In early 2021, when Denis McDonough was sworn in as the Veterans Affairs secretary, he promised to make the department more inclusive, more welcoming and more user-friendly for veterans.
Now, nearly two years later, McDonough says the VA is closer to those goals — but not there just yet.
“One priority is keeping the veteran at the center of all we’re doing,” he said last week in an interview with Military Times. “Are we building our programming and our support, our care and benefits into the veteran’s life, or are we making the veteran fit into us? I’d say on that, things are changing, but there’s still a long way to go.”
McDonough did say, however, that he has been pleased with efforts to make department decisions more transparent, both to the public and Congress.
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“I think that one of the big issues with VA is to make sure that the vets trust us,” he said. “So, we have a lot of tools to try to make sure we can track and we can get feedback from vets. But the most important thing to trust, I believe, is transparency.
“I hope that [the public] believes that they have seen a change in VA on that, with monthly press conferences, with us making sure that we’re inviting in our veterans service organizations, inviting in veterans … and bringing the inspector general in, making sure that we’re working very closely with our accountability and oversight mechanisms.”
In the interview, McDonough also discussed current challenges for the department and his goals for improvements in coming months.
Portions of the interview have been edited for length and clarity
Military Times: Coming out of the COVID pandemic, what is your concern now with morale levels and staff burnout at VA health centers?
McDonough: I’m worried about it. I think everybody in healthcare is worried about it. I’m worried about it also at the National Cemetery Administration. I’m worried about it at the benefits administration.
But you know, so is everybody else. We, as a country, have all come through the pandemic. And people feel isolated, people feel tired, people feel scared.
The thing that excites me is that VA, I think, is leading the way in and identifying ways to address that potential burden. We start from a position that we are accountable to the veteran. We’re not accountable to some bean counter at some health insurance companies. That doesn’t happen here.
We want to make sure that burnout doesn’t come from administrative burden. A nurse told me, “I signed up at VA to nurse veterans. I didn’t sign up at VA to nurse the chart.” I thought that was a pretty powerful concept.
We have to make sure our clinicians are practicing at the top of their license. That means they’re taking care of vets, they’re not just doing paperwork. So we’re working on that, too.
Congress has been very responsive to this. The president has been extraordinarily responsive to this. So, when we’ve needed additional resources, we’re getting them.
We’ve seen this in particular in the new law as it relates to toxic exposure. We have a whole section of that law that gives us additional authority, additional resources to invest in our workforce.
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You’ve focused plenty of resources on veteran issues over the last year. Do you worry that could change in the future, especially if control of Congress changes political hands?
I find that we do not lack for attention or investment from our friends on Capitol Hill.
And in terms of our partners in the administration, I’ll tell you what — for the first time in a long time, we have a military family at the White House. We are not lacking for attention from the president, or the first lady, or the vice president. The president has a way of underscoring his seriousness on these matters.
The president has a lot on his plate right now. How much communication do you have with him on these issues?
We have regular communication with the president, with the Joining Forces team, with the…
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