturbing.
I think I asked you this same question and I want you to
elaborate some more than you did in your opening testimony, but
talk a little bit more about no date of claim situation that
you noted.
Ms. Ruell. Yes. We have a virtual system where the claims
are sometimes scanned right into the computer, and there is an
employee that sends me an email almost every single day that
she is working, and tells me that she finds claims in Virtual
VA that have no date of claim. And I don't process claims on a
daily basis, so I can't speak to any number, how many there
are, but it is disturbing to me that every morning when this
person does her work, some days she will have 10 or more of
these claims, and they are claims that are sitting in the
system that, had she not worked on another claim associated
with it, we would have never known that claim was there. So it
is concerning to me, number one, that this one person is
finding these, and the other employees aren't finding them, or
what I would say ignoring them, and I understand why they are
doing this because you have a choice at the end of the day to
not have a job anymore, or to get your points, so most people,
when it is time to wrap up and go home, need to leave and they
can't do the right thing because that would jeopardize their
job.
Mr. Runyan. Thank you.
Ms. Rubens, one of the stunning realities that has emerged
from this past year of trouble at the VA is the extent to which
managers are willing to retaliate against employees who blow
the whistle on questionable conduct of their leaders, or even
just offer constructive criticism of policies and procedures.
We have just heard more testimony from Ms. Ruell about ERO's
mistreatment of employees who expressed their concerns. At the
July 14 hearing of the House VA Committee, addressing VA
issues, under Secretary Hickey, said, ``intimidation or
retaliation, not just against whistleblowers but against any
employee who raises their hand to identify a problem, is
absolutely unacceptable.''
As recently as this past Monday, Secretary McDonald had
stated that ``at VA, we take whistleblower complaints
seriously, and we will not tolerate retaliation against those
who raise issues which may be--which may enable VA to better
serve veterans.''
Ms. Rubens, if taken concerns of whistleblowers seriously,
and assuring their fair treatment is such a priority to the top
leader of the administration and your department, it seems to
me with Ms. Ruell's testimony that it has not really been a
priority of the management of the regional office to address
the issue. Can you respond to that at all?
Ms. Rubens. Sir, I would tell you that since my arrival,
one of the things that I have worked to do is ensure that
employees feel that they do have a place to come if they have
concerns. I am most interested to hear more about the concern,
particularly of those claims that have no date of claim. If
they are being identified every day, we need to know about that
so that we can identify the process.
As I continue to build my team, and the strengths of my
team, we will continue to work on an understanding of the
importance of employees who bring problems forward, that they
need to be reviewed and addressed, and they need to be done in
a fair way. That, for us, it is about serving the veteran, and
if we have holes in our process or gaps in our process, we need
to know about those. We cannot accept a sense of fear or
intimidation on the part of employees in terms of bringing
those things forward, and I won't accept it.
Mr. Runyan. And relating to the phrase gap, in many of your
town halls, many veteran service officers have told you that
the veterans office often get what they call a stall letter in
the mail, asking for more information, when they have already
sent in the necessary documentation.
I know, I hear it every day, the veterans are getting
increase--increasingly frustrating, and the frustration flows
right back to the VSOs, and obviously, you know, the veteran is
being denied at the end of the day.
What are you doing to change that process to make sure that
we are not technically, I mean, stalling. There has got to be a
miscommunication in the way your processes work if the veteran
and the VSOs are saying you have the data, you need to process
a claim, but yet they are getting a letter saying they need
more, and the stories we are hearing is many times it is
duplicate information that they are sending back in.
Can you talk about how you are going to challenge and try
to change that process to make it work?
Ms. Rubens. Yes, sir, and I would tell you part of the
challenge is making sure that we, as an organization are taking
enough time to review the material that we have. We have
reduced the number of claims in our veterans service center for
disability compensation by nearly 5,000 claims over the last
year, but we can't do that at the cost of quality and accuracy
of the decisions. We continue to engage in training. This year
we took part in nationally-sponsored training due to the funds
provided by Congress at the beginning of this calendar year. We
will continue to build that expertise within our organization
because we have to ensure we are looking at the material we
have. If there are systemic issues, we will work to identify
whether they are individuals, whether they are teams, whether
they are different kinds of work, and ensure that the training
is addressed to ensure that if we have the material, we are
ready to make the decision.
Ultimately, it is about the quality and the timeliness of
that decision we make on behalf of each and every individual
veteran.
Mr. Runyan. And I am just--really just make a statement and
I am going to hand it over to Ms. Titus.
From data manipulation to telling an acting RO director to
ignore congressional staffers, there is always an excuse and it
always seems it is misinterpretation or a misunderstanding.
From where I have--where I come from and the way I was
brought up, stepping up and saying you were wrong is the first
step to fixing it, and I don't think we--I don't think anybody
gets the sense that anybody is willing to do that a lot of
times. You are like, well, you know, well, we will fix it this
way. Admit you were wrong and fix it, and I think it will go a
lot further in building the confidence and the trust back in
the VA.
And with that, I will yield to the Ranking Member, Ms.
Titus.
Ms. Titus. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Ruell, your comments about you don't think anything is
going to change, and that people are still very frightened and
uncomfortable working there, are very concerning to me,
especially after we heard the new secretary say this is a
priority, you heard General Hickey say it is a priority, you
heard Ms. Rubens say that she is trying to meet with employees
and wants to hear your story. You really don't believe it is
getting any better?
Ms. Ruell. No, because I don't think Ms. Rubens can fix all
of the problems in the regional office because she has a
management team under her that is responsible for different
departments, and the people that are in charge, at least in my
department, I still see them doing things to make numbers and
not to care about a veteran. An example is an end product 407
claim. I just raised a question last week to my supervisor
because the--there is something called an informal claim. If
you look at the legal definition of an informal claim, it has
to be something that is not substantially complete. If you then
turn and look at the definition of substantially complete,
there are about five criteria; one being a statement of income.
To me, the word statement is singular. I looked at an
application that a veteran has filled out, and there is an
income block with about maybe 15 different types of income,
maybe 10, I am not sure. There is net worth and there is
income. Our managers are instructing the coaches, which are the
next level of managers, which are instructing their team, to
informalize claims if all of the income is not there.
Now, that is not what the law says. The law says you need a
statement of income. Once we have that, we have a duty to
assist that veteran and get the extra information on the claim.
Instead, we are informalizing the claim and sending them a
letter, which is probably what Mr. Runyan was referring to as a
stall letter, saying thanks for your application, however, it
is not a formal claim, you have a year to come back. Well, then
the claim will come in with a new date of claim. So I get those
claims and I pick up the phone and I call the veteran, even if
I am just doing a quality check on the claim or I am
authorizing, and I ask--sometimes there are only two things
missing on the application. To me, that is a substantially
complete application.
I raised that question and I was told the VA interprets a
statement of income as all of the income section filled out,
because the whole section is their statement of income.
So what I see, based on management in my department, is
they will interpret any rule or any law to their benefit to get
an end product cleared. And it bothers me because an end
product being cleared is not helping the veteran. And when I
come to work, I thought we were supposed to help veterans, so
it upsets me when I am given an answer like that because I
don't--the way that I was trained, I did go to law school, to
read a statute or a law, it is not the way that the managers
are interpreting laws in my department. And I don't know what
you can do about that because when I raise the issues, in the
past I have been told please don't make any more suggestions,
or do you think I don't know how to do my job. And then there
are consequences, so I just sort of, for a while, stopped and
made my suggestions through other people that they respect more
than myself, but I feel most employees see this and they have
no interest when they notice something is wrong in bringing it
up.
Ms. Titus. Well, that sounds like that can be a policy
change in terms of how you interpret the--but we have heard a
lot about how you measure performance and how you hold
employees accountable, and many of the employees of the VA are
veterans themselves, and a lot of promotion or merit or bonus,
or whatever you want to call it, is based on certain metrics or
certain statistics. You think that is not a good way to do it,
it sounds like, and I can see that. If you fill out more cases
and pass them on, and you get more of a bonus because it looks
like you have done more. What would you suggest would be a
better way to evaluate real accomplishment and real service to
our veterans?
Ms. Ruell. I would like our office to be measured on the
amount of people we help or give an honest answer to, instead
of how many claims are cleared in a month because, if you look
at the performance and if you really look into the system, you
get a certain amount of points for completing a case.
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Ms. Ruell. There are different types of cases we process
and different teams. Someone can be on a team and have to do a
case that has to do complex income calculations and write a
letter that is 10 pages, and someone else will have to do a
case where the veteran dies, and they have to hit one button
and some--even sometimes there is a system-generated letter
that goes out. Well, people don't want to do the cases that
take longer because they are not going to get their production
element at the end of the day, so they are constantly looking
for things that are easier. And I see it, I am on the quality
team, and at the beginning of the month you see the kind of
claims that are done. You will see a lot of bad dead people at
the beginning of the month because know their quality is going
to be pulled.
So I think it is a horrible way to measure at the regional
office, because I don't feel that we are doing the best we can
to serve veterans. I think we are boasting about numbers.
Ms. Titus. Yes. I would ask Ms. Halliday, that report that
you all are working on that is in progress is very damning. I
mean I don't see much in there that brags about what is
happening. And I know when you all issue a report, you issue
very specific things that need to be addressed. For example,
you talk about the health environmental safety conditions at a
couple of these call centers. Not only is that bad for the
employees, it is bad for the records because they can't be kept
secure.
As you go through this report, are you issuing those
recommendations now, and are they being addressed and is there
a timeline, or do we have to wait until the whole report is
finished?
Ms. Halliday. We have adopted a practice within the OIG to
issue management notices to the Under Secretary for Benefits
when we find issues that we think need immediate attention. So
my first management advisory, when I put a team in there right
after June 19, was to address the Fast Letter. A second
advisory was issued on the facility conditions at that other
facility that houses the call centers. Based on the information
we provided, we felt we had sufficient evidence to be right on
what we were saying, and our expectation is that immediate
action would take place. With the first advisory, after I put
the team in on date of claim, I made a personal phone call to
the Under Secretary for Benefits to say you have a problem. And
I didn't want any surprises on her part, I wanted her to know I
expected immediate action. Then, that following week, I went up
to the VARO myself to make sure my team was moving forward with
allegations and that people would talk with us and not have
fear of reprisal. I made a personal visit to the Philadelphia
VARO to make sure that people were aware that there were
protections, and we needed to hear exactly what was happening
so we could fix the systemic problems.
So we do use a process that gives early notification. We
may tweak some of the recommendations as we get the final
details associated with reviews of duplicate payments that
might have something specific that we haven't spoken to yet,
but there was a sharing of information with that goes to the
VARO on duplicate payments so that they could take immediate
action, and then we will address character what we saw in the
report and lay the facts out so that any, if appropriate,
administrative actions can be taken.
Ms. Titus. And then if actions have been taken during the
interim while you are working on the report, will it reflect
that as well?
Ms. Halliday. We won't say that in the report.
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Ms. Halliday. I think that there are some confidentialities
with disciplinary actions taken where individuals are involved.
We are going to make a recommendation that we see a need for
appropriate action. But addressing confidential information
could compromise the ability for a removal action, if
appropriate.
Ms. Titus. And, Ms. Rubens, are you working on some of
these things that you all have been notified of along the way?
Some came before you were there.
Ms. Rubens. Thank you, ma'am. I appreciate the opportunity
to respond.
In fact, when Ms. Halliday traveled to the Philadelphia
Regional Office, VBA's Deputy Under Secretary and I both
accompanied her to make sure that there was a clear
announcement that we wanted everybody to feel comfortable
talking with the IG. Mr. Punmil [phonetic spelling] actually
indicated that if someone had a different sense, to let him
know as well, so we were working very much to make sure it was
going to be an open opportunity for employees to engage with
the IG. Upon receipt of the notice of the conditions at the
call centers, I would tell you I was just getting on board and
had been eyeing some space in our current building that had
recently become vacated by the Social Security Administration.
My thinking was we needed to get our call centers back.
Frankly, their second management advisory was a big lever from
my perspective. We have already engaged General Services
Administration, we have acquired the space and are beginning to
work to fit it out so that we can get those call center folks
back into the building right away.
From scanning completed claims to addressing returned mail,
my guidance was immediate. We needed to address these things,
and ensure that the process was in place not to let these
things occur again. And so we continue to look for any of that
feedback. We just got a list yesterday from the IG regarding
the specific duplicate claim payments that they have
identified. I have got that out with my staff already, working
to identify which claim type it is, with a guard--sorry, a
guidance that we will not have another inaccurate duplicate
payment go out with action--without action having been taken
before the end of this month, whether that is to provide due
process, or whether that is to stop one of those duplicate
payments. And so every time we get something substantive, we
are working, we are not waiting for that final report, we are
going to take action immediately.
