Hearing of the Health Subcommittee of the House Veterans Affairs Committee - Opening Statement of Rep. Brownley, Hearing on Healthy Hiring: Enabling VA to Recruit and Retain Quality Providers

Hearing

Thank you Chairman Wenstrup for holding this hearing today.

Last Friday, we passed bipartisan legislation to improve the VA's ability to hire and retain healthcare providers at VA.

I want to thank Chairman Wenstrup for his leadership, and for being willing to work in a bipartisan way to pass this legislation in the House.

I was pleased that my amendment to include the community based outpatient clinics, nursing homes, and vet centers in the GAO's succession planning report was adopted. I would like to work with you to get this important legislation passed in the Senate and to the President's desk without delay.

We passed this legislation because our veterans deserve timely, high-quality healthcare.

I know from talking to staff at the Oxnard CBOC in my district, and with the director at the VA medical facility in West LA that both facilities struggle to hire and retain healthcare providers and HR professionals.

The VA continues to struggle to address staffing shortages at the Oxnard CBOC.

During my meetings with the West LA VA Medical Center, I have heard that HR is one of their biggest challenges, and last we spoke their HR Director Position was unfilled.

The GAO's testimony and its report on VA's longstanding human capital challenges confirm what I've heard from the veterans in my district and the staff at our local VA medical centers.

Even though we provided the VA with an additional 2.2 billion dollars in the Choice Act to hire additional healthcare staff, VA continues to struggle with recruiting and hiring of providers in the 5 clinical occupations with the largest staffing shortages.

Today we will hear from witnesses who I hope will help us understand the root causes of these staffing issues.

I want to learn about the challenges VA HR professionals face, and challenges that the federal hiring freeze affects VA.

As we know, the hiring freeze does not exempt HR staff, and without HR personnel, I am concerned that the VA will not be able to bring on the health care providers they need to serve veterans.

I want to know if this is having a negative effect on VA's ability to fill the 45,000 vacancies in VHA.

I also welcome solutions to VA's human capital challenges from VA and our veteran service organizations. I believe that more must be done to address the lengthy hiring process for healthcare providers. VA must do a better job at hiring and retaining the future health care workforce to care for our veterans.

I look forward to continuing the bipartisan work on this issue, and I yield back.

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