Five hundred and fourteen days. That's how long it took to get the emergency department at the Colmery-O'Neil VA Medical Center in my home state of Kansas reopened after it was closed in 2013 due to a staffing shortage.
Only after numerous phone calls, letters, meetings and more were we able to navigate through the bureaucracy of the Department of Veterans Affairs. For nearly two years, our veterans in Topeka and across Kansas were left without emergency facilities in the face of VA immovability, lacking the care they are owed and deserve.
This is a story told across the country. The VA remains inefficient, unaccountable and completely lacking transparency. One in three veterans seeking VA care have died while waiting, equating to hundreds of thousands of lives.
We promise the brave men and women fighting for our country that if you take care of us, we will take care of you. It's a unanimous principle nationwide, yet for too many veterans, the sad reality is the VA fails time and again to provide the necessary care.
An unaccountable VA, lost in the bureaucracies of Washington, fails to hold accountable employees who do not perform. Before coming to Congress, I spent 20 years working as a certified public accountant. I knew that if I didn't do my job well, I could expect consequences. But for too many VA officials, there is no downside to incompetence. Getting the firing process started takes an average of six months to a year — all while veterans continue to suffer the impacts of VA mismanagement.
While at times I have supported higher funding for the VA, the answer is not just to throw more cash at the problem. Instead, Congress must act to hold VA employees to the same standard as everyone else: If you can't do your job, let's find someone who can.
That's why this week the House will vote on the Veterans Accountability Act of 2015, legislation that will ensure the secretary of veterans affairs can remove incompetent employees, protects whistleblowers desperate for higher VA standards and will strengthen performance measures for senior VA staff.
This is not the first time Congress has passed similar legislation. Last year, I was proud to work toward a bipartisan effort to enhance VA accountability to improve care for our veterans. Yet despite big words from President Obama, action never followed — and a whopping two employees have been dismissed as waiting lists for care continue to grow and widespread waste remains ever-present.
To be clear, the Veterans Accountability Act is not about getting people fired. Rather, it is about improving the health care we owe our veterans.
Unfortunately, in some circumstances, it seems the VA's focus has wandered from the very people the institution was set up to protect. This legislation will tackle that problem head-on. We need a streamlined VA that rewards good performance and weeds out employees incapable or unwilling to uphold and fulfill their duties. This bill will ensure the VA secretary has the powers to do what must be done to make the VA a fully functioning organization.
Too many veterans have already suffered from the VA's failings, and thousands more face dangerous futures if immediate action is not taken. This legislation is an important step to a process that must have only one end — an accountable, transparent, and efficient VA dedicated to the safety, wellness and health of every one of America's veterans.
Jenkins is the vice chair of the House Republican Conference and represents Kansas' 2nd District, which includes Fort Leavenworth.