Ms. Titus. That is encouraging.
Well, Ms. Ruell said that she can't go to you, she can't
expect you to micromanage, but it is at the middle level that
people need to kind of change direction or renew trust, or
respond to people who are working at her level.
How--what are you going to do to change that middle level
that is under you, but is in charge of different divisions
perhaps that needs either to be removed or trained, or
inspired, whatever it might be?
Ms. Rubens. Correct. And I would tell you that part of my
goal is to make sure that I had a chance to try and meet, and I
have invited, and we have got nearly 1,000 folks, have invited
individually folks to come and sit and talk with me. I have
begun to compile some of the trends that I am hearing and the
concerns that folks have. That said, if their allegation is as
serious as Ms. Ruell has identified, I do want you to come to
me. And while I may not be able to do everything all at once,
those things that are this critical I need to know of
immediately so that I can set that right. And in the meantime,
as I move forward completing meetings with all employees, I
will begin to engage at all levels of the regional office,
well, how do we address what I have heard, both from a
leadership standpoint in terms of how are we bringing
consistency, and how we engage with employees and communicate
with employees from my level all the way down, and ensure that,
in fact, we get beyond that concern and fear that I have heard
here today, because I do believe that we have got a lot of
awesome employees in the Philadelphia Regional Office who come
to work every day with that focus on how do they help a
veteran. And we need to make that environment conducive to
doing just that.
Ms. Titus. One last quick question, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Halliday, we have heard it so many times when we have
looked at specific regional offices that this report is just
Philadelphia, or it was just Reno, or it was just Phoenix, but
then you look a little further and you find it is systemic,
that some of the same problems exist no matter where the
regional office is.
Do you anticipate that is going to be the case, or you know
that is the case based on some of your findings in
Philadelphia?
Ms. Halliday. We do know that to be the case. We designed
protocols to look at each VARO, but we are consistently
tweaking those based on what we learn from site to site.
I will tell you at the July House hearing I said that we
had gotten 6 serious allegations from VAROs. We are working
through those. The interesting thing is they are all different,
and some were systemic, some were caused by one person
misinterpreting regulations. But my Benefits Inspecting teams,
they take all of what we have learned from site to site, and
then we design protocols to make sure we will capture this.
What Ms. Ruell said about no data claim, that is being
factored in to how we are moving forward to look at this.
Ms. Titus. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Runyan. Thank the gentlelady.
The testimony on operation and management of the
Philadelphia RO, I think everybody agrees, remains concerning.
Though the OIG's final report has not been finalized, I kindly
ask that all parties remain prepared to address the concerns
raised today in greater detail once we have a chance to review
that final report.
Again, thank you all. You are now excused, and we will
welcome the second panel to the table.
Ms. Titus. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman was trying to ask
you a question.
Voice. I said do you have any questions for us. If not--
okay.
Mr. Runyan. All right, at this time I welcome Panel Two.
Mr. Tafe and Mr. Dorrity, thank you both for your coming and
your testimony today. We--your written statement will be
entered into the hearing--your complete written statement will
be entered into the hearing record.
And with that, Mr. Tafe, I will now recognize you for 5
minutes for your testimony.
STATEMENT OF WALTER TAFE
Mr. Tafe. Chairman Runyan and Ranking Member Titus, thank
you for allowing me to provide testimony to the committee
surrounding the issues at the Philadelphia Regional Office, and
problems that we veterans service offices encounter filing
claims.
It is my strong belief that the effective communication and
honest communication about the failures of the system, and--as
well as an examination of some success stories, could lead to
an improved and expedited claim process that will serve the
veterans of our community with the commitment and integrity
they have earned and that they deserve.
Over the past several years, I have witnessed a steady
decline in the service provided by the Philadelphia Regional
Office. Timely posting of claim information, process
development--process and development, rating decisions and
final approval or disapproval have become a protracted and
unmanageable process. What should be a brief process has turned
into several months, and sadly, often exceeds a year. The
communication between the regional office and the
geographically separated veterans services offices was badly
broken. Phone calls and emails were going unanswered, and I
suspect mail was not being opened or processed.
In providing meaningful testimony and helpful information,
I want to avoid the impression that I am throwing stones at the
VA, however, we veterans service offices are the ones who stand
face-to-face with the veterans every day, trying to explain a
system of endless errors and bureaucracy that simply cannot be
permitted to continue.
A major area of concern is communication between the
regional office and the veteran. Often letters sent by the VA
are confusing and contradictory. During the development stage,
it is not uncommon for a veteran to receive multiple letters
asking for the same information already provided. To comply
with the multiple requests, the veteran will often resubmit the
same information, slowing down the process. Each letter sent to
the veteran allows an additional 30 day time to reply, which
guarantees another full month added to an already lengthy
delay.
From my point of view, there are several areas that require
immediate attention. Posting of dependent information is a
prime example. A veteran's compensation is increased depending
on the number dependents he or she has. The processing of this
simple form can add hundreds of dollars to a veteran's claim.
Processing of this claim currently takes 9 months to a year for
completion. A veteran--to a veteran, a few hundred dollars a
month is meaningful, and his or her frustration grows as the
months pass.
Another area requiring immediate attention is paying the
veteran retroactive pay due to withholding actions because of
receipt of military retired pay. Veterans who receive
retirement from the military service have their retroactive
payment withheld until the VA verifies with the Defense Finance
and Accounting Office that a double payment has not occurred.
This retroactive payment can sometimes be over $100,000. During
the processing, this payment can take up to 9 months to a year
after approval from DFAS has been verified and payment is due.
Imagine if you will, if someone owed you $100,000 and
failed to pay you month after month, as your expenses mounted
and your bills piled up. It is easy to see why elderly veterans
feel the VA is simply waiting for them to die.
When a veteran owes the VA money, they move to collect the
debt almost immediately, but when the tables are turned, the VA
is unable to make outstanding payments in a timely manner. Some
improvement has recently been noted, but not enough. Often,
dependent indemnity compensation, a pension that the VA
provides to the widow or widower of a veteran who dies of a
service-connected illness, are delayed due to bureaucratic
requirements that have no impact on the outcome of the claim.
The mass--the vast majority of these claims are
straightforward cases that could be resolved in a manner of
weeks, but instead, they end up taking months and months to
process.
If a veteran is compensated for the same illness that he or
she dies from, it should be a simple matter of verifying the
cause of death listed on the death certificate and approving
the claim. These claims are often delayed for foolish and
insulting questions. One example is Mrs. Jen Stanley who comes
to mind. Mrs. Stanley was married to a veteran for 56 years,
and was rated 100--he was rated 100 percent for cancer. The
cancer was listed as the cause of death on his death
certificate. She filed her claim within 1 month of his death.
The approval for DIC was delayed for months because she failed
to notify the VA whether or not she had remarried within the
first month following her husband's death, after 56 years of
marriage.
Pensions for low income veterans are another area for
immediate attention, as they take far too long to process. With
the information that we can file--we have been informed, we can
file a financial hardship if the veteran is in financial need,
however, it can pretty much be said that any veteran filing for
a low income pension can be said to be experiencing financial
hardship. I can't speak for the turnaround for the VA for
completing claims; I can only speak to my experience and that
tells me that the process is hardly the picture of efficiency.
Sadly, the majority of veterans have completely lost faith
with an institution that was established to protect their
rights and make amends for their injuries.
All is not doom and gloom, however, and I would be remiss
if I did not say some improvements are being made, and some
workers are totally dedicated to the veteran community. I am
hopeful that the new recent town hall meeting--outreach
meetings will foster a better relationship with veteran service
offices, and give veterans the feeling they have their voices
being heard. The Philadelphia Regional Office are now holding
meetings are out location with the veterans service offices to
directly listen to our issues.
Assigning a public contact person to each county is a
dramatic move, and I think will tremendously aid us, and I
appreciate that having happened.
In closing, let me thank you for allowing a slight use of
my--slight overuse of my allotted time, but it is my feeling
this is not a situation that can be resolved by throwing money
at it or replacing the secretary. The problem that exists can
be found in the regional office, and their midlevel supervisors
must held accountable. Many members of the regional office are
in positions of leadership, and the time has long passed for
them to take on the role they have been entrusted with and
lead.
I thank you for your time today.
[The prepared statement of Walter Tafe appears in the
Appendix]
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, Mr. Tafe.
Now recognize Mr. Dorrity for his testimony.
STATEMENT OF JOHN DORRITY
Mr. Dorrity. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and, Ranking Minority
Member, Ms. Titus.
Rhetoric v. Reality: The Philadelphia VA Regional Office. I
am a combat disabled Vietnam vet. If I may, Mr. Chairman, I
would like to read my testimony into the record.
Thank you.
Mr. Runyan. So ordered.
Mr. Dorrity. I am a combat disabled Vietnam veteran. I have
served my fellow veterans, their spouses and children, in the
capacity of an advocate and claims representative since 1982. I
am the past president of the National Association of County
Veteran Service Officers, and I am also their past national
service director. I am the president of the New Jersey
Association of Veteran Service Officers, and district commander
of VFW District 12, aside from my being the director of the
Ocean County Veteran Service Bureau for over 20 years.
And it is extremely easy to single out a particular RO and
point to problems within that agency without offering
solutions. Ladies and gentlemen, true resolution requires a
semblance of the truth. Truth be told, the inadequacies that
claimants experience under the jurisdiction of the Philadelphia
Regional Office are endemic to the entire, and systemic to the
entire VA system of process and adjudication. Some of the
particular problems that the claimants experience with this RO
are duly executed power of attorney form, VA Form 2122, or VA
Form 2122-A, are not scanned and recorded into the claim file
in a timely fashion. This problem, due to the Privacy Act of
1972, does not allow effective communication from the field rep
and the rating specialist to other personnel stationed at the
RO.
With the utilization of the paperless initiative under
former Secretary Shinseki, copies of rating decisions, to
include rating sheets, are denied the field rep by hard copy.
Unless they are authorized to use the veterans benefit
management system, VBMS, without the rating sheet in particular
available to the field rep, we, who sit across the desk from
the claimant on a daily basis, are left in the blind, and
misinformation and adversity to the VA by the veterans
community abounds. This may seem like a correctable situation
with the onus of responsibility put upon the field rep, but the
authorization process is complex and laborious. At best, case
in point, as I amble through the process of authorization to
utilization VBMS myself, I have to physically count every POA
whom I represent presently. I am halfway through the alphabet,
and I am nearly at 2,000 claimants. This physical counting
procedure has taken, so far, 3 weeks of my time, even with the
assistance of two members of my staff who write claims. They
are taken from that.
There is a new electronic initiative, the PC-3 program,
that became available in December 2013. We in the field were
not notified until June 2014. Training on the use of this
system has yet to be announced. Ineffective communication from
the top down, in my experience in combat, kills people.
Translated to this process, it delays our compliance with this
paperless system. The late adjudication has just denied those
and their families who have put themselves in harm way--harm's
way so the rest of us can enjoy freedom.
The inordinate amount of time that it takes to adjudicate
the claim has literally taken its toll on the veterans
population. The tens of thousands of veterans and their
families whom I have had the honor and privilege to represent
over the decade, of those, I have had at least 3 to 4 dozen
claimants die while waiting for a VA decision on the claim, as
recently as this year.
Now, we can extol the virtue of the electronic initiative
to fully develop claim process FDC, the VA Form 21-526EZ, the
BVD claims, et cetera. These claims are a quick turnaround time
for recently released veterans. What about the World War II
vet? What about the Korean vet? What about the Vietnam vet?
What about all those vets in between? They did not have access
to their service medical records or healthcare, or the
production of any evidence or documents that will support their
claims. What if all the aforementioned veterans' memory of
events is questionable? The oldest claim I have in my office is
11\1/2\ years old. We still have a backlog of those claims.
Dismiss it if you will. I will keep fighting it.
Appeals still take 2 to 3 years to be heard, and when they
are, and when they are with a judge's order to expedite the
claim, I feel that no one in the entire VA system knows the
meaning of the word expedite. I realize that this issue goes
beyond the RO, but maybe we should also look into the
interaction between the RO and the Board of Veterans' Appeals.
I would be remiss if I did not complement the Pension
Management Center director, Gary Hodge, and his staff for their
efforts on behalf of my claimants. If I call or email, they are
right on the problem. The same kudos should be afforded the
RO's insurance center. I do not mean to besmirch the
compensation component or any other operational component, for
that matter, of the RO. I know we do our best. So too do I know
we can do better. Electronic answers from the VA central office
are no substitute for hard work in the field.
