DURHAM—U.S. Senator Thom Tillis is in his fourth month in office, and is wrapping up a two week recess from Congress.
He spent several of those days touring Veteran Affairs health facilities.
Tillis sat down to talk with Time Warner Cable News. He said in general this was a facting finding tour for him.
“I think that generally speaking at least for the North Carolina facilities- we have some issues in other facilities- when they get admitted, when they get appointments, they get pretty good care,” said Tillis. “And the average veteran prefers to be treated in a VA facility. The problem is one of capacity and unaccaptable wait times. The length of time in some of our facilities varies. But we have down in Fayetteville somewhere around 30 days. And that's unacceptable for a lot of conditions, maybe not all of them. But that average is something that concerns us.”
This week, new reports showed that VA facilities have not been making much headway in their efforts to reduce wait times for veterans. Congress gave an extra $16 billion to the VA system last year in an effor to help correct the problems. But Tillis said money is not going to be enough.
“Money will help with the establishment of facilities, providing more capacity, but it alone won't work if we put it in an organization that is not operating as well as it could,” said Tillis.
Tillis says for him this is just step one. He plans to go back to Washington and meet with the new VA secretary and continue the discussion about VA facilities. He says there are still clear questions that need to be answered.
“Why is this backlog as long as it is? How can we best provide care to a veteran? In the most warm accomodating environment possible? Becasue we owe it to them,” said Tillis.