OPINION:
A few years back, my local Veterans Affairs (VA) hospital built a new parking garage. I thought it was a questionable use of funds. I’d never had an issue finding a parking spot and the medical facility needed more exam rooms and other upgrades. What really got me, though, was that during the garage construction, the closest parking spaces were reserved for hospital employees, while patients were relegated to a lot much farther away.
But this was par for the course. Patients rarely feel prioritized or well-respected by VA bureaucracy.
Hospital lobbies and hallways often have posters featuring veterans who were caught and prosecuted for travel fraud — an ominous warning to patients and not exactly red-carpet treatment. I’ve never seen a poster featuring the VA’s bad apples, employees who embezzled money, stole drugs from the hospitals, or abused patients. Patient accountability seems more important to the VA than employee accountability.
The department has a culture problem, and because of it, patients suffer.
Officials at a VA hospital in Iowa knowingly hired a neurosurgeon whose medical license had been revoked in another state and whose mistakes killed, injured and paralyzed patients, according to news reports.
The VA medical center in Colorado Springs kept an unauthorized wait list for veterans who needed mental health care. “As a result, veterans experienced underreported delays in receiving care,” the VA Office of Inspector General found.
A VA Center in Illinois, reportedly served veterans raw chicken and expired food, and rodents were running around the kitchen while the hospital’s head of nutrition sold handbags online from her taxpayer-funded office.
And in our nation’s capital, the VA medical center put patients at “unnecessary risk,” failing to stock surgical supplies and keep sterile storage areas clean.
That’s just a small sampling of patient-care scandals that have come to light this year.
Against this backdrop, the head of the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW), an organization whose mission is to “advocate on behalf of all veterans,” erroneously declared last month that “Veterans enrolled in the VA already have access to the best integrated health care system in the world, as well as access to the best outside providers.”
He made the statement in opposition to the Veterans Empowerment Act, an effort by U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn to give veterans control over their health care and modernize the Veterans Health Administration, while also making it more accountable. The bill would establish the VetsCare Program, enabling veterans to choose care outside of the VA system; veterans who are content with their VA care could remain within the system.
The VFW pummeled Mr. Lamborn after he introduced the bill, charging that the policy would privatize the VA — a claim debunked by The Washington Post and others.
And the organization warned, “Having unregulated choice puts the onus on veterans to find their own care — and that decision needs to be made between doctors and their patients, not by Washington.”
Come on, we’re talking about veterans who led their fellow service members over the sands of Iwo Jima and the mountains of Korea, through the jungles of Vietnam, and across the deserts of the Middle East. They’re the most capable men and women I’ve ever known. They can pick their own doctor.
What’s more, “regulated choice,” which is the status quo, does put Washington bureaucrats in charge. The Veterans Empowerment Act puts decision-making power back in the hands of patients and their doctors, where it belongs.
The VFW also complained that its leadership wasn’t consulted about the bill. The VFW is supposed to be the eyes, ears and voice for veterans on Capitol Hill. It’s their job to speak up and engage with lawmakers. If they didn’t do that here, where the heck were they?
But the complaint is also not true.
The VFW has been part of these policy talks for a long time. When I was the national executive director of AMVETS, one of the nation’s most inclusive veterans service organizations, I attended meetings with representatives from the VFW in which these proposals were discussed at length.
Besides, veterans outside the Beltway — the people the VFW is supposed to serve — feel differently about the Veterans Empowerment Act than the Washington-based leaders of the VFW.
In a Facebook post the VFW told members to contact their congressional representatives so “the Veterans Empowerment Act — and any others like it — never sees the light of day.” Top comments reveal an organization at odds with its membership. “This life member has contacted his representatives in support of it,” said one user. “So the VFW opposes veterans getting sufficient and timely care?” queried another. And more piled on: “Whoever wrote this article is obviously out of touch with the horrible care and neglect of veterans at VA hospitals across the nation.”
Tragically, VFW leadership in Washington is so busy hobnobbing with VA bureaucrats and union reps that they are becoming part of the swamp themselves, instead of standing up for all us vets out in the hinterlands.
My sons followed me into the family business of military service. For their sake, and for of all our nation’s service members past and present, I hope Congress listens to veterans instead of the VFW and other veterans service organizations that have gone astray, and passes the Veterans Empowerment Act. This bill can finally change the culture at the VA and deliver the quality health care veterans deserve.
• Stewart Hickey, the former national executive director of AMVETS, served in the Marine Corps for 22 years and is a veteran of Desert Storm.
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