I am familiar with the new RO director, Ms. Rubens. I hope
that she can address the issues of all we field reps. The
recent town meetings are a good first step. There should be
more. Understand that if government is truly--is to truly serve
the people, as we reiterate constantly, then it is in those
peoples' interests that we are true partners. My associates
are, for better or worse, opine employees that are grossly
underutilized by the VA in general.
Ladies and gentlemen, you should notice by now that I do
not refer to the ongoing problems of the VA process as a
challenge. A challenge is me trying to re-enlist in the
military on 9/12/2001. These problems have been inherent within
the claims process of the VA since I began my voyage of
assisting other veterans and their families over 3 decades ago.
They have not gotten better. We just create new dialogs and the
problems are not adequately addressed as our attention is drawn
elsewhere. I do not believe that there are mean-spirited people
within the VA who would subjectively deny entitlements to a
Claimant. I believe that the process implemented through the
former secretary and his staff in the Ivory Tower to address
the backlog and a rating system were, and still are, based upon
phony statistics. Many of those statistics were the product of
a performance bonus program. Are you serious? I have attended
many meetings in the central office, not with the purpose of
tearing the system down, but to point out deficiencies and
offer any method that would make the system less frustrating to
the Claimant. It took a whistleblower VA medical center
employee to open up the eyes of America and Congress to the
workings of gaming the computer in order to receive a bonus?
Okay. Okay. That was the Veterans Health Administration, VHA.
The same performance bonus system is available within the
Veterans Benefit System, VBA. To me, it is blood money. It is
the blood of my fellow veterans that we are talking about here,
the people who pay our salaries. They deserve better.
Thank you for this opportunity to speak today, and I will
not, even if the rest of you, pay no attention to these
problems, systemic and endemic, within the claims process, rest
on my claimants until the last breath leaves my body.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of John Dorrity appears in the
Appendix]
Mr. Runyan. Thank you, Mr. Dorrity.
And with that then we will open up another round of
questions. And I am going to start with Mr. Tafe. And again,
both of you, thank you--thank you both for your testimony.
Thank you both for your service for what you do for our
veterans, and thank you both for your service----
Mr. Tafe. Thank you.
Mr. Runyan [continuing]. And what you do to ensure that our
veterans get what they need, earned and deserve.
Mr. Tafe, what I heard in your testimony about the
Philadelphia RO disappoints me greatly, but, frankly, doesn't
surprise me. Several veterans and service officers who attended
the recent town hall in Camden described the same trends you
described in your testimony; receiving letters asking them to
resubmit information or documents, sometimes multiple times.
They described those, as I mentioned to the earlier panel, as
stall letters.
Can you tell me how often you get these stall letters, and
what the effect it has on the veteran and you, and your
colleagues' ability to do your job?
Mr. Tafe. Congressman, I can't tell you how many times it
happens because I--it is just so rampant, I couldn't possibly
keep track of it, but I can tell you that on so many occasions
veterans will call me and they will say, well, you were
supposed to send that stuff in and now they are asking for it
again. Why didn't you send it in? And it is extremely
frustrating for us in that role to be viewed as not doing our
jobs when someone else isn't entering information. I will say
that e-benefits, the information is not loaded in a timely
manner at all, but the letters keep going back and then the
veteran loses trust with his veterans service officer, and
begins sending duplicate information back to the VA again, just
stalling the process longer and longer. That is one of the most
frustrating things is when the--when everything is completed,
to keep sending letters requesting information from the
veteran. It is so frustrating, Congressman, I can't tell you
what it feels like to lose a veteran's trust because they
believe you are not sending the information in. And sometimes I
just want to let you know that I have sent information 3 times
and 4 times, and called to verify and they say, no, we don't
have it. I have faxed the information over and have the receipt
in my hand, and they say, no, that's not in there, Mr. Tafe.
That is frustrating.
Mr. Runyan. I would agree. But it is--and I think both of
you kind of mentioned in your testimony, but, Mr. Tafe, again,
it was--glad to hear that you have some good experiences, the
excellent service from Anita Broski at the Philadelphia RO, and
Janet Wilder of the Newark Regional Office. On the other hand,
you mentioned that the leadership of the Philadelphia RO needs
to be held accountable for its steady decline in service over
the past years--several years.
Have you brought concerns to the regional office leadership
at any of the town hall meetings, and if so, what response have
you been given?
Mr. Tafe. I have only attended one town meeting recently;
the one held in Camden, and I did speak with Ms. Rubens, and I
made some suggestions that have already been implemented, which
is really favorable to me. The assignment of Ms. Broski as our
representative of Burlington County is tremendous. She is an
outstanding individual, and, in my mind, should be an example
of what the employees at the VA should be. Also, the--I have
asked that we have--instead of us veterans service officers
traveling to the regional office in Philadelphia to listen to
their meeting about all the statistics, and much of the
information given only is relevant to the veterans service
officers that work in the regional office, I asked that they
please schedule meetings for us service officers. I would host
them in my location or at John's location, and that they would
come to us and just have us veterans service officers who are
geographically separated. Ms. Rubens told me that was going to
happen, and I--yesterday, I received an email saying that they
wanted to set the first meeting up, so I think that is a very
favorable move for us.
Mr. Runyan. Okay, and finally, one last question for you
and then I will move on to Mr. Dorrity.
As Ms. Rubens is the new director of the RO, it remains to
be seen what actions she will take to address the existing
ineffective management as the new leader, and what level of
effectiveness those actions will enjoy. Do you have any advice
from your extended experience with the Philadelphia RO to offer
on the onset of her new assignment?
Mr. Tafe. I think one of the most important things, you
know, in my mind, and I am a military man for 30 years so I am
pretty straightforward, as a command chief, if somebody didn't
do their job, they didn't do that job for very long, they were
removed. And all the talk about additional training and team
building and everything, this is a problem that has manifested
in that office for years and years, and some people need to
either adapt or go home. And I think I mentioned in there, I
think with the important work that the VA has to do, they have
room for two types of employees; either outstanding or out the
door, and that is just my personal opinion.
Mr. Runyan. Thank you.
Mr. Dorrity, again, thank you again for your service on----
Mr. Dorrity. Thank you.
Mr. Runyan [continuing]. What is it, about 90 different
levels?
Mr. Dorrity. Something like that.
Mr. Runyan. Okay. You have heard the perspective of the
Philadelphia RO director and others, including fellow
accounting service--veteran service directors. In your own
experience with the Philadelphia RO with respect to
communication and--what has been your own experience with the
Philadelphia RO in respect to communication and delays in
claims processing?
Mr. Dorrity. Well, thank you for that question,
Congressman.
It has been poor to miserable prior to, prior to Ms. Rubens
coming there. I am expecting change. I am expecting meetings,
as Walter indicated, in his office and hopefully my office. We
hold state meetings every 2 months. Surely, she is welcome to
come to those, and so too is everyone else. As a matter of
fact, we serve pizza.
I can say, and I believe that I issued it in my testimony,
that there are certain operational components within the VA
that I have spoken to over the years. The Pension Management
Center, since Gary Hodge has been in charge, it has been easier
to work with him. I actually have a list of people and
extensions I can call on certain issues. Some are better than
others. And it is the same with we service officers. The
Insurance Center, if I send a one-sum payment in, it is usually
done within a week. The DIC, the pension, this year I had a
gentleman who was a World War II vet, I put in for a pension
for him, he died 4 months later. Absolutely no reason, no
reason why he wasn't afforded pension. I put in for widow's
pension for his wife. I got a great decision. Took me 6 months
to get them paid. So there are delays in payment.
I have heard a lot of the issues of the employees of the
VA, and I understand that. There is politics in every office,
your own included. I don't know how to build the morale of 28--
280,000 employees of the VA, but I know it can be really
distressing at times from our perspective to have claims that
are really no-brainers delayed. Irrespective of what the
electronic system says to you, I can tell you that after 30--
almost 33 years of being a practitioner of my craft, the
average processing time on a claim is a year. Pension shouldn't
take that long. Shouldn't take that long. And compensation,
definitely. The redundancy of VCAA, well, we have to live with
that. I have had the same experience of Walter; submitting
claims three and four times. They don't show up on VBMS. Well,
if this electronics system is all it is touted to be, what the
hell is going on? You know, my computer is as good as my gun.
It depends on who is using it and what they are using it for.
My experience with Philly has been getting better, let me
put it that way, and I anticipate that it will get better, and
I am sorry I talk so much. Thank you.
Mr. Runyan. I know you too well, so understood, but just
one last one, and it kind of goes to culture, and maybe both of
you can comment on it because I think it is something that, in
this electronic world, I think we lack a little bit, but----
Mr. Dorrity. Oh, yes.
Mr. Runyan [continuing]. I have heard at many of the recent
town halls that many of you have reported lack of
communication, responsiveness from the RO. Do you agree with
the veterans also that have said that they feel like sometimes
they were dealing with faceless bureaucrats on a daily basis?
Because I always--when there is a personal connection, there is
usually a little incentive behind it.
Mr. Dorrity. Congressman, I think we have had this
conversation before, but faceless is good. It used to be
mindless. It is faceless now. I am a bureaucrat. I am a very
uncomfortable bureaucrat because of the face that we present.
There is no doubt about it, if there was not a veteran,
there would not be a VA. People wouldn't have jobs. Are they
faceless? Yeah. My suggestion to the VA as a whole is get out
there. There used to be a VA secretary, Jesse Brown. It may be
before a little bit of your time, some of you guys may know
him. He is a great guy. And he would do things like I would do
them. He would put on his old field jacket, his dungarees,
glasses, go into the VA, ride the buses, go to the VDA, you
know, just see how things were going. He never got noticed. I
would do the same thing, and people would walk by and they
would say, hi, Mr. Dorrity, how you doing, you know? I mean
there was a difference in how we did it, and maybe I was better
known than the secretary at the time, but he tried to put a
face on the VA. Unfortunately, he passed away a few years ago.
I think what, you know, we are the face of the VA. We are
not VA employees, but you come into my office and you get this
redundant, stupid letter, stupid letter, all of a sudden,
Walter or John, hey, you never sent my stuff in. Wait a second,
let us read it. It says that they received all this stuff. They
are asking for additional information. The Veterans Claims
Assistance Act was a--was the--a great Act. It overturned
Morton v. West, which I believe is the beginning of the
backlog. Morton v. West was a Court of Veterans Appeals
decision that really screwed up the works here.
I think what the VA can do, Congressman, to make it brief,
if I have ever been that, is to get out there more. To get out
there more. Come to our state meeting. I try and engage not
just the talking heads, but the veterans population. Hell, I
throw food out there for them. Everybody comes to a meeting
where you are going to eat, except today's. But that being
said, I--it is a bureaucracy, yes, it is faceless. Any number
of rating specialists can handle a claim or pass it along. I
truly believe that the bonus system is an affront to the
American taxpayer, and maybe that is where some of our mistrust
of this system as a whole.
I can tell you this, I have come to the conclusion lately
that I don't trust the system, but I trust people within the
system, from a personal perspective. Thank you.
Mr. Runyan. All right, Mr. Tafe.
Mr. Tafe. Congressman, if I might, first, I want to tell
you the food that John offers is not that good, however----
Mr. Dorrity. It is cheap, buddy.
Mr. Tafe [continuing]. I would like to say though, I don't
know so much about the matter of faceless because there are so
many veterans and so many employees, but all that I would ask
is answer the phone, return the message when you say you are
going to, and answer the email when it is sent. At least they
know there is somebody at the other end. What is extremely
frustrating is recordings at some of the VA offices that say
please leave your name and your number and we will call you
back. That call never takes place, and that is a shame. If they
will answer the phone, answer the email and answer the
question, and if it doesn't happen today, it happens tomorrow
or the next day, at least they know somebody is listening, and
that, I think, is very important.
Mr. Dorrity. May I Segway off that, Mr. Chairman?
Mr. Tafe. No.
Mr. Dorrity. No, but the 1-800 number, the National Call-in
Center, many of my claimants refer to it as 1-800-NO-CAN-DO,
because you will sit on the phone. People get hung up on. They
don't get responded to, as Walter had said.
Look, the simple thing is, as we are speaking as people,
the--we have to have that human connect. If we don't have that,
we have nothing. We have nothing.
Mr. Runyan. Thank you both.
And with that I will yield to the Ranking Member, Ms.
Titus.
Ms. Titus. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I share some of your frustration because most of the
veterans in the valley live in Las Vegas, that is where the
population is, and yet the regional office is 8 hours away in
Reno. That is a long trip across a lot of desert to get there,
so veterans just feel like they have no connection whatsoever.
And so then they turn to other places and they come to
congressional offices because they don't feel like anybody is
listening.
