(Hartford, CT) – Today, U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs (SVAC), released the following statement on new information from the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee that identified the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) paid more than $142 million in performance bonuses for executives and employees in 2014, despite a number of VA scandals and mismanagement of funds.

“Bonuses to bad actors are a devastating disservice to honest, hard-working VA staff who actually deserve them. Such rewards after incompetence and corruption also demean and diminish the quality of services and care that veterans need and deserve. I demand that the VA take immediate steps to recoup such potentially unjustified bonuses and communicate clearly and immediately how it will prevent them again in the future.

“Our veterans deserve the best care in the world, and that effort requires changing the culture of VA, ensuring accountability, and attracting and retaining top-notch talent – incentivizing good work and excellent performance. I call on the Secretary to submit to the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs a plan so that the bonus system is no longer on auto-pilot – paying workers for meeting metrics, rather than rewarding the men and women who go above and beyond in service to our veterans.”

VA, like other federal agencies, has the authority to provide an award to recognize an employee’s performance. As detailed in VA’s Handbook on Financial Policies and Procedures, VA “may recognize an employee or a group of employees through the approved use of monetary” awards.

The bipartisan Veterans Access, Choice, and Accountability Act of 2014 (VACA), which was signed into law in August 2014, capped VA cumulative performance awards through FY2024 at $360 million per year. VACA also made two changes to VA’s use of performance awards: 

1. Prohibits the use of scheduling and wait-time metrics as factors in determining performance awards.
2. Requires VA to remove any performance goals for employees that could discourage the payment of veterans claims for non-VA health care, and it modifies the performance plans of the directors to ensure that the performance plans are based on quality of care received by veterans, including reviews and recommendations by VA’s Inspector General.

According to data from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, employees at a GS-11 or below (making up over 75% of VA’s employees), the average performance bonus, if one was received, was well less than $1,000. For example, the average performance bonus for GS-6 police officers, 88% of whom are veterans themselves, is $678.  In 2014, out of VA’s 15,778 medical support assistants, only 2,501 received a performance award; 407 of these performance awards were $100 or less and 1,998 performance awards were $500 or less.

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