[inaudible conversations] >> welcome thanks for joining us today for the full committee hearing the implementation of the veterans of affairs accountability. last year enactment of this bipartisan legislation was a

culmination of years of work by members of this committee one of the consequential reforms to the federal service system in decades. and he said time and time again the vast majority are good hard-working men and women that take the core message to heart the bad action tainted the names of the good for far too long. drafting of this legislation did not happen in a vacuum but it was not an ideological partisan attack in the full house so 23 of the 24 members of the committee and 137

democrats supported by 18 veteran organizations. with the accountability they want them to serve the veterans this could only happen when good work is rewarded when it is clear for those that were fused to or incapable of into make it extremely difficult to hold the accountable that this is

unacceptable so today to discuss with that the sustainable accountability and asset want to make it clear it did not give virginia the licensed uses authority no matter their position against whistleblowers. the department in his continued committee will shed the light on waste fraud and abuse and to worry about how implementation is going on and you can't measure success of this law and if one single man or woman is afraid to come

forward to report wrongdoing because of your retaliation and then i recognized the ranking member with the office of accountability and then to create the office and to create one that could duplicate the office and what we really weeded needed to do to make the right decisions and hold them accountable. all the management should applaud their efforts and particularly i am concerned with the recommendations submitted to congress with the growth and we are looking at addressing those concerns.

and to provide the secretary a toolbox and that could turn into a new toolbox to ensure that this doesn't happen i am no fan of red tape for bureaucracy but i am concerned that former policies and policies and procedures are part of the work product. with the ig access and they found a way to take care of this and understand that you have. with that oversight with the proper usage and implementation of this law. the only way to do this not

with innuendo accounts or agendas. and now have any additional opening statement. >> i thank you for calling this hearing. when the accountability act passed i voted for it with a great deal of caution i was cautiously optimistic that it would do what it set out to do which was to provide care by to improve care to remove bad employees that between dismissing employees was superficial. with several legislative attempts to express the virginia significant issues with human resources. i did vote against several of

those attempts because i felt there were too many bad things in those bills. so to address those employees but also good employees. now we are more than a year out i have real concerns and to provide any accountability act 1096 removals 2018 the majority of those were housekeeping aids was is no doubt contributed to the fact there are over a dozen medical centers. i have seen firsthand the problems caused at the loma

linda university center and how that directly impacts care for veterans. also there are large numbers of housekeeping aids whose performance is so poor it cannot be addressed if that is the case it stands to reason they are also management issues. hiring rank-and-file employees does nothing to have persistent management issues instead it just leads to worse care and vacancies. this type of implementation is not part of the accountability act of hope everyone can agree that it's not possible to fire

but this was a commission based on findings that also found to be understaffed and under resourced this led to problems with poor culture. exacerbated those cycle of accountability and we are to break the cycle but in the past year we have heard of that v.a. human resources and turnover is not good management so for months we have seen a steady stream of reports in the press of a hostile work in voigt -- environment previously led by peter. but then last week it was

reported that mr. shelby himself was fired. although the v.a. said he left to pursue other opportunities whether those reports are true the damage to the v.a. hr management has already been done i'm sure they are supposed to improve their resources of the toxic environment or at the top are they rampant. nose that limits the time for employees but as we all know the official time is not spent on union activities. let me repeat that so spending time on union activities is illegal. rather to have human resources

functions to ensure a work environment for all employees. so with the current turmoil and vacancies the human resources function is more important than ever to ensure that care for veterans is not impacted and then to sustain cuts from both ends does not inspire confidence at the agency the goal is not to further undercut the workforce my hope our discussion today can show what it is doing to better management and i think the witnesses to being here today and i look forward to their testimony.

>> the first panel today acting secretary with those disabled american veterans there has been a couple of hours with a time well spent and to be accompanied i the acting executive director with ed human resources you are not recognize. >> thank you mr. chairman and ranking member with the executive director of the office of accountability. and to legitimize a violation of law or regulation i will

not tolerate it so that is a moral obligation and to take action to those individuals and that includes disciplinary action that the overwhelming majority of employees are here to do the right thing the employees have a positive difference congress and virginia leaderships have the right formula to address accountability so the problems that surfaced covered serious shortfalls those problems led to the interdisciplinary crisis team in july of that year expanding into the office of accountability review the purpose was to improve transparency and elevate the visibility of senior leadership during investigation and those initial efforts and this is

why it signed the accountability protection act and the executive then to create a new paradigm for ability of whistleblower protection. we must change the culture from within i own the responsibility of that change needed to move v.a. forward and let me be clear but the size of v.a. makes time and patience to get those

relationships right will not be easy to my goal is to ensure we have a better system in place that works for all employees. you have tapped the office to develop a system to better support employees when they raise issues in the workplace. and to emphasize the need for greater transparency to promptly investigate and resolve allegations of misconduct. and that is making a difference to build on that foundation and let me talk about the accomplishments over the past year with 170 whistleblower protections at the staff quickly examined the concern and with that alleged

wrongdoing. it would to have disciplinary action and with that unique persons of interest. and then how those change to promote accountability or performance and change culture of the v.a. to do what's right with high quality care and services and benefits we can achieve that shared objection in the look forward to your questions.