Mr. Tafe, also, this business of some of the bureaucracy of
bureau--the red tape, in other words, I learned that when a
person is notified of a ruling on a claim, they have I think it
is 30 days to ask for an appeal, then the VA has 30 days to
send them the form, then they have 30 more days to send it
back. Why don't you just put the appeal form in the original
letter when you send it out, and that takes away that 60-day
problem in the beginning? That is just commonsense.
We had a Bill to do that. It passed our committee, passed
the House, now the VA is doing it. It is just some commonsense
things that could make a difference.
I am glad to hear about the town meetings, and also about
the county officers. I think we should be sure that every
regional office does that, not just Philadelphia, so we need to
get that word out. But I would ask you this, we are talking
about communications, you have the Federal VA, then you have
the regional offices, you have State Departments of Veterans
Affairs, you have the VSOs, you have the Congressional Offices,
and now you have all these charities, it is a big thing to be a
charity supporting veterans these days. Lot of them get grants
like U.S. Vets. They do good work.
What can we do so that they all aren't working in different
directions, aren't duplicating efforts, right hand doesn't know
what the left hand is doing, to better coordinate all of these
services so we can serve veterans better?
Mr. Tafe. Right. I think one of the starting points is that
the VA, and this starts in the regional office, but they
certainly have to know who is representing the veteran, and I
can tell you that my mail goes all around the state. When they
do send it, I go down to John's and he will give me 20 letters
that went to his office, and I will take them up to Mercer
County or wherever, or to the state office, because we have the
New Jersey Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, and we
have the County Veterans Service Offices of New Jersey, it is
very confusing, but they need to keep track of that. That is
what they get paid to do.
As for the charity organizations out there, I think that
one of the issues that I have known dealing with some of the
charity organizations is a lot of people want to help veterans
and it is very popular thing to do, but they haven't defined
what it is they want to do other than help veterans----
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Mr. Tafe [continuing]. And that can very, very cumbersome
to try to deal with those. They will come in and say--I will
say what is your mission statement, and they will say, well, we
are developing it.
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Mr. Tafe. Well, that makes it more confusing for a veteran
to know who to turn to for help when they are not, you know,
they are not even certified yet or know what their mission is.
Ms. Titus. Some of them are not legitimate either----
Mr. Tafe. Absolutely.
Ms. Titus [continuing]. And they prey on collecting money
from people who think, sure, I will donate if it is to help a
veteran, and then none of that money really goes to veterans.
Maybe we need better clearinghouses of information and the
regional offices of who is out there, what they are doing,
where you go, what the phone numbers are, who to call, that
sort of thing.
Mr. Tafe. Right.
Ms. Titus. Mr. Dorrity.
Mr. Dorrity. Yes. May I address a couple of comments you
made, Ms. Titus?
First off, there are only two sacrosanct time frames within
the VA. When I get a decision, I have 1 year to file a notice
of disagreement. That is the first step in the appeal process.
Now, that takes a year, so let us put that on top of the year
it took to get to a no decision. Okay, so that takes a year. If
we resolve the issue within that time frame, terrific,
wonderful. If not, if not, and there are people sitting in the
room whom I have trained over the years, then they have to
issue a statement of the case. So there is no 60-day turnaround
time until--unless the one year has elapsed from the decision
time.
We have to be understanding of the process before we can
make assertions, and put legislation on the table that is
meaningless----
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Mr. Dorrity [continuing]. Or meaningful. Okay. That being
said, if it is beyond the year time frame from the decision
letter, irrespective of good, bad or indifferent, then I have
60 days to respond to the appeal.
Now, my office is a culture of get it done, try not to
inconvenience the veteran. We have the largest number of
veterans in New Jersey living in Ocean County. We have the
largest number of veterans in New Jersey over the age of 65,
believe it or not. More than Nevada. Nevada. I say it right?
Okay, thanks. It is unconscionable that, on average, an appeal
takes 2\1/2\ to 3 years to be heard, because you have that 2
years, then you have 2\1/2\ years and----
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Mr. Dorrity. And my friends in the VA can dispute it all
they want. Boy, I can run through an easy claim. I can run
through a fully developed claim if you got out yesterday, but
if I have a 92 year old vet, like I had sitting in my office
yesterday, 70 years ago, boy, I can't remember what I had for
breakfast. It--the process--the measures that are put in place
to eliminate this backlog, the first thing I would say to the
secretary, a number of years ago I noticed that if you go on
VA.gov and you Google in Monday morning workload, that gives
you the backlog. During the former secretary's tenure, one of
the things he did, and I know Rick Shinseki well, he is a--and
he is a really good guy, a really good guy, but he is gone. One
of the things they did is they revised the Monday morning
workload.
So, Congressman, you and I have had this discussion about
what is the true number of the backlog, and I believe Ms.
Rubens addressed it before, she said rating and non-rating
claims. When you guys see 600,000, all you are seeing is rating
claims. There are non-rating claims. I get Walter 30 percent.
He is married with two kids, I have to put in a 686C for
dependency. That is a non-rating issue. I hand in his marriage
certificate, form filled out, signed by him, his kids' social
security cards, a copy of them, pay the man. Why does a non-
rating issue take up to 6 months? They used to take 30 days or
less, or a little more.
There are a number of problems within the entire system.
Philadelphia is just one of the sources. I believe the IG said
they are looking at every RO.
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Mr. Dorrity. That is important.
As far as the nonprofits go, I have written letters of
support for a number of them, some of them you guys may be
familiar with, and they have gotten their grants from the VA.
Throwing money at the problem, putting a band aid on my jugular
when it is cut is not going to stop the bleeding, ladies and
gentlemen. Direct pressure is. Okay?
I believe that the former secretary's statements that he
was going to knock this backlog down and cure homelessness
amongst veterans by 2015 are ridiculous. Are ridiculous.
Totally absurd. There is no truth to it. You can assert
anything you want, doesn't mean you are going to get there.
I have found--and I can poke holes in the electronic
initiative of the VA consistently. I could. I could. As
recently as yesterday. The charity organizations, maybe a
clearinghouse is in order, but I am hesitant to add layers of
bureaucracy on top of bureaucracy myself. Is it the VA's
responsibility? I don't know that it is. Maybe VHA, Veterans
Health Administration, if we are talking about a project like
Soldier On, or Shriner House, Homeless Veterans.
Ms. Titus. Yes.
Mr. Dorrity. A great illustration we have, we are fortunate
enough in Ocean County to have an organization called Vet Worth
that I started working with when I started this career. I
didn't start working with them, I was a volunteer. And they are
an illustration, if the VA really wants to look at how to cure
homelessness, they should look at the New England Shelter for
Homeless Veterans. There are project out there; we don't have
to keep reinventing the wheel. The mousetrap works, believe me.
I took a mouse out this morning in the trap. Works. Works. We
don't have to keep inventing stuff. What we have to do is
admit, and my illustration before with the backlog is, and I
can never get this across at my meetings in DC., admit there is
a problem. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Say there is a problem. I
screwed up. Let me straighten it out. Hell, I do that every
day. Everybody thinks I know everything. When you think that
way, you know nothing. You know absolutely nothing. I have run
into arrogance, and don't take offense, most of the arrogance I
have run into in the VA comes out of Washington.
Look at VACOLS, the appeal system. The backlog in the
appeal--by the way, that 11\1/2\ year old case is mine. It is
at the BVA. I had a hearing 6 years ago. I am still waiting for
expedited service, as the judge ordered. So if it is happening
to me, how many folks out there is it happening to, you know.
And I applaud the VA for allowing me to expedite a claim based
on homelessness, terminality, financial hardship, they will at
least consider that, or if I am sitting in front of a judge, as
I will be in a couple of weeks, filing a motion to expedite a
claim based on age. But that serves my 92 year old vet, that
doesn't serve Walter. Are his due process rights not the same
as mine and that 92 year old vet, and the EC claims? Aren't we?
If we are not, great, but I think we are.
Thank you.
Ms. Titus. Thank you, Mr. Dorrity. I certainly honor your
service, and I appreciate your enthusiasm, but I have to
disagree with your final statement. I think it was a little
unfair when you said that we may ignore what we are hearing
here today, but you would never do that. Well, Mr. Runyan and I
are not ignoring this, or we wouldn't be here and holding these
field hearings and being very concerned, as you are, about
these problems.
Mr. Dorrity. And I respect your disagreement. I have been
doing this for quite a long time and I have provided testimony
on a number of bases, and as I said, I never apologize for my
words, I am sorry that you may be offended. I know the good
work that my congressman has done. I truly do.
Ms. Titus. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Runyan. The gentlelady yields back, and I thank her.
Thank you all for being here with us today. The panel is
excused. I appreciate everyone's time and attention that went
into preparing all of your remarks today, and ask you all to
keep up the communication with this subcommittee because this
is how we are going to get this fixed. I also ask unanimous
consent that all Members have five legislative days to revise
and extend their remarks, and include any extraneous material.
Hearing no objection, so ordered.
I thank the Ranking Member, Ms. Titus, for her attendance
today, and I am so pleased she took the time out to travel
across the country and join us here in south Jersey.
With that, this hearing is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:47 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
APPENDIX
Prepared Statement of Jon Runyan, Chairman
Good afternoon and welcome everyone. This oversight hearing of the
Subcommittee on Disability Assistance and Memorial Affairs will now
come to order.
Usually when we hold our DAMA Subcommittee hearings, we are sitting
in Washington.
Today, I am honored and happy to be here with all of you at
Burlington County College, here in my District, and where I am proud to
call home.
Although we are far away from our normal hearing room on the Hill
and the CSPAN cameras, this is still an official Congressional
oversight hearing of the House Veterans' Affairs Committee, and hearing
rules of conduct apply.
Today's hearing will focus upon the Philadelphia Regional Office.
In July, the Full House Committee on Veterans' Affairs held a
hearing that revealed disarray and data manipulation at the
Philadelphia Regional Office.
Accordingly, today's hearing will update upon the situation at this
Regional Office, including concerns on mismanagement, manipulation to
make the backlog of claims appear smaller, and exceptionally low
employee morale.
A Regional Office employee, from another part of the Nation,
recently shared an impression--he said that Regional Office structure
has an excess of ``management,'' and a complete void of leadership.
I think that observation is telling when we look at what has been
going on at the Philadelphia Regional Office.
Ms. Rubens is here today, as a new Director of this R-O, and I hope
that she will develop this needed leadership at the Regional Office . .
Because, up to this point, I am convinced that change is neither
desired, nor sought, by complacent management in Philadelphia.
Thus, this morning's hearing will also address whether the
Philadelphia R-O Director has taken appropriate measures to address the
failures that we have recently heard about--and whether the Director is
prepared to act swiftly and appropriately in response to VA O-I-G's
forthcoming report.
Continued claims of ``misunderstanding'' are simply not
believable--even if they were, it would show such a level of gross
incompetence that disciplinary action would be necessary . . . Nobody
is fooled.
I look forward to hearing from the Regional Office, as well as the
Office of Inspector General, and the input of various interested
individuals and organizations that will speak today.
With that, I will begin introductions. Seated at the witness table,
we have the first panel. First, Ms. Kristen Ruell, Authorization
Quality Services Representative, at the Pension Management Center,
Ms. Linda Halliday, Assistant Inspector General for Audits and
Evaluations, Office of Inspector General,
Accompanied by Ms. Nora Stokes, Director of the Bay Pines Benefits
Inspection Division, Office of Audits and Evaluations;
Mr. Al Tate, Audit Manager of the Atlanta Audit Division, Office of
Audits and Evaluations; and Mr. Jeffrey Myers, Benefits Inspector with
the San Diego Benefits Inspection Division, Office of Audits and
Evaluations.
Panel One also features Ms. Diana Rubens, Director of the
Philadelphia Regional Office.
Once concluded, we will move onto Panel Two, which will consist of
Mr. Walter Tafe, Director of the Burlington Department of Military and
Veterans Affairs, and Mr. John Dorrity, with the Bureau of Veterans
Services, Ocean County, New Jersey.
I thank you all for being with us today and I now yield to our
Ranking Member, Ms. Titus, for her opening statement.
Thank you, Ms. Titus.
At this time, I formally welcome our first panel to the witness
table. Your complete written statements will be entered into the
hearing record.
Ms. Ruell, you are now recognized for five minutes--please proceed.
Thank you, Ms. Ruell.
Next we have Ms. Halliday. You are now recognized for five minutes.
Thank you, Ms. Halliday.
Ms. Rubens, you are now recognized for five minutes--please begin
when you are ready.
Thank you, Ms. Rubens.
I will begin the questioning and then will recognize the Ranking
Member and our other Members, alternating in order of arrival.
I now recognize the distinguished Ranking Member for any questions
she may have.
Thank you Ms. Titus.
The testimony on the operations and management of the Philadelphia
Regional Office remain alarming, though as noted, O-I-G's final report
has not yet issued on current investigations.
