Annie Kuster

What my number one concern is that the outcomes from the task force have credibility with our veteran community.

Thank you very much. And thank you to my colleague for the shout out about academic affiliates.

Employees who misuse purchase cards should be held accountable and should be prevented from being a purchase card holder or authorizing official.

I am proud of the bipartisan oversight and legislative work that we do on this Committee.

Thank you, Chairman Bergman, for holding this hearing, and I would like to welcome Ranking Member Walz...

This legislation should ensure that VA follows best practices and sticks to a timeline, so that VA facilities and vendors have a predictable, functional medical surgical supply system.

Chairman Bergman and Congresswoman Rice's draft legislation to address purchase card abuse is also much-needed legislation that I hope this Committee will send to the floor without delay.

Our job here is to keep the VA on track and Ranking Member Walz's bill will give us the tools and the information to do just that.

I do think it is important to restore confidence in our executive officials, and so I hope in the coming days you will be forthcoming with the American people.

I appreciate that. And, again, look forward to working with your team on reviewing that structure.

I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Speaker, in New Hampshire and all across this country, people are dying every day. Communities have been devastated by the heroin and opioid epidemic. Last year, we lost nearly 500 people…

Thank you again for coming to New Hampshire. We had a wonderful meeting with you and I appreciate it.

Can you make a commitment to me today that you will help us get the funding for the Northern Borders Regional Commission?

I hope this will be in the upcoming farm bill. If not, I will be back with an amendment.

I want to move on to the VA Central Office, I am concerned about their ability to retain accountability and oversight over regional offices.

I want to thank Representative Dina Titus for her great work on this issue. Thank you for your leadership.

I want to speak candidly and directly to the American people. There are many, many issues that we agree upon, Republicans and Democrats, coming together to solve big challenges. In my district in New Hampshire, people are dying, and they…

New Hampshire-based housing organizations have experienced a shortage of caseworkers to work VA's supportive housing initiatives under the HUD-VASH program.

I think in a bipartisan way, we need to take back this discussion from an administration that seems to be turning a blind eye.

there needs to be greater flexibility to meet the unique needs of veterans

I think you have taken on kind of a calm tone in what I consider to be a serious change in policy that Congress was not consulted about.

I want to make sure that we get a chance to get to the bottom of what the impact is on a daily basis for our veterans.

In the meantime, we will have to pay for both facilities, everything will be doubled in cost?

Clearly, I am just doing basic math, you will not be able to serve as many veterans in the new facility as were served in the old facility?

I would just like that added to the lessons learned as we spend the taxpayers' dollars...