>> that 50 people had disciplinary action is that correct. >> that is at the senior leader level. >> or to manage this organization? or what you used to define success. so that standup of the office with the recognition of that capability what we are trying to do the senior executives

doesn't understand the purpose and to investigate that performance but that is successful by nonthreatening environment with the unions and the groups with everyone that could take the call to reach out with questions they can have. >> i read a whistleblower. but as submitted for the record how do you make them

hold in that case? >> first listening to the whistleblower. but the legitimate complaint to understand what that definition was. but regardless to listen to them to make sure their voice was heard in with the leadership of that organization or with the supervisors to determine what was really going on. really it was just the two sides not talking to one another than weakness facilitate other times it had been too long as we needed to take other action if that was a full-blown investigation. >> but if you don't protect the whistleblowers this will fail. they have to feel that you can step forward to not be retaliated against.

that is a huge deterrent in an organization as large as the v.a. but in this bill this isn't something that existed before that they could feel is retaliatory. and to stop that action whether the office of accountability or special office and then i could not be affected if it was retaliatory or not.

but how many are veterans? >> i will let mr. manley address that specifically but in the 218 report and then to see a significant difference with unrealistic firings or removals let alone focusing on lower-level employees. >> looking at custodial workers so what we are seeing is not a significant change with less than 1% increase so granted those three occupations are the highest

for terminations they compare similarly to the private sector. your recognize. >> i understand that they are entitled to the inspector general act with paul and complete access to records and all other requests made? >> and has been complied with? even before the recent access? >> so that you will continue to provide full complete

access to all ap records with the previous request there was a very public request but that you will comply with that future request. >> it is unfortunate it was such a public issue because zero ap has been unfettered. >> but that is not what played out. >> but the commitment remains the same. >> i'm not talking about day number one but will you comply going forward? >> esb make thank you. >> with the 1096 removals less

than 1.4% are supervisors and those were housekeeping aids. there has always been a preference requirement and also for veterans so in the past that can verify by facilities. with those disabled veterans. >> so they are all veterans so

they tend to be very veteran dominated? >> so of those employees that have been removed we are talking veterans. one third of all veterans is nearly 100% but if there are so many housekeeping aids it is likely there are some management issues as well. so personal decisions not just to create vacancy at the lower level. or to remain on the job?

>> so regardless if they are veterans or not. that is the highest turnover that is closer to 200%. >> but talking about people that have been removed. >> but that turnover rate implies with removal even back at 2014 that indicates the first five months of removals. and to improve the personnel

function and is also in turmoil. >> to stay on the turnover rate. >> what are you doing to ensure that, my time has run out. >> you are recognized. >> thank you mr. chairman. to the ranking secretary, thank you so much for responding to a concern that was raised in denver colorado that led to the oig to make sure there was no conflict of interest. let's let me raise an issue of accountability. i guess this is different than

what was raised but i'm concerned that your executive service management level and with those positions that have had multiple negative reports that have never been cleaned up but yet people are allowed to remain. so specifically we are going to be opening a hospital in aurora colorado on saturday. and to be responsible for the last person there with construction management that

led to that was five years from behind schedule to replace the virginia construction management team with the army corps of engineers so without that i don't think it ever would have been built and then to find those cost overruns but under her leadership to strip of the construction management authority. yet this person is still there in charge of instruction facilities management. not only is she still there but actually she was tried to be promoted to be in charge of facilities management and contracting.

