Update on Shreddergate

Update on "Shreddergate"

UPDATE: NEW VA FIGURES SHOW NATIONWIDE PROBLEM

WITH SHREDDING CRITICAL DOCUMENTS -- VA finds

hundreds of documents critical to veterans' claims

in shredder bins across the country.

ARTICLE UPDATED WITH FILNER COMMENT (10-24-08)







All stories regarding the VA's shredder scandal can be found on this page... click here...
http://www.vawatchdog.org/VAshredderscandal.htm

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UPDATE: Shortly after this article was originally posted, I received an email from Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA), Chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs. His comment on the following story was, "These guys remind me of the Keystone Cops!"

Filner went on to say, "We will have two hearings during the week of November 17th: (1) Implementation of the GI Bill and (2) Shredding Our Confidence in the VA"

So, for those who have asked, yes, Congress is getting into the VA shredder issue.

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UPDATE: NEW VA FIGURES SHOW NATIONWIDE PROBLEM WITH SHREDDING CRITICAL DOCUMENTS

VA finds hundreds of documents critical to veterans' claims in shredder bins across the country.

by Larry Scott



At 9:30am (EDT) on Thursday, October 23, 2008, the Department of Veterans' Affairs (VA) held a conference call with the major veterans' service organizations (VSOs). The purpose of the call was to update the VSOs on documents found in shredder bins at VA Regional Offices (VAROs) run by the Veterans' Benefits Administration (VBA) of the VA. Complete background here...
http://www.vawatchdog.org/VAshredderscandal.htm

The conference call was moderated by Adm. Patrick W. Dunne, VA's Acting Under Secretary for Benefits. Most of the speaking was done by Mike Walcoff, the Deputy Under Secretary for Benefits.

VA Watchdog dot Org made a formal request to be included in that call. The VA denied the request.

Up to this time, the VA had said they had found 10 documents in shredder bins that were critical to a veterans' claim with the VBA. These documents came from just four VAROs.

Because of this discovery, the VA ordered a halt to shredding at all VAROs and ordered management to search shredder bins for critical documents.

According to a person involved in the conference call, Walcoff told the VSOs that they found 423 (later revised to 489) documents critical to veterans' claims in VARO shredder bins across the country. "Critical" means that the document was necessary for the veteran's claim to be properly adjudicated by the VBA.

The biggest problems were at three VAROs. 259 of the 489 documents were found at Columbia, SC, St. Louis, MO and Cleveland, OH.

Investigations at Columbia (105 documents) and St. Louis (96 documents) pinpointed the source of the documents waiting to be shredded and one employee at each VARO has been put on administrative leave. An investigation is ongoing at Cleveland (58 documents).

It should be noted that some VAROs returned a "negative" report, meaning they found no critical documents in shredder bins. We do not know which VAROs turned in those reports.

Walcoff told the VSOs that VA will come up with a plan of action to try to prevent this type of activity. One plan might be to have at least two employees sign-off on any documents going to a shredder.

For an article in the October 23, 2008 edition of the St. Petersburg Times, reporter William Levesque interviewed Walcoff the day before the conference call and asked: Have workers for months or even years destroyed untold numbers of documents critical in deciding if the VA owes a veteran a pension or disability payment? Walcoff answered, "That's the obvious question. We can't answer that at this point." Walcoff added, "This is not something we're comfortable with. I won't say anything to diminish the importance of the documents veterans send us. We didn't take care of some of them like we should." Complete article here...
http://www.tampabay.com/news/military/vet
erans/article867002.ece

MAJOR ISSUES NOT ADDRESSED

What the VA did not address in the conference call is the underlying issue of mishandled documents. Shredders are just a small part of the problem. We know that VBA employees keep documents in their desks, briefcases, file drawers, storage boxes and other areas. These "unaccounted for" documents, not checked in to the VBA's system, and not attached to a veterans' claim file, are the real problem and may number into the tens of thousands.

It's time for the VA to "strip search" every area of every VARO to find these documents and make a full accounting.

The other major issue is that these VARO reports are just a "snapshot in time." What was in the shredder bins was only there at that precise moment. What about the day before and the week before and the month before?

We will never know how many critical documents have been shredded and how many veterans' claims have been delayed or denied because of this unacceptable, probably criminal, practice
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Given that my claim has been in appeal at Columbia VARO since 2003 I have to wonder if any of the documents found at Columbia VARO SC were mine or had any of mine been destroyed before this, how does the VARO get away with keeping an active appeal open for 6 years without action?

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