I kindly ask that all parties remain prepared to address concerns
raised today in greater detail once we all have a chance to review that
report.
Thank you all again, and you are now excused from the witness
table, and we will seat our second panel.
At this time, I welcome Panel Two, Mr. Tafe and Mr. Dorrity, thank
you for coming to testify at today's hearing.
We appreciate your attendance today and your complete written
statement will be entered into the hearing record.
Mr. Tafe, you are now recognized for five minutes.
Thank you, Mr. Tafe.
Mr. Dorrity, you are now recognized for five minutes.
Thank you, Mr. Dorrity.
I will begin questions for the second panel, and will again
recognize the Ranking Member.
I now recognize Ms. Titus for any questions she may have.
Thank you Ms. Titus.
Thank you everyone for being here with us today, and Panel Two is
now excused.
I appreciate your time, and the attention that went into preparing
your remarks for today and I will ask you all again to keep
communication open with this Subcommittee.
I also ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative
days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous
material. Hearing no objection so ordered.
I thank Ranking Member Titus for her attendance today, and I am so
pleased that she took the time to come out and visit us here in
Southern New Jersey.
This hearing is now adjourned.
Prepared Statement of Kristen Ruell
My name is Kristen Ruell. I testified July 14, 2014 in Washington,
DC regarding gross mismanagement and violations of law occurring at the
Philadelphia Regional Office. I want to thank you for the opportunity
to be heard today regarding the Philadelphia RO and regret to inform
you that things have not changed and accountability is greatly lacking
for the management officials involved in the alleged illegal behaviors
previously reported.
As a result of a preliminary OIG investigation, Fast letter 13-10
was rescinded. The practices of data manipulation have continued at the
Philadelphia RO. Instead of creating an end product with an altered
date of claim, there are many instances where claims are in the
computer and have no dates of claims as if we never received them from
a Claimant. These veterans are worse off because before they had a
false, altered, new date of claim and now they have no date of claim.
If the claim is old, I am seeing many instances where it is not placed
under control at all, which affects the VA's average days pending.
The duplicate record problem has not changed. I was informed that
VSOs are now able to create dates of claims, which are creating
duplicate records. E benefits is creating duplicate records as well. A
colleague of mine, Ryan Cease, has reported this to the VA Central
Office, but to date has heard nothing regarding a policy change.
On July 14, 2014, I testified to boxes of claims that were
processed in 2011 and were not scanned into Virtual VA, the Veterans
virtual claim file system in place at the VA. Management scanned the
sixty something boxes of thousands of claims into the system but did
nothing to rectify the Veterans denied for not having information that
was sitting in the boxes for nearly 4 years. There is no way to track
people affected by the management decision to let those claims sit for
years.
The returned mail that was boxed up with the claims stamped
``Cannot ID'' were thoroughly reviewed and most employees that were on
the project informed me that a majority of the claims could be
identified with a few minutes of attention to detail and some claimants
were getting retroactive benefits as a result of papers labeled
``cannot ID'' and had this not been reported, these boxes would have
been shredded after being held the required one year timeframe.
Employees also reported to me that they were given timelines to
complete a box, when the timeline was not reasonable. One employee
resigned after the project because he felt extremely stressed and
rushed. I have received spreadsheets from concerned employees that are
afraid to speak up regarding the Returned mail project. One employee
went back and checked his spreadsheet and noticed that a number of the
cases he marked ``required action'' have still not been cested and no
action has been taken, although management stated the project is
finished.
I have seen the reasonable accommodation process get worse for
employees with disabilities. I feel as though the management team in
the Pension Management Center should be removed from the process
altogether, because they are creating liability on behalf of the Agency
due to their inability or overt actions to fail to follow EEO laws.
There is no reason for them to follow the law, because the Agency uses
taxpayer monies to pay off employees that have been wronged and at best
sends the management official to a training, for them to return to the
office and target their next victim, with no consequences.
I have lost faith in the Department of Veterans Affairs. I have not
seen any accountability for the managers responsible for the violations
that were investigated by the VA OIG. They are still entrusted with
making decisions with our taxpayer monies and on behalf of our nations
Veterans when they have admitted they cannot understand simple fast
letter language and have left thousands of pieces of Veterans claims
dating back to 2008 in white boxes with no action taken to grant or
deny benefits. There is no training that can instill morals in these
managers. They seem to be playing by a different set of rules and using
our taxpayer dollars to have free legal representation when they are
failing to provide timely accommodations for disabled employees and
benefits to the Veterans that put their lives on the line for our
nation. Employees repeatedly say to me that nothing is going to change
here and refuse to report wrongdoing because they feel that there is no
accountability and they will end up being targeted by the people they
reported.
It is my sincere hope, as a citizen of the United States of
America, that the Department of Veterans Affairs holds management
accountable for retaliation toward whistleblowers and any alleged
wrongdoings that are substantiated in the upcoming report from the VA
OIG.
Prepared Statement of Linda A. Halliday
Chairman Runyan and Ranking Member Titus, thank you for the
opportunity to discuss the results of the Office of Inspector General's
(OIG) work related to the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA). We
will focus on previously issued reports regarding the Philadelphia VA
Regional Office (VARO), as well as recent situations that have come to
our attention through the VA OIG Hotline and directly from current and
former VARO employees. I am accompanied today by Nora Stokes, Director,
OIG Bay Pines Benefits Inspection Division; Al Tate, Audit Manager,
Atlanta Audit Division; and Jeffrey Myers, Benefits Inspector, San
Diego Benefits Inspection Division.
Background
Delivering timely and accurate benefits and services to the
millions of veterans who served in our Nation's Armed Forces is central
to VA's mission. The Philadelphia VARO is responsible for administering
a range of benefits to 825,000 veterans and their families living in
eastern Pennsylvania, Southern New Jersey, and Delaware. These services
include administration of compensation and pension, loan guaranty,
national call center services, and vocational rehabilitation and
employment benefits--programs that annually total approximately $4.1
billion.
The OIG's Benefits Inspection Program was created at the request of
Congress in 2009 to review individual VARO operations. We are on
schedule to complete a review of each VARO approximately every 3 years.
Our inspections focus on high-risk functional areas within each VARO's
Veterans Service Center (VSC) such as disability claims processing,
management controls, workload management, eligibility determinations,
and public contact. In addition, our inspectors identify and report on
systemic issues impeding VARO performance, including examining issues
or allegations referred by VA employees, Members of Congress, VA
leadership, or other stakeholders. Upon completion of each inspection,
we issue a report to the VARO Director on the results and publish a
report with the Director's comments. We completed benefits inspections
of the Philadelphia VARO in October 2009 and again in August 2012.
In May 2014, we received a number of allegations through the VA OIG
Hotline of mismanagement at the Philadelphia VARO. We were concerned
that many of these allegations included indicators that VARO staff have
a serious mistrust of VARO management. Based on our initial assessment
at the VARO, we performed an unannounced visit to the Philadelphia VARO
on June 19, 2014, and issued a Management Advisory Memorandum on June
20, 2014, to alert the Under Secretary for Benefits (USB) of situations
requiring corrective actions (Exhibit A). Shortly thereafter, OIG
issued another notification to the Under Secretary on July 23, 2014,
outlining concerns about facility conditions at the VARO facility
located at 4700 Wissahickon Avenue.
To summarize, from the date of our unannounced visit to the
Philadelphia VARO on June 19, 2014, until our last visit on August 15,
2014, VA OIG benefits inspectors, auditors, and criminal and
administrative investigators conducted over 150 interviews with VARO
management and staff to assess the merits of over 100 complaints and
allegations of gross mismanagement and potential wrongdoing. In
general, most staff we interviewed felt the working environment at the
Philadelphia was hostile and did not trust management because they felt
they were not treated fairly or with respect. Generally, employee
complaints addressed a broad range of issues including unfair work
assignments; discriminatory practices based on disability, race, and
gender; and denial of a reasonable accommodation request. Our work
related to these allegations is ongoing, therefore we must limit our
testimony today to our two prior benefits inspections and the concerns
raised in the management advisory notices to the USB.
OIG Benefits Inspections of the Philadelphia VARO
Since we first began benefits inspections of VAROs in April 2009 to
present, we have conducted 93 benefits inspections at VAROs and have
consistently reported the need for enhanced policy guidance, oversight,
workload management, training, and supervisory review to improve the
accuracy and timeliness of disability claims processing and VARO
operations.
During our first inspection of the Philadelphia VARO in October
2009 we reviewed claims processing actions related to claims for
temporary 100 percent disability evaluations, post-traumatic stress
disorder, traumatic brain injuries, and herbicide exposure-related
disabilities.\1\ The overall inaccuracy rate for the 120 claims
reviewed was 33 percent, resulting in improper payments to 14 veterans
totaling just over $475,000. Moreover, we identified 21 errors with the
potential to impact veterans' benefits if left uncorrected, and 4 other
miscellaneous errors. We made other recommendations for improving VSC
operations, the safeguarding of veterans' personally identifiable
information (PII), and the processing of adjustments in fiduciary
claims for veterans.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Inspection VA Regional Office Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, March
4, 2010.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Prior to the start of inspections for each new fiscal year, we
review the protocols and change as needed or appropriate. For the
fiscal year 2012 inspections, we discontinued our review of post-
traumatic stress disorder claims due to policy changes that relaxed
stressor requirements. We also discontinued our review of herbicide-
related claims due to significant improvement in claims processing
action associated with these types of claims.
While conducting our second benefits inspection work onsite in
August 2012, we reviewed claims processing actions related to claims
for temporary 100 percent disability evaluations and traumatic brain
injuries.\2\ In comparison with our previous inspection, the overall
inaccuracy rate for the 60 claims reviewed in 2012 increased slightly.
Within this sample of 60 claims, we identified improper payments to 4
veterans totaling $194,130 and 18 errors with the potential to impact
veterans' benefits if left uncorrected. Additionally, we reported that
VARO staff did not comply with VBA policy when processing health care
entitlement decisions for Gulf War veterans. This report also included
recommendations for the VSC to improve its homeless veterans outreach
efforts. Based on information received from VBA, we closed our report
in November 2013 indicating that they had acted on our recommendations
in the report. The effectiveness of the actions taken by VBA will need
to be assessed during our next inspection.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ Inspection VA Regional Office Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, April
9, 2013.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
While the claims processing inaccuracy rates from both inspections
were at unacceptably high levels, they remained somewhat consistent
between 2009 and 2012. At the same time, the VARO's inventory of
pending rating-related claims more than doubled--from 7,182 pending in
2009 to 15,615 in 2012. Further, it took VARO staff an average of 122
days in 2009 to complete rating-related claims whereas in 2012 it took
288 days to complete similar work. Despite the increase in inventory
and time to process claims, the VSC experienced a reduction of 94
positions from April 2009 to March 2014. Based on repeated areas of
non-compliance with VBA policy, we remained concerned about the VARO's
ability to process high-risk disability claims accurately and timely.
During our 2012 inspection, we also found that the Philadelphia
VARO management team continued to face multiple challenges within the
Veterans Service Center. These challenges included the need to improve
oversight of operational activities, gain control over workload, and
improve the accuracy of disability claims processing.
Comparison to Other VA Regional Offices
Our benefits inspection protocols are designed to review disability
claims processing actions we consider at increased risk of processing
errors. Therefore, our inspection results do not represent the overall
accuracy of disability claims processing at the VAROs. Noteworthy, to
date, none of the VAROs inspected have been totally compliant with all
operational areas reviewed. The following offers a comparison of our
Philadelphia VARO inspection results with those of other offices
previously inspected in the same time frame.
October 2009 Benefits Inspection: From April 2009
through September 2010, we published 16 VARO inspection
reports. Of the 16 VAROs on which we reported, the Jackson,
Mississippi. VARO had the highest level of overall compliance
(70 percent) with VBA policy in the areas inspected. The
Philadelphia VARO was the 6th most compliant of 16 VAROs
inspected, with an overall compliance rate of 55 percent when
our report was published in March 2010.
August 2012 Benefits Inspection: From January through
September 2013, we published 20 VARO inspection reports. Of the
20 VAROs, the Milwaukee and Denver VAROs had the highest level
of overall compliance (80 percent). The Philadelphia VARO was
tied with five other VAROs for being the 13th most compliant,
with an overall compliance rate of 20 percent when we published
our report in April 2013.
Allegations of Mismanagement
Since May 2014, we received numerous allegations regarding the
operations of the Philadelphia VARO. Allegations included a broad range
of issues such as ``cooking the books,'' referring to data manipulation
and taking actions that appear to reduce workload backlogs, mail
mismanagement, and potential duplicate payments. Further, one
allegation raised concerns that the Fast Letter 13-10 guidance issued
by VBA provided opportunities for ``cheating'' on the dates of
mishandled claims (Exhibit B). Several allegations raised concerns of
inappropriate reprisals against whistleblowers. This led us to make an
unannounced visit to the VARO on June 19, 2014. Since our June 2014
work began, we expanded our work to include reviewing allegations of:
Staff not timely scanning documents into Virtual VA,
the electronic claims repository.
