Over-Budget Hospitals

Nicole Kaeding The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is plagued with problems. Veterans wait months for medical care and have few options for accessing non-VHA providers. In addition to all of the issues relating to providing health care, construction of VA medical facilities is mismanaged, which burdens taxpayers with billions of dollars in extra costs. However, the VHA might be trying to change direction. Glenn Haggstrom, the individual who oversees VHA construction, “stepped down” last week after being put under internal investigation. Hopefully, he will be replaced by a reform-minded leader. In 2013 the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found a host of problems at the four largest VHA construction projects, which are located in Denver, Orlando, New Orleans, and Las Vegas. All four projects had major cost overruns and schedule delays. GAO discovered that the combined costs for the projects have doubled, from $1.5 billion to $3 billion. Construction of the Denver facility was 144 percent over budget and the Orlando facility was 143 percent over budget. The New Orleans facility was only 59 percent over-budget. The construction projects are also taking much long than planned. The Denver and New Orleans projects were 14 months behind schedule. The Las Vegas project was 74 months behind scheduled. GAO put much of the blame for these problems on the VHA: “Our review of VA’s four largest projects indicates that weaknesses in VA’s construction management pr...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs