Jeff Miller Proposes New VA Employee Reform Bill

From his perch as chairman of the U.S. House Veterans Affairs Committee, U.S. Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., is calling to give the secretary of Veterans Affairs more power to discipline incompetent senior executive service (SES) employees. Miller introduced a bill giving the VA secretary more flexibility in disciplining underperfoming SES employees, including reducing pensions, reducing time on forced paid administrative leave, reforming appraisals for bonus and adding more transparency.

Miller left no room for doubt that his bill was the result of reports of last year on how the VA dealt with altered waiting lists at medical facilities across the country.

More than nine months after the VA scandal, Americans are asking where is the accountability? Unfortunately, VA doesnt have a good answer to this question, Miller said. "Thats why our focus remains on giving the VA secretary more tools to ensure corrupt and incompetent executives face serious consequences for mismanagement and malfeasance that harms veterans. Right now, the task at hand for VA leaders is replacing the departments culture of complacency with a climate of accountability, and we are going to give them everything they need to do get the job done.