Staff inappropriately shredding or destroying military
and returned mail that could not be delivered.
Staff hiding mail within the VARO.
Staff ``cherry picking'' and processing easily
appealed claims out of order, potentially misrepresenting
performance.
Staff not addressing over 32,000 electronic inquiries
from veterans and beneficiaries.
The paramount issue is the Fast Letter guidance. In issuing this
guidance, VBA deviated from its longstanding policy of establishing
dates of claims, which adversely affected claims processing for many
VAROs across the Nation. By design, the Fast Letter guidance required
claims processing staff to apply current dates to older claims
previously overlooked. Many of the Philadelphia VARO staff told us they
took exception to this Fast Letter guidance on adjusting dates of
claims and thus we concluded those actions were inherently contrary to,
the VA core value of integrity.
Philadelphia VARO and Fast Letter 13-10
VBA uses dates of claims within the electronic processing
environment to control and manage its claims inventory and generally
prioritize which cases staff will process first. VBA policy states that
the date of claim is the earliest date a claim is received at a VA
facility. Each document VA receives in any of its facilities or
locations where it has a presence must be annotated with the date of
receipt. Incorrect application of dates of claims results in delayed
claims processing actions and compromises the integrity of reported
time it takes VARO staff to process claims.
On May 20, 2013, VBA issued Fast Letter 13-10, which provided an
exception to this longstanding date of claim policy. The Fast Letter
guidance advised staff to adjust dates of claims for unadjudicated
claims to a more current date, that is, the date each claim was
``discovered'' in the claims folder. VARO staff were to use a special
designator, ``Unadjudicated Claims Discovered,'' to identify these
unprocessed claims in the electronic record. Without this electronic
label, VBA staff cannot identify claims where the dates of claims were
adjusted under the new guidance. The Fast Letter also reminded staff to
consider the earliest date stamp shown on the claim document when
determining the effective date for benefits payments--a requirement VBA
staff must follow for all claims, found/discovered or otherwise.
Additionally, the Fast Letter required the VARO Director or Assistant
Director to approve each adjusted date of claim and send an email
notification to VBA Compensation Service.
During our onsite review beginning June 19, 2014, we identified 30
instances where the Philadelphia VARO's Pension Management Center (PMC)
staff adjusted dates of claims using the Fast Letter guidance. However,
in some of the cases, we determined staff had misapplied the guidance.
The following are examples of how VARO staff misapplied the guidance.
PMC managers instructed claims processing staff to
apply the ``date discovered'' rule to manage their backlog of
mail.
PMC staff cancelled claims that were already
established and pending in the electronic record and
reestablished the claims using current dates. PMC staff were
already aware that the claims existed, so they should have used
original date of claim not the ``date discovered'' rule. Such
actions made the average days that claims were pending appear
better than if staff had used the original dates the claims
were received.
While the VARO Assistant Directors signed the memorandums approving
the adjusted dates of claims to recent dates, they did not provide the
required notification to VBA Compensation Service after VARO staff
adjudicated the claims. Philadelphia VARO management indicated the Fast
Letter guidance was confusing as their explanation for misapplying the
guidance. We disagreed and felt the guidance provided in this 3-page
Fast Letter was clear even though it deviated from longstanding policy
that ensured consistency and accuracy regarding how long a veteran
waited for his or her claim to be processed.
Mail Management Concerns
During our initial walk-through of the VSC during an unannounced
visit in June 2014, we found mail bins full of claims and associated
evidence that had not been scanned into Virtual VA since 2011. We
became concerned that evidence located in these mail bins was needed
for processing future claims because until the documents are scanned,
claims processing staff may be making decisions without all of the
required evidence.
Another concern centered on the electronic date stamps used by PMC
staff at the Intake Processing Center to record dates of claims on the
documents received. Management told us that each claims assistant
maintained a key that allowed access to the mechanism inside the stamp
where they could adjust the electronic date. As such, the opportunity
existed for staff to misrepresent dates of claims. Although we did not
find any instance during our limited review where staff changed the
electronic dates, we did find one instance where the electronic date
stamp incorrectly stamped documents with a future date. Management
indicated they were aware of this problem and had instructed staff to
cross out the incorrect date stamps and re-stamp the documents with the
correct dates of claims.
Duplicate Records and Payments Allegations
VARO staff also showed us several instances where veterans or their
dependents received duplicate payments resulting from duplicate records
in VBA's electronic system. We were told that this is an ongoing
problem, both in the PMC and the VSC. Although management was aware of
this issue, it was not a priority to make corrections in spite of the
potential for improper payments.
In our report, Audit of VBA's Pension Payments (September 4, 2013),
we substantiated that VBA's corporate database contained duplicate
pension records, and that these duplicate records occurred because VBA
relied on PMC staff to identify pre-existing records prior to creating
a new record. VBA did not have system controls in place to prevent
users from creating duplicate records. As of September 30, 2014, 6 of
the 8 recommendations in this report remain open.
VBA's Response
The USB agreed to do the following to address the issues that we
reported on:
Issue a moratorium on Fast Letter 13-10 while VBA
determined the appropriate way to move forward.
Prioritize scanning the claims and associated evidence
we identified in mail bins into Virtual VA.
Establish a key control point, limiting employees'
access to keys for electronic date stamps.
Prioritize the correction of duplicate claims to
reduce the risk of potential improper payments.
We plan to follow up on the corrective action taken in future
benefit inspections.
Facility Conditions
Based on numerous complaints we received from VARO staff about the
physical conditions in which they work, we dispatched a group of
administrative investigators to the Philadelphia VARO. VARO employees
told us, and by our own observations, we learned of unacceptable
conditions at the VARO workspace located at 4700 Wissahickon Avenue.
According to employees, the environment within this building (a
separate building located close to the main VARO) has adversely
affected employee health, morale, and productivity. Based on our own
observations, we identified several areas that violated VA's
Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) standards, leading the OIG to
issue a Management Implication Notification to the Under Secretary on
July 23, 2014, outlining these concerns. For more details on the
conditions, please see Exhibit C which is attached.
We recommended the USB take immediate action to ensure that the VBA
workspace at 4700 Wissahickon Avenue complies with VA's OSH directives
and handbooks, occupational safety and health requirements contained in
Federal laws, regulations, and Executive Orders. We also advised that
the Under Secretary ensure the protection and safeguarding of all
veterans' records.
Conclusion
These are challenging times for VA in general and VBA specifically,
as they attempt to work through the compensation claims backlog while
simultaneously implementing multiple initiatives to move VBA into an
electronic, paperless environment. From an oversight perspective, these
process changes require an increase in oversight at all levels.
Management involvement is critical to minimize the financial risk of
making inaccurate benefit payments, maintain a balanced approach to
processing all workloads, and ensure the accurate and timely delivery
of benefits and services.
Our work at the Philadelphia VARO is ongoing and we will issue a
report upon completion of our work. Moving forward, the VARO leadership
must work to restore the trust of employees and promote open
communication. They can succeed by working transparently and engaging
the staff to work together to deliver vital services and benefits to
veterans and their families.
This concludes my statement and we would be happy to answer any
questions that you or Congresswoman Titus may have.
Prepared Statement of Diana M. Rubens
Good morning, Chairman Runyan and Members of the Subcommittee.
Thank you for the opportunity to discuss operations, leadership, and
employee morale at the Philadelphia Regional Office (RO). The dedicated
employees of the Philadelphia RO are committed to improving the
delivery of benefits to Veterans and their families. VA has strong
institutional values--those mission-critical ideals and attitudes that
profoundly influence day-to-day behavior and performance: Integrity,
Commitment, Advocacy, Respect, and Excellence (I CARE). At the
Philadelphia RO, we recently asked every employee to reaffirm
commitment to the I CARE values, putting Veterans and their needs
first. We understand our ultimate measure of success will be how we
serve Veterans, and we are determined to succeed by regaining the trust
of each Veteran we serve. Leadership within the Veterans Benefits
Administration (VBA) and management at the Philadelphia RO take
recommendations from VA's Office of Inspector General (OIG) very
seriously, and we have actively, and quickly, worked to address issues
that were recently raised. My testimony will outline the benefits and
services provided by the RO and actions taken to improve operations.
Leadership and Employee Morale
First, let me assure you that since I assumed my new duties as the
Director of the Philadelphia RO in July, I have been and will continue
to be committed to fostering an environment and culture where employees
feel safe to raise issues. I am inviting all employees to meet with me
in small groups so I can hear their concerns and respond, which is an
approach I will continue to take as we strengthen our entire leadership
team, creating a more inclusive environment for the entire workforce. I
have received suggestions and recommendations from employees and will
engage them in developing plans to address these concerns as I reach
the end of my first 90 days in Philadelphia. The workforce is the key
to successful benefits delivery. As we create more open lines of
communication with our employees, the Philadelphia RO is committed to
becoming more transparent to our Veterans and stakeholders as well.
Overview of Operations and Outreach
The Philadelphia RO is staffed by nearly 1,000 employees, 38
percent of whom are Veterans themselves. The RO administers disability
compensation benefits for Veterans in 40 eastern counties in
Pennsylvania and 7 counties in southern New Jersey. The RO also
administers vocational rehabilitation and employment (VR&E) benefits
for disabled Veterans in eastern Pennsylvania and manages the
Wilmington RO in Delaware. In addition, the RO is responsible for two
of VBA's call centers and a Pension Management Center (PMC) that
processes pension and survivor claims for the eastern United States,
Puerto Rico, and all foreign countries with the exception of Central
and South America. Each month, the Philadelphia RO provides more than
$390 million in VA benefits to over 170,000 Veterans and their
dependents.
Disability Compensation
The Philadelphia RO's Veterans Service Center transitioned into the
new organizational model in November 2012. The new organizational model
incorporates a case-management approach to claims processing, by
reorganizing the workforce into cross-functional teams that give
employees visibility into the entire processing cycle of a Veteran's
compensation claim. These cross-functional teams work together on one
of three segmented lanes: express, special operations, or core. Lanes
were created based on the complexity and priority of the claims, and
employees are assigned to the lanes based on their experience and skill
levels. An Intake Processing Center, located in the Veterans Service
Center, serves as a formalized triage activity to quickly and
accurately route Veterans' claims to the correct lane when claims are
first received. This model also includes Quality Review Teams comprised
of local quality review specialists. The teams evaluate station quality
and individual employee performance and perform in-process reviews to
eliminate errors at the earliest possible stage in the claims process.
The Philadelphia RO started processing claims using the Veterans
Benefits Management System--VBA's web-based, electronic claims
processing solution--in April 2013. Approximately 95 percent of the
RO's rating inventory now resides in this web-based system.
In addition, the RO is assisting our Nation's Veterans by promoting
use of eBenefits, the Fully Developed Claims Program, and Disability
Benefits Questionnaires. The RO is also collaborating with Veterans
Service Organizations (VSOs) to promote these tools and encourage VSO
representatives to utilize the Stakeholder Enterprise Portal, a secure,
web-based connection that complements eBenefits and gives access to VSO
representatives and other authorized advocates so that they can assist
Veterans in filing disability claims electronically. The Philadelphia
RO is also collaborating with the Veterans Health Administration to
have three doctors from the local VA Medical Center located in the
Veterans Service Center to provide medical opinions, which will reduce
deferral rates and increase efficiency.
This fiscal year, the Philadelphia RO provided over 28,000 rating
decisions to Veterans who filed disability claims. The RO has already
surpassed the number of decisions provided to Veterans last fiscal year
by 34 percent. The 3-month, issue-based accuracy rate is currently 95.1
percent, and the 3-month claim-based accuracy rate is currently 88.9
percent. Veterans are now waiting an average of 179 days for a decision
on their disability compensation claims, an 85-day or 32-percent
improvement over the peak wait time in April 2013. Although we are not
there yet, we are continuing to make progress toward the goal of
completing all disability compensation claims within 125 days.
The Philadelphia RO also has one of VBA's seven National Call
Centers, which primarily answers calls related to compensation
benefits. The National Call Center answers over 2,400 calls per day.
Pension Management Center (PMC)
The Philadelphia RO manages one of three national PMCs. This fiscal
year to date, over 269,000 rating and non-rating pension claims have
been completed with an accuracy rate of over 97 percent. The PMC in
Philadelphia also houses the National Pension Call Center, answering
1,600 calls per day. The Pension Call Center provides information to
claimants and dependents regarding pension and survivor benefits.
