Congressman Bishop Statement On FY 2017 MILCON/VA Appropriations Bill Mark Up

Today, Congressman Sanford D. Bishop, Jr. (GA-02), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies, issued the following statement regarding the passage of the Fiscal Year 2017 Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Appropriations bill out of the full U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Committee.

"The Fiscal Year 2017 Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Appropriations bill maintains a strong reputation for finding bipartisan common ground as members work together to fund the construction of military facilities and strive to improve the quality of life and care afforded to our veterans and military families. I am pleased the Committee continues to demonstrate strong support for our service members, but also recognizes the serious challenges remaining in fulfilling our responsibility to veterans and moving the appropriations process forward using the limited resources we have been allocated.

"The bill maintains tough but fair reporting requirements for DoD-VA Electronic Health Records integration, prioritizes the elimination of the VA claims backlog, and includes healthy funding for the Board of Veterans Appeals. Additionally, the bill provides necessary funding for military maintenance and construction of military family housing, medical and prosthetic research, and medical facilities.

"One item of particular concern is the inclusion of bill language limiting performance awards to Senior Executives at the VA. As I have stated time and again, this language will not provide any solution in the short-term and, in fact, may have more long term consequences by compounding the very problem it attempts to address. By limiting such bonuses, the VA becomes a less attractive option than other agencies when it comes to recruiting and retaining quality executive leaders. Instead, we must do more to attract and retain exceptional talent to the Department in order to better serve the needs of our nation's veterans.

"Lastly, we need to be more strategic about how we handle our federal budget and that strategy must include the cessation of artificial crises created by a small minority in Congress with unrealistic demands. I applaud Chairman Rodgers for honoring the allocation of the Bipartisan Budget Agreement (BBA) set for Fiscal Year 2017. While certainly not ideal, the BBA must suffice until we can get past the unrealistic belief that we can just cut our way to prosperity. I am hopeful today's mark-up represents the first step in the necessary movement of getting the appropriations process back on track.

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