Veterans Affairs

  • VA will seek at least $1.1 billion from Congress to rescue a Denver hospital project that was supposed to cost $600 million. The final price tag won't be known for several more months. VA also asked the Army Corps to conduct a complete examination of its major construction programs across the country.

    January 23, 2015
  • Veterans Affairs whistleblowers reclaimed their jobs and reputations after supervisors tried to downplay claims of falsified performance reports, a delayed response to rape allegations against a VA employee and low staffing levels at VA medical centers.

    January 20, 2015
  • The reverse auction vendor says its decision to split up its federal and commercial businesses has nothing to do with the critical Veterans Affairs inspector general report from September. Joe Jordan said FedBid has taken several steps to ensure any problems highlighted by the IG are resolved.

    January 20, 2015
  • With the challenges that chief information officers face today, it is worth asking whether becoming a CIO is worth the work and jeopardy it seems to entail, says former FAA IT leader Bob Woods in a new commentary.

    January 15, 2015
  • We've gone through the first 400 bills in the new Congress to pull out those you'll want to watch, from a measure to kick political appointees out of the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan to three that embrace across-the-board spending cuts.

    January 08, 2015
  • Christmas is over, but a new Congress starts this week. So now is really the perfect time to offer Capitol Hill a federal IT wish list. Roger Baker is chief strategy officer of Agilex, and former chief information officer of the Department of Veterans Affairs. On In Depth with Francis Rose, he shared a wish list of his own.

    January 07, 2015
  • Troops start the new year with a 1 percent pay raise. That's a little less than the 1.8 percent raise they would have gotten automatically from the annual cost of living adjustment. A study on pay and benefits from the Military Compensation and Retirement Modernization Commission is due next month. Vice Adm. Norb Ryan is president of the Military Officers Association of America. He says some kind of reform is long overdue. He shared his Top 3 for 2015 on In Depth with Francis Rose. He says morale is still a top priority for the military, even with fewer commitments in Afghanistan.

    January 06, 2015
  • New Office of Personnel Management clarifies statutory language affecting who is eligible to receive veterans preference during the hiring process at federal agencies.

    January 02, 2015
  • Even without all the fireworks caused by furloughs and the government shutdown that occurred in 2013, Federal News Radio readers found plenty to intrigue them in 2014. Read our 10 most-read stories for 2014.

    December 31, 2014
  • The Veterans Affairs Department says veterans using a specific contractor for home telehealth services found a vulnerability that potentially could've exposed personal information of veterans. VA said the vulnerability has been closed and it has offered those affected credit monitoring services.

    December 24, 2014
  • Reps. Jackie Walorski and Mike Coffman wrote separate letters to VA Secretary Bob McDonald asking for details about how the agency is addressing ongoing cyber challenges. Walorski asked VA to answer four questions about how it's protecting the identity of veterans using the eBenefits site.

    December 22, 2014
  • Some days, it's not easy being a senior career executive in the Federal Government. Ill will reached a peak last summer at the height of scandal in the Veterans Affairs Department. That led to Congress enacting legislation cutting the civil service protection of SESers at the VA. A couple of weeks ago, President Obama gave the SES a pat on the back, promising to make the service into how it was originally envisioned. So what will 2015 bring? David Dye, the director of Federal Human Capital Services at Deloitte and a former official at the Office of Personnel Management, offered some answers on the Federal Drive with Tom Temin.

    December 22, 2014
  • A ruling could have a major impact on the pay, pensions. bonuses and job security of Uncle Sam's 6,000 top career executives, says Senior Correspondent Mike Causey.

    December 22, 2014
  • Steph Warren, the Veterans Affairs Department chief information officer, said the agency is the first to implement advanced cyber capabilities from DHS known as Einstein 3A, and is expanding its continuous monitoring capabilities.

    December 18, 2014
  • A Veterans Affairs hospital construction project is shaping up to be a classic failure. Late and over-budget, the billion dollar Denver facility is only 62 percent complete. And now a court rules, the contractor could legally walk away from the whole thing. Judges for the Civilian Board of Contract Appeals say the VA has acted in bad faith. This mess has not escaped notice of the Government Accountability Office. David Wise, the director of physical infrastructure issues at GAO, joined Tom Temin on the Federal Drive to explain more of what went wrong and whether it can be salvaged.

    December 16, 2014