Leadership vacuum at VA reduces ability to serve veterans

by Jeffrey M. Freedman, Esq.

While Congress and the Trump administration play politics with leadership at the Department of Veterans Affairs, disabled veterans go without disability benefits.

As of mid-2017, according to the VA, 345,000 disabled veterans were waiting for benefits. An additional 300,000 who had appealed their benefit ratings were waiting for rulings on appeals. Locally, we have seen clients appeal ratings and wait five years for a decision. While they wait, these applicants suffer severe financial stress, which impacts their health.

There is a vacuum of leadership at the top of the agency extending far beyond the controversial top position of Veteran Affairs secretary. According to John Hoellwarth, spokesman for Amvets: “There has been a mass exodus of the organization’s most knowledgeable and experienced personnel.” This includes losses in the rank and file – 33,000 vacancies in total. Curt Cashour, agency spokesman, said, “in many cases, employees who were not on board with this administrations’ policies have departed.”

In addition to losing well-qualified staff, the contract for the new $16 billion electronic health records system set to replace the current decades-old system, was scrapped. The Trump administration approved a contract for a new system earlier this month.

President Trump’s revised Veterans Choice Act – the original was signed by President Obama – allowing veterans to seek care from private physicians, created a mountain of paperwork for VA doctors, whose primary job is to provide care for the general population of veterans, and medical evaluations and documentation to those applying for disability.

Now, VA physicians find they don’t have time to see patients because they have to input data from private caregivers into the antiquated records system. Many have left, further crippling the VA’s ability to provide services

The impact of the leadership vacuum affects veterans on a very personal level. For those in need of health care, the loss of physicians makes it difficult to obtain treatment. For those disabled due to service-related injuries, obtaining disability benefits has become a long and arduous process.

This country promises the young men and women who go into combat to protect our interests, that we will protect their interests, should they be injured. The 330,000 employees left at the VA are doing their best to stick to their mission, but as the former chief of staff at the VA hospital in Cleveland says, “morale is running low.”

Ignoring the leadership and staffing needs of the sole agency serving our veterans is like trying to build a house without a general contractor and electrician. You can have great carpenters and plumbers – but who is going to coordinate the workers and make sure the power is on? Our veterans deserve better.

About Author: Jeffrey Freedman, managing attorney of Jeffrey Freedman Attorneys, PLLC, is an accredited attorney with Department of Veterans Affairs.