“A Total Mess:” Vets Air Gripes About VA Contracting Veterans groups attacked VA’s Center for Veterans Enterprise as mismanaged, understaffed and unresponsive during a hearing before a House Veterans Affairs subcommittee. “I have to tell you that there’s a great deal of anger toward CVE,” said Joseph Sharpe, director of the economic division of the American Legion. The center is tasked with verifying the eligibility of service-disabled and other veteran-owned businesses as well as providing advice and training for veteran entrepreneurs. Last year the Government Accountability Office found that a sample of 10 companies had received $100 million in SDV contracts, although some were ineligible for the program and several were passing through most or all of their work to large corporations. GAO’s chief investigator, Gregory Kutz, said, “Some people refer to it as ‘rent-a-vet.’” (SAA, 1/8) At the Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity hearing March 11, Rick Weidman, policy director of the Vietnam Veterans of America, testified that VA “has made a total mess of the verification process.” He added that CVE is “not friendly” to veterans. Representatives of the veterans organizations said their members reported long waits to have their eligibility verified, unanswered phone calls and unreturned emails. Because of allegations of fraud, Weidman said, “Everybody’s caught up in trying to be a policeman” and cannot do anything else. The new director of VA’s OSDBU, who supervises the center, estimated there is a two-year backlog of applications for verification, and the backlog is growing. Tim Foreman said CVE receives 700 to 800 new applications every month, but can process no more than 300. Scott Denniston, who set up the center when he was VA’s OSDBU director, said it has been chronically underfunded and understaffed, and is “overwhelmed by the verification program.” The OSDBU director’s job was vacant for more than a year after Denniston retired. Foreman, who took over two months ago, has thirty years’ experience in federal small business programs, most recently as head of the Navy’s small business office. He acknowledged that some of the complaints “are true,” and said he is moving to tighten controls over the verification program and reorganize the center. But he defended the staff he inherited: “The energy is there. The passion is there. The brains are there…. There just needs to be some direction.” He said he is hiring three additional staffers. Foreman said the center is installing an automated system to help speed up verifications and will require additional documentation from companies seeking eligibility as SDV- or veteran-owned firms. When the automated system is complete, veteran entrepreneurs should be able to track the status of their applications like a FedEx package. Four veterans organizations—the National Veteran-Owned Business Association, Vietnam Veterans of America, the American Legion and Amvets—unanimously objected to two provisions in VA’s new rules governing its vets’ set-aside program. Under the rules, a veteran may own no more than one eligible business and the owner must work full-time in the business. Veterans’ advocates said successful entrepreneurs often operate more than one company in different lines of business. Of the requirement that the owner work full-time on the premises, Weidman said, “That’s just silly in an electronic age.” VA said the restrictions are safeguards against front companies. But VA’s Foreman, who was not involved in writing the rules, said he personally questions whether they are necessary. VA, alone among federal agencies, has authority to set aside work for companies owned by non-disabled veterans as well as SDVs. Starting in 2012 it will contract only with companies whose eligibility has been verified by CVE. But other agencies could continue to accept self-certification of SDVs.