Richard Burr

I hope you understand our frustration and, Dr. Schohn, I am going to ask you to provide for the Committee a detailed audit of how the $5.7 billion has been spent.

I have a tremendous amount of respect for all of you.

I will give you credit for having one. How about that? But I have yet to see one yet.

How is it that that Give an Hour can identify the need for flexibility in the delivery of mental health services but the VA cannot?

I think these are all things that we will follow up in detail.

We urge the Committee to demand more.

This is simply unacceptable.

Unfortunately, their stories are not unique. I continue to hear from veterans about the problems they run into trying to get mental health care.

I want to thank you for holding this important hearing today to examine the barriers that veterans face in receiving the mental health services from the VA.

I wish the outcome of the Super Committee had been different, but I know that on both sides Members committed a lot of hours to try to complete that process and it shows how daunting the task is.

Do you acknowledge that an increase in the user fee is eventually passed on to the consumer?

I think you've got to weigh in this equation. How much are we increasing the cost of devices?

I commend the FDA on their decision on the 510(k) because I think that it does embrace what it set out to.

I urge my colleagues to read these bills. Look at your school systems. Make a decision that is right for the future of every child in this country and support our reauthorization efforts. I thank the Senator from Tennessee.

We've got to look at the way we teach these folks to make sure it's appropriate for what we're asking them to do.

Now, if you could serve 100 kids and have no quality, but you could serve 50 kids and have quality, what would you choose?

Even if that's a high water mark, which is an appropriate term I think today for Maryland.

One of the more commonsense changes that I propose is a background check.

I think you're onto something. I would caution all of us that hotlines in some cases can be used as a reason not to act.

But I don't think we can look at it and say, 'well, we can't meet this requirement because then we either reduce slots or we don't have a pool that's big enough of professionals.'

I think we would all agree this is affordable, and I would hope that we would all consider it not as an add-on but as a floor requirement.

I might say for the record, North Carolina does require four inspections a year.

This is a bill that Senator Enzi and I have introduced and the Chair has graciously co-sponsored.

The length of time that it's been since we reauthorized the Act is a reminder to us of how things have shifted since then

We can't teach teachers today the way we taught them 50 years ago because generationally and population-wise it's different.