Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. AMODEI. Mr. Chairman, first of all, I would like to thank Chairman Culberson and Ranking Member Bishop for their effort on bringing forth a good bill that addresses the needs of our veterans and maintains our commitment to providing them with the benefits that they earned and deserve.

I rise with this amendment for the first time since I've been in this body because of the existing claims backlog, which is over 600,000 claims nationwide.

As a member of the primary committee of jurisdiction and the primary subcommittee of jurisdiction on the House Veterans' Affairs Committee, I can tell you that, in dealing with this number of claims, we are not making mission in the Department of Veterans Affairs. I can also tell you that the proposal to spend $44 million, according to the Veterans Affairs testimony in front of our committees, to clear 50,000 of those claims in the backlog is, quite simply, more of the same. That's about $900 a claim and will leave you with 550,000 claims when it's done this year.

I appreciate the opportunity of coming technology, but I can tell you this: if you represent a district that's in California, New York, Arizona, Indiana, Virginia, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Texas, Ohio, Maryland, another Texas hit, Boston or Mississippi, which is the majority of Members in this House, then guess what; you've got a majority of those claims in your district offices.

I say it's time for this House to take action and say this: don't cut a single regional office's budget. This amendment does not attempt to do that. This amendment says take that $44 million and allocate it for personnel in those 15 offices that all have over a year of processing time.

By the way, while we're mentioning that, I want to give you a quote that is from Under Secretary Hickey that basically says:

Quite frankly, we have a resource allocation model that doesn't make any sense.

That's before the Veterans' Affairs Committee.

Let's try something new. Let's put the staffing where those offices are that are in need of it most. Two of them are in California and two of them are in the Lone Star State. Chicago also needs help. You name it. Let's try that instead of just doing what we have been doing. It adds no money to the bill, and it also does not take any money away from existing offices.

In closing, Mr. Chairman, I would like to say this. Even though staffing at the VA's 58 regional offices has increased by almost 300 people since September 2010, because of turnover and loss of more than 2,000 workers temporarily paid through stimulus funds, the VA regional offices are severely understaffed. Overtime will not be the answer. At a majority of the regional offices, including those in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Waco, and Oakland, the VA presently employs fewer people than it did 2 years ago, according to their own internal documents.

Let's take the leadership on this issue and do something that's a little different than, quite frankly, a resource allocation model which the determined Under Secretary says makes no sense.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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