House approves Coffman bill to make VA contracting more efficient

The House on Tuesday approved legislation introduced by U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman (R-CO) to increase efficiency by requiring the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to track cost savings resulting from its contracting competitions and to use standardized contracting procedures.

The House passed the VA Procurement Efficiency and Transparency Act, H.R. 2006, on a voice vote.

Coffman introduced the bill in light of reports that the VA racks up at least $6 billion a year on spending that violates federal contracting rules. Further, a Government Accountability Office report found that the VA should carry out more effective oversight of its $20 billion procurement budget.

“The VA has mismanaged billions of dollars in contract spending through its archaic procurement rules,” Coffman, a member of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, said. “Sadly, these mismanaged billions could have gone towards the care and benefits for our veterans. H.R. 2006 is a concrete first step towards stopping the waste and modernizing the VA’s procurement process.”

Under current practices, flawed or inconsistent data results from the VA using local policies and varying models to calculate its savings from competitive contracting. By directing the VA to establish standardized and centralized procurement document templates, H.R. 2006 aims to make procurement process more transparent and consistent.

U.S. Rep. Phil Roe (R-TN), the chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, spoke in support of Coffman’s bill on the House floor, calling it “common sense contracting, transparency and efficiency legislation.”

“This bill will make clear how much money the VA is saving by competing contracts and direct the VA to organize its contracting documents,” Roe said. “Procurement difficulties seem to happen year after year, and I thank Rep. Coffman and other members with reform bills under consideration today for their work on this issue.”