Mr. Chairman. As you all know, this bill has a strong reputation for finding bipartisan common ground as members work together to fund the construction of military facilities and strive to improve the quality of life and care afforded to our veterans and military families. Once again, Chairman Culberson has continued this tradition. The bill before us provides funding levels that I think most members on both sides of the aisle agree are appropriate, while avoiding contentious legislative riders that complicate passage.
I am pleased to join Chairman Culberson as the House takes up the fiscal year 2015 appropriations bill for Military Construction, Veterans’ Affairs and Related Agencies. The Milcon/VA bill is critically important to the strength and well-being of our military, our veterans and the families who sacrifice so much to defend our country.
Working with Chairman Culberson and the members of the subcommittee, we have crafted a bill that will address the funding needs for military construction and family housing for our troops and their families as well as other quality of life construction projects. In addition, it will provide funding for many important VA programs as well as agencies like the Veterans Court of Appeals and the American Battle Monuments Commission. The bill before us today touches every soldier, sailor, Marine and airman. In addition this bill also will impact military spouses, their children, and every Veteran that participates in VA programs.
I want to commend the Chairman for his work. Together we sat through hearings, gaining valuable insight to the workings of all agencies under the subcommittee’s jurisdiction. I also would like to thank all of our subcommittee members and recognize them for their hard work on this bill. I believe that the minority was treated fairly during this process and I want to thank the Chairman for ensuring this bipartisan result.
Chairman Culberson has already provided the funding highlights in the bill and I will not repeat them all but I will say this, in my opinion, the FY 2015 bill adequately provides for the Department’s priorities in military construction for each of the services. If the Department needed something, it is in the bill-and if it didn’t need it, it is not in the bill.
The Department of Veterans Affairs is funded at $64.7 billion, which is $1.8 billion above the FY 2014 enacted level. Overall, the bill meets the discretionary budget request in all areas of administrative expenses, research, and facilities. In addition, the bill includes $58.7 billion in advances-same as the budget request. While I am pleased with the healthy funding increase for the VA, many constituents from my district are still extremely frustrated with the claims backlog. Frankly, I would have to agree. Now, while the VA has made some progress on lessening the backlog, however, there are still over 300,000 claims considered as backlogged. So I was pleased that an additional $20 million was included in the bill to assist the VA with making even more progress on the backlog. In addition, Mr. Chairman, it is my hope that coupling the Veterans Claims Intake Program with continued rigorous reporting requirements, while fully funding the Veterans Benefit Management System, will help the VA reach its goal to end the backlog in 2015.
On the issue of the Electronic Records, you all know my frustration on this issue and I could spend all the time you yielded to me on just this one topic, but I will say just this-We have finally gotten the two Departments’ attention and I expect to see some real progress on this soon. The bill continues the practice of fencing money for this endeavor to make sure that when its completed we have a system that works and works well.
Mr. Chairman I believe we have a strong bipartisan bill that supports our military, their families, and our veterans, and I would hate to see the hard work of our committee upended by contentious partisan riders intended to serve in scoring political points instead of those that serve our nation. I also believe the most important part of this bill are the resources and accountability provided to assist the VA in tackling the claims backlog. So I say to my colleagues that our committee strongly shares the deep commitment of this body in fixing the claims backlog issue. We looked at numerous approaches and firmly believe our bill has found the optimal approach in dealing with this pressing concern of our veterans.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Source: U.S. Department of HCA
