Federal prosecutors should investigate whether a former Veterans Affairs Department executive committed perjury when he testified about the cost of a new Denver-area VA hospital, which is more than $1 billion over budget, members of Congress said.
Florida Rep. Jeff Miller, chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, and Rep. Mike Coffman, R-Colo., said Wednesday the Justice Department should investigate Glenn Haggstrom’s statements to Congress in 2013 and 2014.
The VA’s internal watchdog released a report Wednesday saying Haggstrom knew the project was veering toward huge cost overruns but didn’t tell lawmakers that.
Haggstrom didn’t immediately return a telephone message seeking comment.
He was the department’s top official in charge of construction projects nationwide. He retired in 2015.
The VA has said Haggstrom left one day after he was interviewed under oath about the hospital as part of a separate internal investigation.
The hospital, now under construction in suburban Aurora, is expected to cost around $1.7 billion, nearly triple the 2014 estimate.
Miller said he will ask the Justice Department to look into perjury charges against Haggstrom and others.
“To this day, the department’s handling of the replacement Denver VA medical center continues to be a case study in government waste, incompetence and secrecy,” he said.
Coffman had asked the inspector general to consider recommending a criminal investigation if warranted, but the report didn’t address that.
Coffman said he will ask the inspector general again to consider recommending a criminal inquiry.
“I’m trying to get to the bottom of this. And I think quite frankly the Veterans Affairs (Department) doesn’t seem to care,” he said.
Rep. Kathleen Rice, D-N.Y., another member of the Veterans Affairs Committee, also called on the inspector general to turn the matter over to the Justice Department.
Haggstrom twice testified that the hospital would not require more money, “and he knew that wasn’t true,” Rice said.
The inspector general’s report said gross mismanagement, delays and lax oversight by the VA added hundreds of millions of dollars to the cost of the hospital and delayed it by years.
The report repeated some conclusions from earlier investigations but is the most scathing account of the project to date.
It accused senior VA leaders of making poor business decisions, allowing architects to include lavish and unnecessary design features and delaying decisions on construction changes by up to three years.
The inspector general accused the VA of “gross mismanagement” for assigning far too few engineers and project managers.
Sloan Gibson, deputy secretary of veterans affairs, has said that everyone involved in the cost overruns has either retired or was transferred or demoted. No one has been fired or criminally charged.
Gibson said the department has taken responsibility for the problems and has made changes.
The 184-bed facility is about 70 percent complete and construction is expected to be done in January 2018. It will replace an aging, overcrowded facility still in use in Denver.
Two weeks ago, Miller’s committee subpoenaed documents on a separate internal VA investigation into the cost overruns. The department has not said whether it will comply or fight the subpoena.
The VA has said making the documents public could have a chilling effect on future internal investigations.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
Wonder what the total Sq Ft is, square ft cost is when completed.. at about 9 million per patient room, this is an abhorrent cost… opps PER BED!! I remember before the falloff 2008, average hospital costs were about 500 Sg Ft before placing equipment inside.
If Average room was 25×40= 1000sq ft per room= 500K (falloff 2008)(before equipment and supplies).
If ‘184 beds’ comes to 150 rooms x 600$ per sq ft x 1000 sq ft room= 90 million..
minus 1.7 billion leaves 1.6 billion for …equipment and supplies’???
Boy howdy, are ever in a need for an outsider to halt the waste!
It is typical of any “Federal” or state projects, to always cost at least double, despite the best cost estimates, when the final brick is laid. It is a “Federal” law that any “Federal” construction project requires all trades involved to be in a union. This by itself ups the cost tremendously, but does not matter, because it is we, the taxpayers who are footing the bill. Whenever taxpayers money is involved, costs are far less competitive and pricey. It should also be understood that “padding” takes place and/or price gouging. The bottom line is in a word “greed”, from administrators down to the final clean up crew upon completion of these projects. Every “wheel” involved has to be “greased”, in order for the project to go forward.
That goes without saying. Don’t steal the Govt hates compatition
People should be losing there jobs over these costs!
This is all a scam. Instead of building a good hospital for our veterans, this administration has set up and allowed a group of people, (corrupt?) who obviously did not have any required knowledge or experience, to build an opulent, over the top complex. The cost had sky rocketed, and the veterans are still without the help they need. Politicians cannot be trusted to help our veterans. They have their hands in everything they do, and this time it is jurting our brave fighting men too much. Someone should be put in prison over this.
I’m a former POW and I TOLD MY WIFE DON’T NEVER PUT ME IN VA HOSB.OR HAVE ANY DEALING WITH THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ALL THEY DO IS WHEEL YOU IN. AND PUSH YOU OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
TO THE BURRIER GROND’S