Pension applicants are currently waiting an average of 75 days for a
rating decision, an improvement of 121 days, or 62 percent, since the
peak wait time in November 2012.
Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (VR&E)
The Philadelphia RO's VR&E Division is currently providing services
to over 2,000 Veterans in Pennsylvania and Delaware, and over 100
Veterans have been rehabilitated this fiscal year. The VR&E Division
participates in the VetSuccess on Campus Program and has a Vocational
Rehabilitation Counselor assigned at the Harrisburg Area Community
College. This counselor provides outreach and counseling on benefits
and services to over 1,100 Servicemembers, Veterans, and their
dependents enrolled at the school.
Outreach
The Philadelphia RO has four Military Services Coordinators who
provide comprehensive briefings on Veterans benefits to active duty
Servicemembers stationed at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, Carlisle
Barracks in Pennsylvania, and Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New
Jersey. The RO supports the Transition Assistance Program (TAP) Goals,
Plans, Success (GPS), which is mandatory for separating Servicemembers.
Mandatory components of TAP GPS include pre-separation counseling, two
VA briefings on benefits, and the Department of Labor Employment
Workshop. After Servicemembers learn about eligibility for benefits in
the briefings, RO employees accept any applications for disability
benefits submitted (within 180 days from separation) and ensure
supporting documents are certified.
In addition to military outreach, the Veterans Service Center
conducts targeted outreach to Veterans who are homeless, former
prisoners of war, women, minorities, and elderly. During these outreach
sessions, coordinators distribute literature and answer questions about
VA benefits. The Philadelphia RO provides volunteers to annual Stand
Down events in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Cherry Hill, New Jersey; and
Wilmington, Delaware, and works closely with national and county-level
VSOs.
Steps We Are Taking To Resolve Recent Issues
We understand that serious concerns about the operations at the
Philadelphia RO have been raised, and I want to assure you that we
share those concerns and are quickly taking action to address these
issues. We take seriously our commitment to providing timely and
accurate benefits and are working to ensure we meet this commitment for
Veterans and their families. Our partnerships with Congress, VSOs, and
other stakeholders are critical in meeting this commitment.
OIG Management Advisory
On June 20, 2014, OIG issued a Management Advisory concerning
claims processing at the Philadelphia RO. Four recommendations were
included in this advisory. The first recommendation was related to the
allegation that staff at the Philadelphia RO misapplied VBA Fast Letter
(FL) 13-10, Guidance on Date of Claim Issues (FL 13-10). OIG found
instances in which the Philadelphia RO did not enter the correct date
of claim in some Veterans' records and recommended that VBA discontinue
the use of FL 13-10. On June 27, 2014, VBA suspended FL 13-10, pending
a thorough review of its implementation. VBA concurred with the other
three recommendations in OIG's advisory and has moved to address all
the issues raised by OIG, as detailed below. OIG has not yet issued its
final report.
The second recommendation was related to scanning completed pension
claims. OIG found 68 mail bins containing completed pension claims and
associated evidence that had not been scanned into VA's electronic
records. These claims were completed in 2011, and it is important to
note that no Veterans were waiting for the resolutions of these pension
claims; in addition, the most relevant information was available within
VBA's electronic systems. Moreover, if the original documents were
needed for processing subsequent claims, PMC employees were aware of
how to access those documents in the paper records. Nevertheless, in
April 2014, the Philadelphia RO started a concerted effort to reduce
the volume of paper records associated with completed claims needing to
be imaged; by adding resources to this mission, we completed this task
in August 2014.
The June 20, 2014 OIG Management Advisory also reported on several
instances in which Veterans or their dependents received duplicate
payments resulting from duplicate records in VA's electronic system. In
response to OIG's recommendation, the Philadelphia RO is prioritizing
review of any potential duplicate payments. VA's Hines Information
Technology Center generates monthly reports identifying potential
duplicate payments in VBA's corporate database. One report identifies
beneficiaries who have two running awards for the same benefit (such as
two compensation awards), while the other report identifies
beneficiaries who have more than one running award but for different
benefits (such as one for compensation and one for pension). To reduce
the creation of duplicate records in VBA's systems, the Compensation
Service provided guidance to nationwide ROs in September 2013 on how to
prevent duplicate records. The P&F Service provided similar guidance to
PMCs during the February, April, and June 2014 monthly PMC calls.
Additionally, VBA developed standardized training for field personnel
on how to avoid creating duplicate records and how to correct the
system when they identify a duplicate record.
The fourth recommendation in the Management Advisory was to limit
employees' access to electronic date stamps. To address OIG's
recommendation, the RO changed its procedures on July 11, 2014, and
moved date stamping into a secure mailroom. A small number of
exceptions were permitted for the Public Contact staff and other front
office employees. Employees continue to be assigned to specific
machines so the RO can audit use of date stamps. All unassigned
machines remain secured by the RO's Records Management Officer.
Proactive Steps To Address Other Recent Concerns
In addition to the issues identified by the OIG's advisory, during
a July 14, 2014, hearing before the House Veterans' Affairs Committee,
allegations were made that mail was being improperly shredded at the
Philadelphia RO. The referenced mail included returned mail (VA-
generated correspondence that the U.S. Postal Service returned because
it was undeliverable) and ``military file'' mail (materials VA was
unable to associate with a Veteran's record because of a lack of
identifying information on the documents). VA became aware of these
issues 2 years ago and, at that time, initiated steps to address the
problem. In March 2012, VBA's Pension and Fiduciary (P&F) Service
visited the Philadelphia RO to investigate allegations of claims
records being destroyed. At that time, there were 126 boxes of returned
mail needing to be reviewed and 13 file cabinet drawers of ``military
file'' mail dating back to 2009.
The Philadelphia PMC is in compliance with all procedures regarding
records disposal. In 2012, procedures were put in place to ensure newly
returned mail is addressed timely, and no additional returned mail has
accumulated. The Philadelphia PMC has also consolidated all ``military
file'' mail into one properly-marked location and incorporated reviews
of that mail into weekly Philadelphia PMC workload assignments. The
Philadelphia PMC has now completed this work, and all ``military file''
mail is up-to-date. By August 19, 2014, the Philadelphia PMC had
reviewed all boxes of mail returned as undeliverable and has screened
approximately 1,400 pieces of returned mail and identified a small
number that need further processing.
While the OIG was at the Philadelphia RO to conduct a thorough
review of operations, the OIG raised a concern about the volume of
unanswered telephone and email inquiries requesting the status of
pending claims. In response to this concern, the Philadelphia RO
quickly initiated an action plan to reduce the volume of unanswered
inquiries. As a key part of the action plan, the Philadelphia PMC
temporarily assigned ten additional employees to review and respond to
the outstanding inquiries. Over the past 2 months, this number of
pending inquiries has been significantly reduced, and the RO is
currently evaluating the number of employees assigned to this activity
to ensure the continued provision of timely responses.
Although the final results of the OIG's review have not been
issued, the Philadelphia RO has worked to address all issues that were
raised with the leadership of the RO during the OIG's review.
Town Hall Meetings and Seminars
At the direction of Secretary McDonald, the Philadelphia RO
recently conducted four town hall meetings, including two at the
Philadelphia RO, one in Southern New Jersey, and one in Delaware. We
hosted these meetings to engage our Veterans and hear their concerns;
Secretary McDonald believes these events will help us to accomplish our
mission, live our I CARE values, and improve the care and benefits we
deliver to Veterans. In addition to the town halls, we hosted
informational seminars and claims clinics for any Veterans looking for
claim-specific information. As we spoke with our Veterans, we learned
that we need to improve engagement and communication with our VSOs, VA
medical centers, and local National Guard and Reserve units. We found
this experience to be beneficial, and we are conducting quarterly town
halls to continue to engage and hear from our Veterans and other
stakeholders.
The Philadelphia RO was recently visited by Congressmen Fitzpatrick
and Meehan, as well as Senator Toomey's staff. These visits have been
valuable opportunities to exchange information and improve our
partnership in serving Veterans. We are also scheduling seminars with
Congressional staff and our VSO representatives for this fall to
continue to strengthen our partnerships in service to Veterans.
Conclusion
The Philadelphia RO remains committed to providing the best service
possible to Veterans who reside in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and
Delaware. We continue to look for ways to improve our outreach and
partnerships to provide timely, accurate, and comprehensive assistance
to all those we serve. Mr. Chairman, this concludes my testimony, and I
look forward to answering any questions you and the other Members of
the Subcommittee may have.
Prepared Statement of Walter J. Tafe
Congressman Runyan, Committee members, it is indeed an honor for me
to provide testimony to this committee concerning issues surrounding
the Philadelphia VA Regional Office and problems I've encountered
during the claims filing process. I commend the committee, and
especially Congressman Runyan, for their continued concern for the
veterans of this district as well as those throughout our nation. It is
my strong belief that our effective and honest communication about the
failures in the system, as well an examination of some success stories,
can lead to an improved and expedited claim process that will serve our
veterans with the commitment and integrity they have earned and
deserve.
My office services Burlington County and its more than 35,000
veterans. We serve not only the veterans of our community but, with our
close proximity to Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, we also process
the claims of National Guardsman and Reservists as they return from
deployment. We are proud of what we do, and feel honored to serve our
nation's best. Unfortunately, our reputation can become tarnished when
the claims we file on behalf of our veterans are not processed in a
timely manner, or are simply ``lost in the mail.'' I cannot count the
number of times veterans have called me complaining that the regional
office has not received information or claims my office has filed.
Over the past several years, I've witnessed a steady decline in the
service provided by the Philadelphia Regional Office. Timely posting of
claim information, processing and development, rating decisions, and
final approval or disapproval has become a protracted and unmanageable
process. What should be a brief process has turned into several months
and, sadly, often exceeds a year. The communication process between the
regional office (RO) and geographically separated veteran service
officers is broken. Phone calls and emails go unanswered and, I
suspect, mail is not opened or processed. While toll-free 800 numbers
are provided, wait time can exceed 35 minutes. With the high volume of
clients my office services, this is simply not acceptable.
In providing meaningful and helpful information, I want to avoid
giving the impression that I am throwing stones at the VA. However, we
Veteran Service Officers are the ones who stand face-to-face with
veterans every day, trying to explain a system of endless errors and
bureaucracy that simply cannot be explained or permitted to continue. I
sometimes provide second, third, and fourth submissions of the same
information only to be continually informed that it has not been
received. Even when I fax in paperwork and have a successful send
receipt on file, I'm still informed that the information was never
sent.
One area of major concern is the communication between the RO and
the veteran. Often, letters from the VA are confusing and
contradictory. During the development stage, it's common for a veteran
to receive multiple letters asking for information they already
provided. To comply with the multiple requests, a veteran will often
re-submit the same information, slowing down the process. Each letter
sent to the veteran allows for an additional 30-day reply time, which
guarantees that another full month is added to an already lengthy
delay. Simple, straightforward claims that could be completed within 90
to 120 days are taking 6 to 9 months, and the veteran or Veteran
Service Officer is always blamed for the delay. They either didn't
respond to a letter (which they never received), didn't show up for an
appointment (which they didn't know about), or didn't send an address
change to the RO (even though they did). The list is endless, but it's
never the fault of the VA.
From my point of view, there are several areas that require
immediate attention. Posting dependent information is a prime example.
A veteran's compensation is increased depending on the number of
dependents he or she has. The processing of this simple form can add
hundreds of dollars to a veteran's claim. Processing this form takes an
average of 9 months to a year for completion. I'm told by VA employees
it is because this is not seen as a priority by the VA. To the veteran
a few hundred dollars a month is meaningful and his or her frustration
grows as the months pass.
Another area requiring immediate action is paying the veteran
retroactive pay owed due to withholding actions because of receipt of
retired pay. Veterans who receive retirement from their military
service have their retroactive payment withheld until the VA receives
verification from the Defense Finance and Accounting Office that
Concurrent Retirement Disability Payment (CRDP) has not been paid. The
intention of this process is to ensure the veteran does not receive
double payment. This retroactive payment can sometimes be over
$100,000.00. Processing this payment can take 9 months to a year after
DEFAS has verified the payment is due. Imagine, if you will, that
someone owed you over $100,000.00 and failed to pay month after month
as your expenses mounted and your bills piled up. It's easy to see why
elderly veterans feel the VA is waiting for them to die. When a veteran
owes the VA money, they move to collect the debt almost immediately . .
. but when the tables are turned, the VA is unwilling or unable to make
their outstanding payments in a timely manner.