whether at my behest i raised issues of her competence that she was put back down to construction management. if we don't clean house so no matter what the new v.a. secretary says or does so at this level nothing will change. that is my concern. do you have a response. >> as you described it is a very difficult challenge looking at the culture of an organization the size and intricate at this point as we restructure to bring construction management into federal alignment hopefully that leads to better management structure and so

then by adding accountability and performance as a part of that. that was new and innovative to the degree we don't give ourselves enough credit for. that will allow us in the future once we get through the accountability side and as the ranking member mentioned and what their performances they have to do that very carefully. but that is something we have to address. how the department of veteran affairs that are just below those political appointees so

i hope the new secretary would take a look across the board of where we have consistent failure those people have to be removed. on a bipartisan basis to have that a theory to remove those managers so i just want to commend you for cleaning house. >> thank you to the chairman and the ranking member that when congress passed the whistleblower protection act it was in recognition that more accountability was needed at the v.a. and we hear that today but the accountability doesn't just mean increasing the number of employees pushed out the door but that means creating real change and

culture to ensure that bad behavior is not repeated. management has enabled bad behavior and needs to be held accountable just like those low-level employees who may not have been properly trained. for acting secretary our committee has been made aware of the significant number of career employees who have served under multiple secretaries removed or demoted or reassigned or retired as made aware adverse actions are coming their way there is a large number of personnel changes that brings about instability to manage a large agency so can you tell us now how many personnel changes you are aware of for the office of secretary personnel including executive secretary the protocol office and centers for women and minority veterans between may 30 and

july 16? >> i just want to make sure i can address two of those with women's veterans the director resigned and is now working for national security and started on monday the executive secretary we recognized we needed to make changes at the office of secretary level that required us to move people one in particular they moved to a new job the other moved to another gs 15 job. we are not on the path of things randomly they are all well-planned and design to have better efficiency and effectiveness and we are

encouraging leadership to do across-the-board. if you had issues with your performance do not hesitate to take action whether just restructuring for better performance. >> can you clarify if it is for cost or performance issues or efficiency. >> it is organizational efficiency we talk about if you have an office that is not performing the way it needs to that doesn't always mean the person was committing misconduct means were not getting the performance that we need sometimes that requires a change in leadership. >> i'm sure we will revisit this issue in six months. to be clear what is non-performance and and how are you measuring that what he doing to ensure there is

better performance? to set up training or new performance there is a lot of concern and we are hearing a lot of back channel with morale and we are losing a lot of senior people that is institutional knowledge happening all at once with an acting secretary is very destabilizing we have major pieces of legislation so to clear out that many people is a concern to change those that have the institutional knowledge you have addressed you say those were not for cause. >> with those two no action was taken so i don't know if it was for cause or not. >> are you communicating with the nominee about any of these changes? >> yes. >> do you intend to do that it is important for him to understand if confirmed what

the reasons are for these changes and what you are attempting to achieve. so i would like you to follow up for the reasons of these changes why they have moved and where they have moved and frankly we will have to look with the back channels from what we are hearing for different reasons than you are suggesting today of the rationale for these changes. it is a concern to politicize these high-level positions and that is the concern. >> i'm sorry, politicizing? >> if there is any concerns of the implications why these people are replaced that is a deep concern there is no place for politics in this agency and people need to be hell to performance standards if you go through multiple secretaries if it is a performance issue we should be aware and also the incoming nominee as we should to do oversight. thank you.

i yield back. >> mr. o'rourke there is a number of employees have reached out and believe issues within the v.a. would qualify them as whistleblowers. how does the office of accountability and protection handle the correct way with disclosure? how do you train them? >> there has been ongoing training or awareness from office a special counsel and t5 required by statute to post what do you do to those two agencies as disclosure whistleblower protection is new we had to educate what we needed him by statute we are required to identify a form and toll-free number that was

within the first few weeks we continue to refine those but those are available to all employees we also have the website updated to describe very clearly what is a disclosure to show we really understood that we had to listen to employees to let them talk about their issues because if they feel they cannot talk to their management or supervisors they need someone to talk to and what we found is what caused a lot of this to fester and grow and then become a bigger issue we have done a lot in that area. we have more to do we have trained 40000 you have those specific numbers. >> 2000 hr professionals and attorneys and supervisors and specifically from the senior

executive office as well. >> so when somebody comes forward who goes to them? is it somebody trained from your office or at the site were they are at? how is that handled? >> if they reach out to us they have multiple channels they have congress office of inspector general or counsel they can go anywhere to make their disclosure if they come to us through the form or through the hotline or the toll-free number so then our folks will talk to them if they reach out and just submit the form and we reach out to them to develop that disclosure to give a sense of what it is we handhold them through that process that is the most effective.

