Congress Inaction Always Harms Veterans

This weekend in Orlando the new Lake Nona VA Hospital is finally opening. I went to the groundbreaking back in 2008. This was the news back then. Orlando VA Medical Center Awards Final Contract For New Medical Center

The $665 million medical campus, located on a 65-acre campus in southeast Orange County, is expected to open in late 2012. In addition to the hospital providing acute care, complex specialty care and advanced diagnostic services, the facility will also have a large multispecialty outpatient clinic, 134-inpatient beds, 120-community living center beds, a 60-bed domiciliary and administrative and support services.

As you can see, building a VA hospital is never quick or easy or cheap. The point is, that years pass from the time Congress gets around to approving plans, accepting bids, and getting the land to build it on. A lot happens in between the time Congress approves it and it actually happens.

Congress has the responsibility to oversee everything so when things don't happen, they are supposed to take action to make sure it does. So why didn't they?

VA chief rips Congress for ‘inaction’ on Denver hospital
The Hill
By Martin Matishak
05/20/15

The authorization for the project, which began more than a decade ago, expires this weekend.

Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert McDonald is warning lawmakers that, unless they act soon, construction on a delay-plagued VA hospital outside of Denver will come “grinding to a halt.”

“I have provided multiple proposals to the Congressional authorizing committee as to how we can complete this campus for veterans. The options were rejected and the result has been inaction. Our veterans deserve better than that,” McDonald said Wednesday in a statement.

He said that, “without immediate Congressional action prior to returning home for the Memorial Day holiday recess, construction on the Denver Replacement Medical Center in Aurora will shut down Sunday, grinding to a halt as Kiewit Turner demobilizes its team of contractors and sub-contractors.”

Earlier this week, the agency chief sent a memo to the leaders of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee and other lawmakers, asking for a $200 million increase in the funding limit for the facility being built in Aurora, Colo., for a new total of $1 billion.

“Let me be clear. Inaction by Congress will punish the nearly 400,000 Colorado veterans and families that Aurora will serve,” he added.
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