Often, Dependent Indemnity Compensation (DIC) claims--the pension
the VA provides to the widow or widower of a veteran who dies from
service-connected illness--are delayed due to bureaucratic requirements
that have no impact on the outcome of a claim. The vast majority of
these claims are straightforward cases that could be resolved in a
matter of weeks, or even days; instead they end up taking months to
process. If a Vietnam Veteran dies of an Agent Orange-listed illness,
and was being compensated for the same illness at the time of death, it
should be a simple matter of verifying the cause of death listed on the
death certificate and approving the claim. Yet these claims will be
held up in development for months before arriving at the rating office.
Often these claims are delayed for foolish or insulting questions. The
example of Mrs. Genna Stanley comes to mind. Mrs. Stanley was married
to her husband, veteran Harry Stanley for over 50 years and he was
rated 100 percent for cancer. When Mr. Stanley died, the cancer he was
rated for was listed as cause of death on his death certificate. His
widow's approval for DIC was delayed for months because she failed to
notify the VA whether or not she had remarried after her husband's
death. Adding insult to injury, the question was totally irrelevant
since a widow who remarries after the age of 56 is still entitled to
the DIC.
Pensions for low income veterans are another area for immediate
action; they take far too long to process. We are informed that we can
file a financial hardship for a veteran in severe financial need . . .
however, pretty much any veteran filing for a low income pension can be
said to be experiencing financial hardship! I can't speak to turnaround
the VA reports for completing claims. I can only speak to my
experience, and that tells me that the process itself is hardly the
picture of efficiency. I would like to tell my veterans it will take
120 days, but the reality of my experience is that these claims can
take up to a year.
I can offer innumerable examples of veterans who have suffered due
to the delay in processing claims, but time doesn't permit me to
expound. Suffice it to say that many of my veterans have become
extremely frustrated when hearing about bonus programs at the Regional
Offices that reward workers for their efficiency while they face a
seemingly endless wait for much-needed financial help. Sadly, the
majority of veterans have completely lost faith in an institution that
was established to protect their rights and make amends for their
injuries.
All is not doom and gloom however, and I would be remiss if I did
not note some improvements that are being made and some workers who are
totally dedicated to the veteran community. The new mail system
recently instituted by the VA should drastically reduce lost mail. It
is my understand mail received at the processing centers is scanned and
send directly to the ROs. I have more confidence it this system and
hope to see the effects in expedited claims soon.
I'm hopeful that recent town hall outreach meetings will foster a
better working relationship with Veteran Service Officers and give
veterans the feeling that their voice is being heard. By simply
enabling veterans to voice concerns directly to RO personnel, we can
help enhance what has become a tarnished image.
Lastly, allowing the geographically separated VSO access to the RO
files through the Stakeholder Enterprise Portal should prove to be a
major asset that dramatically improves communication across the entire
spectrum.
In the short time I have left, I would like to recognize and
commend Ms. Anita Brodsky who has been assigned to work with our
county. Ms. Brodsky is responsive, aggressive, and displays a very
caring attitude. She always returns phone calls and emails, and seeks
the VSO out when she sees anything concerning our clients that may be
problematic. I'm comfortable that anything I fax to Ms. Brodsky will
receive her immediate attention and confident in the professionalism
she projects; the Philadelphia Regional Office should be proud of her
hard work and the difference she's making every day.
Additionally, Ms. Jannah Wilder of the Newark Regional Office, who
recently assumed duties as a Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor, is a
breath of fresh air. In a very short time, she has established a solid
reputation as a person who truly cares and is totally dedicated to her
clients. It is refreshing to work with a true professional who will go
the extra mile to ensure our veterans receive the benefits they have
earned.
In closing, and let me thank you for allowing me to use slightly
more than my allotted time; it is my feeling that this is not a
situation that will be resolved by throwing money at it, or replacing
the Secretary. The problems that exist can be found in the regional
office, and their leaders and their mid-level supervisors must be held
accountable. Many members of the Regional Office are in positions of
leadership, and the time has long passed for them to take the role
they've been entrusted with and lead! In today's environment, there's
room for just two types of workers in the VA: outstanding and out
processing! Thank you for allowing me to provide my thoughts today.
Prepared Statement of John P. Dorrity MSW, CVA
I am a combat Disabled Vietnam Veteran. I have served my fellow
veterans, their spouses and children in the capacity of an advocate and
claims representative since 1982. I am the past President of the
National Association of County Veterans Service Officers (NACVSO, 2004-
2005), the past National Service Director (NSD, 2005-2012), the
President of The New Jersey Association of Veterans Service Officers
(NJAVSO, 1998-present) and the District Commander of VFW District 12
(2013-present).
It is extremely easy to single out a particular RO and point to
problems within that agency without offering solutions. Ladies and
gentlemen, true resolution requires a semblance of the truth. Truth be
told, the inadequacies that claimants experience under the jurisdiction
of the Philadelphia RO are endemic to the entire VA system of process
and adjudication. Some of the particular problems of claimants
experience with this RO are;
1) Duly executed power of attorney forms (VA form 21-22, VA form
21-22A) are not scanned and recorded into the claim file in a timely
fashion--this problem, due to the Privacy Act of 1972, does not allow
effective communication from the field rep and the rating specialist or
other personnel stationed at the RO;
2) With the utilization of the ``Paperless'' initiative under
former Secretary Shinseki, copies of rating decisions, to include
rating sheets, are denied the field rep by hard copy, unless they are
authorized to use the veterans benefits management system (VBMS).
Without the rating sheet, in particular, available to the field rep,
we, who sit across the desk from the claimant on a daily basis are left
in the blind and misinformation and adversity to the VA by the veterans
community abounds. This may seem like a correctable situation with the
onus of responsibility put upon the field rep but, the authorization
process is complex and laborious, at best. case in point, as I amble
through the process of authorization to utilize VBMS, I have to
physically count every POA whom I represent. Presently, I am halfway
through the alphabet and am at nearly 2,000 claimants. This physical
counting procedure has taken, so far, 3 weeks of my time, even with the
assistance of 2 members of my staff.
3) There is a new electronic initiative, the PC-3 program. It
became available in December, 2013. we, in the field, were not notified
until June, 2014. training on the use of this system is yet to be
announced. Ineffective communication from the top down, in my
experience in combat, kills people. Translated to this process, it
delays our compliance with this ``paperless'' system. Delayed
adjudication is justice denied those, and their families, who have put
themselves in harm's way so that the rest of us can enjoy freedom!
4) The inordinate amount of time that it takes to adjudicate a
claim has literally taken its toll on the veterans population. the tens
of thousands of veterans and their families whom I have had the honor
and privilege to represent over the decades. I have had at least 3-4
dozen claimants die while waiting for a VA decision on their claim. Oh,
we can extoll the virtue of the electronic initiative, the fully
developed claim process (FDC), the VA form 21-526EZ, etc. These claims
are a quick turnaround time, for recently released veterans. What about
the WW II vet, the Korean vet, the Vietnam vet and all of the others in
between who do not have access to their service medical records or
healthcare or the production of any evidence or documents that will
support their claims. What if all of the aforementioned veterans memory
of events is questionable? The oldest claim I have in my office is 11
years old. We still have a backlog in those claims.
5) Appeals still take 2-3 years to be heard. and when they are, and
when they are with a judge's order to expedite the claim, I feel that
no one in the entire VA system knows the meaning of the word
``expedite''. I realize that this issue goes beyond the RO but maybe,
we should also look at the interaction between the RO and the board of
veterans appeals (BVA).
I would be remiss if I did not compliment The Pension Management
Center Director, Gary Hodge, and his staff for their efforts on behalf
of my claimants. If I call or e mail, they are right on the problem.
The same kudos should be afforded the RO'S Insurance Center. I do not
mean to besmirch the compensation component, or any other operational
component for that matter, of the RO. I know we do our best. So, too,
do I know we can do better. electronic answers from the VA Central
Office are no substitute for hard work in the field. I am familiar with
the new RO Director, Ms. Diana Rubens. I hope that she can address the
issues of all of we field reps. The recent town meetings are a good
first step. There should be more! Understand, that if government is to
truly serve the people, as we reiterate constantly, than it is in those
people's interest that we are true partners. My associates are, for
better or worse, FTE who are grossly underutilized by the VA in
general.
Ladies and gentlemen, you should notice by now that I do not refer
to the ongoing problems of the VA process as a ``challenge''. A
challenge is me trying to reenlist in the military on 9/12/2001. These
problems have been inherit within the claims process of the VA since I
began my voyage of assisting other veterans and their families over 3
decades ago. They have not gotten better. We just create new dialogue
and the problems are not adequately addressed as our attention is drawn
elsewhere. I do not believe that there are mean spirited people within
the VA who would subjectively deny entitlements to a claimant. I
believe that the process implemented through the former secretary and
his staff in the ivory tower to address the backlog and the rating
system, were, and still are, based upon phony statistics. Many of those
statistics were the product of a performance bonus program. Are you
serious? I have attended many meetings in the central office, not with
the purpose of tearing the system down but, to point out deficiencies
and offer any method that would make the system less frustrating to the
claimant. It took a whistleblower former VA medical employee to open up
the eyes of America and Congress to the workings of ``gaming'' the
computer in order to receive a bonus. Okay, that was the Veterans
Health Administration (VHA). The same performance bonus system is
available within the Veterans Benefits System (VBA). To me, it's blood
money. It is the blood of my fellow veterans that we are talking about
here; the people who pay our salaries; they deserve better!
Thank you for this opportunity to speak today and I will not, even
if the rest of you pay no attention to the problems endemic within the
VA claims process, rest on my claimants until the last breath leaves my
body.
FOR THE RECORD
Congressman Michael G. Fitzpatrick
The Philadelphia VA Regional Office is broken.
Since 2012, my office has been involved in highlighting the very
serious issues that are detracting from the Philadelphia VA's ability
to execute its primary mission--serving veterans.
We've had reports of improper mail handling. Boxes upon boxes of
returned mail sat stacked in a dark corner of the mail room for years.
This is despite efforts in 2012 to highlight the problem. Only
recently, after national attention, has the Philadelphia office made
efforts to sort the mail. This comes as veterans in the region describe
sending mail to the Philadelphia VA as a black hole, almost expecting
their mail to go missing.
We received reports of potentially millions of dollars of duplicate
payments being improperly doled out. The VA Central Office in
Washington, DC attempted to downplay the concerns, telling my office
that they have procedures in place to catch this problem and that any
payments are minimal. But whistleblower testimony paints a different
picture, and more needs to be done to ensure that taxpayer money is
being used efficiently and effectively.
We have been presented with a picture of the Philadelphia office as
one of low employee morale plagued by a broken process; a process that
is putting the emphasis on numbers and production to the detriment of
individual veterans. Time and time again we hear stories of employees
focusing on easy claims while putting off, or worse, hiding older more
difficult claims.
We have seen data manipulated to meet production goals. Management
in Philadelphia directed employees to change the dates on claims, thus
making the backlog look smaller than it really was. Furthermore, the
Philadelphia failed to follow national protocols that required they
report any changed dates to the VA Central office.
I am not confident that the Philadelphia VA has identified the
right fix.
I have been to the Germantown office twice since the Office of
Inspector General investigation began. I have met and listened to the
stories of many of those hardworking employees. The picture they paint
of the office culture is not good, and most of it leads directly back
to management. The majority of these employees just want to serve
veterans. Those hardworking employees are not the problem in
Philadelphia; the problem is the management.
When I asked Acting Secretary Sloan Gibson, during a July 24th
Veterans Affairs Committee hearing, what the VA's plan was to fix the
Philadelphia office, he told me that they are sending one of their most
``capable and experienced senior leaders'' to take over that ``troubled
location,'' and to expect ``steady improvement.''
Veterans in the greater Philadelphia area have been expecting
steady improvement, as promised, for the last 3 months. But we haven't
gotten it. Instead we are getting more of the same. We get training
materials comparing veterans to a homeless grouch that lives in a
trashcan. Then we get claims from Philadelphia office management that
the Oscar the Grouch training material was referring to VA employees
and their ``inner Oscars'', not veterans. I've seen the materials. How
you come to that conclusion is beyond me. In fact, it appears to be a
concerted effort by Philadelphia to spin the issue in a way that, as
the VA Secretary confirmed in correspondence to my office, is contrary
to VA's mission and values.
We need a Philadelphia Office that works. We cannot accept failure.
It's going to take a concerted effort by local veterans, the
Philadelphia VA, and by Congress to get this right. We must succeed.
But a first step in rehabilitation is admitting you have a problem.
Veterans know Philadelphia is a problem, and have known for some time.
Philadelphia VA employees know we have a problem, but they've been
silenced. Congress has been ringing the alarm about Philadelphia for
several years, but has been paid lip service. But what is missing is a
realization by the management within Philadelphia that they have a
problem, that they need help. And so I hope today's hearing finally
gets the message across to VA management. We need change. We need
accountability. We need to fix this.
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