NEWS FROM….

CONGRESSMAN LANE EVANS

RANKING DEMOCRATIC MEMBER

COMMITTEE ON VETERANS AFFAIRS

    U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Washington, DC - "VA nurses have been excluded from fair pay too long," said Congressman Lane Evans of Illinois, Democratic Leader of the House Veterans Affairs Committee. Evans, a primary sponsor of legislation adopted today by the Committee on Veterans Affairs, sought and won an agreement with other bill architects, to include a provision to mandate for VA’s nurses the same annual pay raise other federal employees receive. "I’m hopeful the full House will act on this measure yet this session," Evans said.

Nurses are the largest part of the VA workforce and the only VA health professionals who work without a definite annual comparability pay raise. The "Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care Personnel Act of 2000" provides VA nurses the same predictability of a pay raise that every other VA health professional enjoys. The bill also allows VA hospital directors who face nursing staff shortages an opportunity to raise salaries so they can compete with other local health care facilities.

Today competition for skilled health care personnel is fierce. Besides annual nurse pay increases, the legislation:

• addresses pay inequities faced by VA dentists, a concern of Congressman Bob Filner (D-CA), whose bill was the basis for provisions incorporated into the legislation;
• provides physician assistants long-sought representation within VA headquarters along with better training opportunities; and,
• helps VA retain social workers, pharmacists and medical support personnel.

Additionally, the legislation adopted today provides for a pilot project to pre-authorize geographically remote veterans who rely upon VA outpatient clinics to receive some basic medical hospital inpatient services in their own communities. The bill also mandates a follow-up survey of the status of the readjustment of Vietnam-era veterans advocated by veterans organizations. The follow-up survey was proposed earlier this year to Congressman Evans during an issues seminar he sponsored marking the 25^th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War.

"This legislation will address many problems faced by the VA’s hard-working and devoted medical staff," Evans said. "Many nurses and other skilled professionals have devoted their careers to caring for our Nation’s veterans, when they might have been able to make more money in the private sector. VA employees have earned our speedy adoption of this bill."