9 News - Senators in Colorado Scrutinize Over-Budget VA Hospital

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By Associated Press and Melissa Blasius

Members of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee sharply questioned VA officials about financial responsibility after touring the new veterans hospital in Aurora Friday.

"Sometimes we waste money in Washington, but sometimes we come to hold people accountable," said Chairman Johnny Isakson, R-Georgia, at a committee field hearing in the Aurora Municipal Center.

"We are going to make this a permanent, indelible lesson to be learned for not just the Veterans Administration but for all the government," Isakson concluded after criticizing the VA for not firing construction managers involved in the Aurora boondoggle.

The Aurora campus will hold a 182-bed hospital, a spinal cord injury clinic, a PTSD treatment facility, and a wide range of other specialty medical offices. The complex was budgeted to cost $600 million, but the cost estimate has ballooned to $1.73 billion.

"The essence of the issue was VA's failure to acknowledge what it was going to cost to build in the first place," said VA Deputy Secretary Sloan Gibson.

"How is it possible that an institution could be that immune to that level of information and that arrogant about what it was doing?" asked Sen Michael Bennet, D-Colorado. Bennet characterized the culture at the VA as one of "disrespect" and being "unwilling to learn."

Gibson said he hoped the senators sensed positive changes in the VA's "openness to communication" and "interest in other views and opinions" since new leadership took over last year.

A Government Accountability Office report issued Friday said the VA has implemented changes recommended in 2013 to avoid future construction cost overruns. These changes include assigning medical equipment planners to major projects and streamlining the change-order process.

"Our number one goal is not to rehash old arguments; it's to complete the job here," said Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colorado.

The VA has asked Congress for another $830 million to finish the Aurora complex. It wants to take the money from a $5-billion fund Congress approved to improve veterans' access to care.

Some lawmakers are promising to fight that plan, saying it would siphon funding off dozens of smaller VA projects to the detriment of veterans nationwide.

When Sen. Isakson urged the VA to chip in money from the department's administrative budget, Gibson responded the VA doesn't have "buckets of money" that could be diverted to Aurora.

When completed in 2017, the hospital will serve more than 80,000 veterans in eastern Colorado and neighboring states.

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