VA program lacks funding

July 06--While Washington lawmakers are busy trying to repeal and replace Obamacare, another healthcare funding issue looms as the Department of Veteran Affairs, the nation's largest health care system, is at risk of losing critical funding for a program that would allow veterans to use non-VA providers.

Known as the Choice Program, it gives veterans the chance to access care outside of VA outpatient clinics and hospitals in order to cut down on wait times and help those who may be too far away for care.

Legislators will return from recess next week.

VA Secretary David Shulkin warned last month in Senate testimony that the program was at risk of going bankrupt by August and that the VA is running out of funding ahead of schedule due to high demand.

There will be no easy solution or fix, said John Hale, Parker County Veteran Service Officer.

"This is complicated stuff," he said.

The White House Budget plan proposed making cuts to veterans' individual unemployment benefits to free up funding, but was met with political backlash from multiple veteran organizations, Hale said.

The individual unemployment benefit is a VA compensation program that rates certain veterans' disabilities that could prevent them from performing gainful employment duties.

The Choice Program can help those most affected in rural areas, Hale said.

"What it's for is for people in far, distant rural areas that have a difficult time getting to the VA hospital or facility," he said. "If you live between Fort Worth and Wichita Falls and Abilene, you're looking at a 150-mile drive. In North or South Dakota it could three or 400 miles," he said.

"It's for people who have trouble going a long way to see their VA doctors," Hale said. "That makes sense."

Although Parker County has multiple VA outpatient clinics within 40 miles of Parker County residents, there is still only one comprehensive care hospital with an emergency room, which is located in Dallas, 60 to 90 miles away depending on a resident's location in Parker County.

"It's completely and totally full 90 percent of the time," Hale said. "If you're out here having a heart attack caused by agent orange you can't get that far. So you go to the local hospital and the VA pays for that if the local hospital calls the VA ... (if not) you get stuck with the hospital bill because the VA doesn't know you were there. It's a complicated thing that hasn't been ironed out."

Local care providers may be the only source where veterans can get urgent or life-saving care since there aren't enough VA hospitals to do so, Hale said.

"There's not enough of them, I don't know how they're going to build more of them," he said.

Another issue is whether or not local doctors would accept the funding, Hale said.

"Are these doctors going to accept Medicaid level funding when they don't have to," Hale said.

The answer to the funding issue may be in the form of shutting down excess VA properties that often sit as semi-abandoned structures, Hale said.

"There's an old VA headquarters in Waco," he said. "Why not develop that area. The money is just sitting there. We're talking about hundreds of buildings nationwide."

"Why not develop it, then sell it," he said. "There are all types of malls, shopping complexes you could put in there. I know it's an investment to do it upfront, but once you sell it off ... I know the federal government doesn't want to go into the rental business, even though they rent from people and they don't want to own property and rent it out.

"It's a good idea, I just hope it can be worked out without being too complicated," Hale said of the Choice Program.

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