>> so to shift, prior to the hearing that was requested copies of written policies and directives and regulations that were sent out and what they received they thought were lacking to say the least. is there an intent for a larger policy to be put together when someone for our office request what is the checklist how do you do that and how do we know what you are doing is it for the whistleblower or write for the agency? >> i will take criticism of tha that. earlier we had a bias to action to reach out and work with the whistleblowers. we had quite a bid of legacy

or just backlog of whistleblowers to reach out. so we did focus more on the operational side now we are trying to see what we have learned from the process standpoint to change that we do have work to do to create actual regulations around what we do we do have an "in-depth" process to sit down with the oig to see how we handle disclosures which is interesting because it will have a similar mission but that is more work we have to do. >> you mentioned earlier about the 714 hold? exactly how did that work? >> when the whistleblower is given an adverse action would have previously disclosed to

whistleblower protection then we will reach out the supervisor and say you will hold this action until you hear from us so they cannot move forward. >> my time is expired but demotion or suspension or anything. >> yes. >> you are recognized. >> i certainly agree with your opening comments in terms of change of culture within the v.a. and many have already spoken to that and i concur with your perspective changing culture takes time and persistence it isn't easy to change a culture of a large organization. but we also know that the v.a. is only is as good as the

employees. and i would say the secretary changing culture is the top priority without question but we continue and i am concerned we still get negative reporting around the morale within the agency and the morale is not very good. so my first question would be since the accountability act was instituted do you think morale has increased or decreased since the act has been applied? >> anecdotally on trips i'm

not saying that to counter yours but best what we know from our own employees survey and when we will have those results in hot process to get that back will definitely share them with you. >> we did conduct an all employees survey every year every employee across the v.a. to give us an adf morale and how things are going so this year it closes on june 25 our commitment is to have those results to go 45 days later so in mid august we will have those results i am already to come back and brief this committee i believe on those results of the survey. >> so the previous morale survey what were the results? >> the virginia went down a list of places to work so we

are comparing those results to see how we have done. >> who will be leading the personnel department now that we have a vacancy? >> right now officially the principal deputy is leading that office. >> what is your assessment of the current leadership there and what is your plan to ensure the office remains fully functional to meet the needs of the despite these recent departures? >> i don't think any office across the federal government is dependent on one person it is important to have leadership to have full confidence in the leadership team and we will be working with them on our expectations

we have that hr function and those are massive organizations across the territories and the countries and there is a huge challenge and we will make sure they have everything they need to continue the progress we have already made. >> from my perspective hr is in a weak spot across the v.a. if they aren't filling vacancies than other departments are not operating at full capacity so that is a constant issue we have debated and discussed many times here in the committee so to actually fill these vacancies in a timely manner with high quality people is really important. so i do see this as the

weakest link in the system and really we need to be focused on it very much so. so again it goes to my question around your plan and your personal involvement will be to make sure that this department is operating as effectively as possible. >> we are taking this leadership involvement at a very serious level. >> my time is up and i yield back. >> you are not recognized for five minutes. >> thank you mr. chairman and secretary for coming in to review the accountability and whistleblower protection act there have been articles regarding the number of v.a. physicians who were whistleblowers making legitimate complaints they

reported allegations of limiting access to computers bullying and intimidation with actual threats against their medical license or false claims to the medical board in fact there was a case of a physician who reported overprescribing inappropriate use of opioids and after reporting those her practice privileges were suspended and false allegations made to her medical board these are chilling things for your physicians to hear those that you employee or the perspective so how do you protect these physician whistleblowers? >> i think everyone of those claims of retaliation of that nature are made they are immediately addressed through the triage process. i can tell you with my experience with those cases there is a lot more to the story so we try to find all of

the elements we can to make a determination very quickly to send that to the medical inspector. >> so i see a number 319 complaints over the last year of retaliation against whistleblowers is that correct? >> think an organization like the v.a. that has not done what it should to define what retaliation is from an educational standpoint simple but also to really dig into that use examples to have every level of management hold each other accountable for that type of behavior. i have seen incredibly egregious examples and also claims of retaliation that absolutely were not.

>> as somebody does have legitimate retaliation what action can the v.a. take for the employee that was retaliating. >> there are two forms in the department to take adverse action and it has to be in those categories. >> can you give me a for instance. >> we have removed individuals for that normally after the second requirement the office of special counsel mandatory is a 14 days or more suspension with the first instance of retaliation. >> it is important to protect their anonymity. >> absolutely. >> that is a key concern if somebody does come to your office with a legitimate complaint about opioids that they don't know that this is

not public knowledge that they made that complaint. >> that is the single highest reason we have given four retaliation is because they were of whistleblower there are other claims with other types of activity but that is a single highest. >> so to protect the witness if you will like witness protection program so the official time when the employees are working with union duties on the payroll that is supposed to be reported we are supposed to know how much going through the process and that is inconsistent and unreliable. do you have faith in that? will that give us honest

data? >> yes or we will start to record their official time 472 employees will go back to work and of those psychologist 62 are physicians. >> so this can help us manage to give folks credit for that official time they need to use. >> when will that be rolled out? >> we are on the hook this month for deployment. . . . .