Veterans Serving Veterans Act of 2018

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 5938) to amend the VA Choice and Quality Employment Act to direct the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to establish a vacancy and recruitment database to facilitate the recruitment of certain members of the Armed Forces to satisfy the occupational needs of the Department of Veterans Affairs, to establish and implement a training and certification program for intermediate care technicians in that Department, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous material.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 5938, as amended, the Veterans Serving Veterans Act. This bill is sponsored by my friend and fellow committee member, the gentlewoman from Puerto Rico (Miss Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon).

Mr. Speaker, I am very grateful for her hard work and leadership on this bill on behalf of our Nation's veterans in Puerto Rico and across the country. The Veterans Serving Veterans Act contains two provisions that would help alleviate staffing shortages at the Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities and create employment opportunities for servicemembers separating from the Armed Forces.

First, it would expand VA's recruiting database to include information about soon-to-be separated servicemembers whose military training and experience match open positions within the VA healthcare system. It is common sense.

Second, it would expand an existing pilot program that recruits former medics to serve as intermediate care technicians in VA medical facilities. We all know that, all other things being equal, veterans prefer being seen and treated by their peers. This bill would create a pathway for that to happen more often, while addressing the serious recruitment issues that continue to hamper VA medical facilities coast to coast.

Mr. Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to join me in supporting this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, before I yield to our next speaker, I want to tell Members about this young woman. She represents the island of Puerto Rico, and before one of the hurricanes hit, I called her on the phone just moments before the hurricane. I was amazed that I even got through.

Following that, we led a group. I came to visit the hospital and the island of Puerto Rico, and the passion that she shows for the people she represents, and the passion she shows for veterans, is second to none.

I wanted to pass that along. I saw something in this young woman down there that I had not seen before I visited her beautiful island.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Puerto Rico (Miss Gonzalez-Colon), a member of the Veterans Affairs' Committee.

Mr. Speaker, once again, I encourage all Members to support H.R. 5938, as amended, and I yield back the balance of my time

Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Roe for, first of all, visiting the island. This is the first time ever the Committee on Veterans' Affairs ever visited Puerto Rico. I thank the gentleman for that, for his leadership, and for his commitment, and the ranking member's commitment, during the last months.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak in support of my bill, H.R. 5938, the Veterans Serving Veterans Act of 2018. This bill seeks to alleviate chronic staffing shortages that currently affect the Department of Veterans Affairs, which hinders their ability to serve our veterans in an effective and timely manner.

This issue never fails to come up during those meetings with veterans residing in Puerto Rico and is often discussed by my colleagues here in the House. H.R. 5938 seeks a remedial option to this issue by doing two things.

First, amending section 208 of the VA Choice and Quality Employment Act of 2017 to include the military occupational specialties of soon- to-be discharged servicemembers that correspond to vacant positions at the VA in the recruiting database, as well as servicemembers' contact information and the date of discharge. Inclusion in the database is completely optional for those servicemembers. If included, they will potentially be matched for vacant positions at the VA that correspond with the skills they acquired with the Department of Defense.

Second, the bill will also require the VA to implement a program to train

and certify former Department of Defense healthcare technicians as intermediate care technicians, ICTs, to address the large demand for healthcare providers at the Veterans Health Administration.

These very skilled technicians trained by the DOD have difficulty gaining employment in their field after separating from the Armed Forces due to the lack of a certification. At the same time, the VHA has a significant shortage of providers. The ICT program has a high satisfaction rate and helps fill this void.

Servicemembers are a remarkable asset upon transitioning from the Department of Defense. We should do everything we can do to foster this transition and facilitate this opportunity to our men and women in uniform to serve our veterans.

Mr. Speaker, I need to again thank Chairman Roe for his leadership. For me, it is an honor to serve on this committee with a gentleman who has this commitment and who works in a bipartisan manner with Ranking Member Walz and Congressman Takano. I thank the gentlemen for their support. It is an honor to improve so many bills like this with these amendments.

Their leadership and assistance in moving this bill forward make us all proud, so I urge all my colleagues to vote in favor of this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 5938, as amended, the Veterans Serving Veterans Act of 2018.

Veterans exit the military with the highest quality of education and experience in their respective fields. We, along with the private sector, have worked diligently to ensure servicemembers are able to translate their skills to the private industry. However, this bill takes our efforts a step further by allowing the VA to create a searchable vacancy and recruitment database containing each VA vacancy and the corresponding military occupation code or skill that corresponds to the positions.

The database will also allow interested servicemembers to opt in to be included in the database, so that the VA may begin recruiting transitioning servicemembers to fill vacant positions before their discharges are complete.

In addition to the creation of the database, the bill also allows the Secretary to create a pilot program to train servicemembers who served as basic healthcare technicians while serving in the Armed Forces to be trained as intermediate care technicians at the VHA.

By creating a pipeline from service to bedside, the VA can better treat the 9 million veterans who depend on its services.

I appreciate the gentlewoman from Puerto Rico (Miss Gonzalez-Colon) for her hard work on this bill, and I urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in passing H.R. 5938, as amended, and I yield back the balance of my time.