WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson, R Ga., chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, delivered the following opening statement at today’s committee hearing on the Fiscal Year 2016 Budget for Veterans’ Programs and Fiscal Year 2017 Advance Appropriations Request:

“I’ve thought a lot… about the last two years on the committee because it has been a rough two years in a lot of ways at the [Department of Veterans Affairs] and a rough two years for the [Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs]. There have been many increases in money to the [Department of Veterans Affairs] and there have been increases in parameters. The Veterans’ Choice bill passed (last Congress) and we’re trying now to implement that.

“We have had challenges with mental health, particularly with veterans’ suicide rates, and we have had a lot of problems with construction (costs) within the department, so you could look back and say this [agency] is a mess.

“The fact of the matter is, with your estimate of employees in [Fiscal Year 2017], you are going to have 305,000 employees in the [VA] healthcare alone. That is a big organization, second only to the United States military in its totality as the largest employer in government.  When you have an organization that big, it could be and sometimes is unwieldy. 

“We as a committee want to try and make it work as seamlessly as possible. We want the funding to be appropriate, but not in the excess. We want our attitude and the attitude of the department to be equally focused on the veteran and our veterans’ healthcare and not on ourselves.

“To that end, I did a little math last night and … I was trying to figure out the ratio of employees to number of beneficiaries in the VA.  There are 6.5 million veterans that are using the VA. And there are going to be 305,000 employees in veterans’ health systems if you get the number of employees you want in two years.  That is a ratio of 21 veterans to every one employee in the VA.  That is a lot better people teacher ratio that you get in public education today. So, I am not sure that we have a shortage of employees as much as we do not have every oar in the water rowing in the same direction in terms of those that are following you and your leadership, or in terms of us and the support we are giving to you.

“I am troubled by the lack of detail in some of [Sec. McDonalds’] requests. I know there is a request for 5,000 more employees in VA over the next couple of years, and I understand why it’s being asked for, but I ask the question: If the ratio is 21 to 1 now, and if we lower it to 19 to 1 (over the next couple of years), is that going to improve anything? Because more is not necessarily better in any business. In fact, sometimes more can be more cumbersome than it can be helpful. 

“Secondly, as I told the [American] Legion yesterday in a hearing where the [Veteran Service Organization (VSO)] made it clear that while they understood the Veterans’ Choice Act, they wanted to make sure that we understood that they didn’t want the Veterans’ Choice Act to replace VA Healthcare, … we need the VSOs and the [VA] putting their heart and soul behind making VA choice work.  Not as a replacement for VA healthcare, but as a force multiplier for VA healthcare and to be the VA healthcare of the 21st century. 

“The Veterans’ Choice [Act] was not designed to be a replacement, but it was designed to help deal with a problem that existed in the administration in the delivery of (veterans’) healthcare -- in appointments, in timeliness and in proximity to specialized care that veterans often times need.

“One thing that you are going to hear me say over and over and over again, and I hope that the VA employees and VSO leaders are listening, is that they need to get on board and start going forward (with implementing veterans’ choice). … We need to make the (Veterans’ Choice Act) work to address the problems that the VA healthcare has experienced and get healthcare to our veterans in the most timely and seamless way we can, and I am going to dedicate and commit my service as chairman to doing just that.

“I’ve got [challenge] coins for the members which say IDWIC – ‘I do what I can’ – to help improve veterans’ healthcare, and we want (Sec. McDonald and the VA) to do what you can to make it work for us.”

Click here to view the video online.

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The Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs is chaired by U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., in the 114th Congress.

Isakson is a veteran himself – having served in the Georgia Air National Guard from 1966-1972 – and has been a member of the Senate VA Committee since he joined the Senate in 2005. Isakson’s home state of Georgia is home to more than a dozen military installations representing each branch of the military as well as more than 750,000 veterans.