Category: Veterans’ Affairs Department

A number of folks have sent us links to the story of Anthony Salazar, a Veterans Affairs driver in Los Angeles who told his supervisor Robert Benkeser that there were 30 VA vehicles missing out of their stable of 88 vehicles. He also told Benkeser that there was significant abuse of Department credit cards. To reward Salazar, Benkeser fired Salazar;

The department convened an “administrative investigation board” (AIB) that resulted in “a letter of counseling” to Benkeser for mismanaging the motor pool. Benkeser then fired Salazar several months later.

The Office of Special Counsel (OSC), a government-wide agency that protects whistle-blowers, said earlier this month that VA blocked Salazar from showing that he was being retaliated against. The Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) imposed “an overly rigorous” standard of proof to show prohibited retaliation.

[…]

Salazar was fired Feb. 4, 2015. The ease with which Salazar was fired — he was put on a “performance improvement plan,” told he didn’t meet the goals, then let go — stands in contrast to the many employees who unambiguously committed egregious misconduct and are still on the job.

Funny how the VA can’t fire people who really need to be fired – folks who abuse the system – but they always find a way when they want to fire someone.

Someone dropped this document in our inbox this morning. It’s a report by the Veterans’ Affairs Department Office of the Inspector General of the time the current Director of the Denver VA Regional Office, Melanie Renaye Murphy, didn’t bother to show up for her work.

VA OIG investigation

I’ll summarize some of the findings; During her time in the position, she habitually showed up late for work 508 days out of 1000 days between 2011 and 2014 (the year she was appointed to her current position). Of those days that she came to work, she showed up for work at least 30 minutes late 90 times. She also claims that she teleworked for 180 days but could not prove exactly what she was doing while not at the office.

The VAOIG concluded;

Ms. Murphy misused her official time by frequently arriving late to her duty station between January 1, 2011, and December 31, 2014. Although she was permitted to flex her day by up to 15 minutes, we were unable to determine if she worked later to compensate for her late arrivals, whether 15 or more minutes. Further, this time was not entered into her ETA. As a senior leader, Ms. Murphy is held to a higher standard and should set the tone for her subordinates to follow, and arriving late to work over 70 percent of her workdays diminishes her position and authority as a senior leader.

We also found no or insufficient records to support her arrival at the facility or that she worked the entire day for 14 identified workdays. Subsequent to our interview with her, Ms. Murphy amended her ETA to retroactively take leave for 2 full days and 7 partial days not related to these 14 days. We gave Ms. Murphy ample opportunity to provide evidence that she worked these unaccounted for days, and the most she provided us was one email or email chain for 5 of the days in question. Although she may have worked extended hours to compensate for these days, she failed to properly record her time through the use of VA Form 5631 or in the ETA as required by VA policy.

Additionally, we found that Ms. Murphy improperly teleworked for about 6 months. She not only failed to take the required training, she split her workday to care for a family member and did not take the appropriate paid and/or unpaid leave to cover her personal travel time and the time she spent caring for the family member. Ms. Murphy, as the most senior leader within that facility, has a duty and responsibility to set the highest possible example for her workforce by adhering to Federal laws and regulations, as well as VA policy. Unfortunately, she failed to establish a culture of accountability for time and attendance, and time and attendance recordkeeping was too lax to provide an accurate accounting of the time she worked.

Moreover, we found that Ms. Murphy and her staff improperly used a local credit hour policy, which was contrary to VA Policy. Employees maintained an off-the-books credit hour spreadsheet, did not notify supervisors in advance when credit hours were accrued, and did not record these hours as required in ETA. In addition, the former VARO Director, Ms. Murphy, and the Assistant Director failed to establish a culture of time and attendance accountability, which is a primary responsibility of senior management.

So, that was just one employee in the Denver office, the director, but the OIG discovered that the problem was office-wide, probably because the director provided such a stellar example for her subordinates. The report was circulated to leadership in the VA two months ago, and all indications are that Ms. Murphy still occupies her position as director of the Denver VARO.

According to Daily Caller, there was this guy, Robert Gingell, who was a GS-15 at the Veterans’ Affairs Department who didn’t bother to show up for work for six months while he started his dream-business. He pretended to be sick and unable to come to his office, and drew his paycheck, continuing to stockpile “sick days” that he eventually cashed in when he retired;

He submitted a doctor’s note to VA saying he couldn’t work, but, “although the heading on the note reflected a legitimate medical practice, the signature on the note was unrecognizable as either of the named practitioners,” according to the IG. After bosses became skeptical about how long-running the illness was, he said he eventually became well enough to work, but unable to commute and thus needed to work from home.

Well, until another VA employee started making inquiries which resulted in an Inspector General investigation.

[W]hen the IG subpoenaed his store’s business records, Gingell immediately “appeared at an HR Specialist’s office with retirement forms completed and signed, asking that his retirement be effective” immediately instead, the IG said.

At that point, the IG announced that “we are administratively closing this allegation, as Mr. Gingell retired from VA effective September 21, 2015,” with no further actions planned.

Well, miraculously, he’s recovered from his ailment now that he has a business which is nice.

USAToday reports that four veterans have made 5,619 abusive and vulgar phone calls to the Veterans’ Affairs’ suicide hotline just in May for reasons that aren’t explained in the article.

“It’s unacceptable that they would block that kind of access for other veterans and other active-duty service members that really need crisis help and so we’re working through this clinically now to address that, cause it’s just wrong,” Gibson said. “My bottom line was deal with it and deal with it quickly because we’re not going to continue to have that happen.”

Five thousand phone calls from four people seem like a lot to me. I know of people who would do something like that – my inbox is full of emails from people like that – the VA ought to get to the root of the problem. I get the sense that, whatever their reason is, it’s probably not helping to force the VA to spend scarce resources on catering to these four guys’ opinions.

Thanks to Dave for the link.

The Washington Post reports that Secretary of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, Bob McDonald told reporters at the Christian Science Monitor that the amount of time that veteran waits to receive care from the VA shouldn’t be important to the VA, much like your wait in line at Disneyland isn’t important to the Disney staff;

“When you go to Disney, do they measure the number of hours you wait in line? Or what’s important?” McDonald told reporters at a breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor.

“What’s important is, what’s your satisfaction with the experience?”

So, are the customers in line at Space Mountain going to die if they don’t get to the ride in time?

While I have very few complaints with the VA, I also understand that my experience hasn’t been the same for every veteran. Trivializing the fact that veterans have actually died waiting for care from the VA isn’t helping McDonald. Besides, the Post claims that Disney does indeed keep track of wait times;

Disney, it turns out, does collect and analyze extensive waiting time data, which it considers core to its overall customer experience. The company has a system that manages the information.

[…]

[McDonald] said the date the appointment is made “is not the ultimate measure of satisfication.”

“You would have a veteran who waits two days and one who waits eight days” for a medical appointment, McDonald said, but the one who waited longer might feel better about the care he or she received.

I know what he’s saying, but he needs a more artful phrasing.