Veterans Dept. Seeks to Tackle Claims Backlog

There is near unanimity among those who know the agency best in identifying the biggest challenge facing the Department of Veterans Affairs in the first year of President Bush’s administration: fixing the much-clogged claims processing system.

“The biggest challenge the VA must come to grips with is the backlog of claims,” said Bob Norton, deputy director for government relations with the Retired Officers Assn. “There are literally hundreds of thousands of claims backlogged.”

Representatives of Veterans of Foreign Wars and Disabled American Veterans agreed.

The good news for these advocates who represent the agency’s key constituency--there are about 25 million veterans--is that VA Secretary Anthony J. Principi has pledged to make cleaning up the backlog, mostly in claims for service-related disabilities, a priority, as he told the House Veterans Affairs Committee recently.

The good news for Principi is that he begins the cleanup and other tasks at the sprawling department with widespread support and the goodwill of the veterans’ organizations, who know him from his earlier stints as deputy secretary and acting secretary of the agency in the administration of Bush’s father.

“We’re very eager to work with him because we believe what he says and he has a track record of doing it,” said Bob Wallace, executive director of the VFW’s Washington office.

But that does not mean that Principi can expect an extended honeymoon. The veterans’ organizations say the Bush administration’s initial budget proposal for the VA is inadequate and would barely allow the department to maintain its current level of services.

The veterans’ groups are also lining up solidly in opposition to an administration proposal to force about 700,000 military retirees who are enrolled in both VA and Defense Department health care systems to choose one or the other.

Beyond that, veterans’ advocates say Principi also must change the culture within an agency that has lost the confidence of many veterans and impose a system of accountability on those who administer its functions.