Plan Would Address VA Acquisition Issues in GAO’s High-Risk List
This week, Congressman Chris Pappas (NH-01), member of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs and Chair of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, sent a letter to Secretary of Veterans Affairs Denis McDonough urging that VA provide an action plan to address deficiencies in acquisition management identified by the Government Accounting Office (GAO) as part of its High-Risk List. The plan would detail the key steps and timeline to fix major problems with VA's antiquated medical supply chain.
GAO released its High-Risk List describing programs and operations that are deemed to be at ‘high risk' due to their vulnerabilities to fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement, or that need major transformation. GAO's latest report shows the VA has three high-risk areas, including VA acquisition management.
"I am encouraged that VA had partially met two of the five GAO criteria," wrote Congressman Pappas. "However, as GAO stated in the High-Risk report, many of its recommendations remain unimplemented."
Chairman Pappas's letter specifically addresses VA acquisition management as a risk factor for the department. GAO reports that VA needs to demonstrate greater leadership commitment and strategic planning to ensure efficient use of its acquisition funding and staffing resources.
The Department of Veterans' Affairs has one of the most significant acquisition functions in the federal government, spending tens of billions of dollars annually to contract for goods and services. GAO noted that "VA faces several long-standing medical supply chain challenges, further exacerbated by the demands of the COVID-19 pandemic."
Chairman Pappas continued in his letter to Secretary McDonough: "I am confident that you and your leadership team will provide continued attention and resources to lead sustainable improvements to VA acquisition management. However, GAO noted that VA has yet to provide Congress with a corrective action plan to address deficiencies and, over time, that will allow its removal from GAO's high-risk list. I ask that you provide the Subcommittee with VA's action plan."
In September 2019, Pappas, along with Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee former Ranking Member Jack Bergman (MI-01), introduced the bipartisan
. This legislation seeks to improve management and better the quality of care within the Veterans Health Administration in order to remove it from the Government Accountability Office's (GAO) "High-Risk List" of federal government programs that are most susceptible to fraud, waste, or mismanagement.
On January 5th of this year, former President Trump signed this legislation into law as part of the bipartisan Johnny Isakson and David P. Roe, M.D. Veterans Health Care and Benefits Improvement Act of 2020.
This landmark veterans package also contained two other provisions introduced by Congressman Chris Pappas (NH-01) to improve access to prosthetics for female veterans and reform VA debt collection processes.
Read the full letter from Chairman Pappas here.
Original source can be found here.
