Department of Veterans Affairs building in Washington. (Carlos Bongioanni/Stars and Stripes)

WASHINGTON — Senior executives at the Department of Veterans Affairs would be banned from ever again taking bonuses that Congress established for rank-and-file workers — including police, housekeepers and claims processors — under legislation adopted by the Senate.

Sponsored by Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., the legislation stops funds in the Critical Skills Incentives Program from going to executives at VA headquarters who weren’t eligible to receive them.

About $11 million from the program, which was authorized under the PACT Act, was erroneously paid out as year-end bonuses to VA executives at the agency’s central office in late 2023. Payments to individuals ranged from $39,000 to more than $100,000.

The VA also has pledged to examine the improperly awarded bonuses and recoupment efforts, according to Peter Kasperowicz, the VA press secretary.

Moran, who is chairman of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, described the improper payouts as a gross misuse of funds.

“This legislation will make certain these funds will not be used to enrich VA bureaucrats,” he said.

Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., chairman of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, speaks in January 2025 during a committee meeting. (Eric Kayne/Stars and Stripes)

Air Force veteran Nicholas Marino of South Carolina, who is 100% disabled and medically retired, said he welcomes the legislation but worries its impact will be limited. He said he often is frustrated by VA decisions over the delivery of services and benefits.

“I see the VA bureaucracy as a big part of the problem,” said Marino, a former staff sergeant who served from 1997 to 2008, including in the Middle East. “Incentive bonuses will only be helpful with those VA employees already dedicated and trying to do a good job. But there will always be bad actors — workers who just show up for the paycheck and little else.”

Moran’s legislation, passed by unanimous consent, was offered as an amendment to the Protecting Regular Order for Veterans Act, which seeks to bring more financial accountability and transparency to VA spending.

Sponsored by Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, the PRO Act requires the VA secretary to give Congress a quarterly budget briefing on the agency’s spending plan that includes projections about shortfalls and the reasons for them.

Sullivan said his goal is to bring greater oversight to the VA’s $369 billion budget and prevent mismanagement of VA funds. The bill, which collected more than a dozen Republican co-sponsors, has been forwarded to the House for consideration, after its adoption last week in the Senate.

The improper award of critical skill incentive payments to senior VA executives “lacked adequate justification and was inconsistent with the PACT Act and VA policy,” according to the VA Office of Inspector General, which published an audit of the program in May 2024. “This was due, in part, to breakdowns in leadership and controls at multiple levels.”

More than 80% of the improperly paid bonuses went to members of the senior executive service at the Veterans Health Administration, with the remainder to senior executives at the Veterans Benefits Administration.

The extra pay was set up, in part, as a tool to recruit and retain VA employees in jobs with a high number of vacancies, including for housekeepers, police officers and human resource coordinators, according to lawmakers.

“A critical skill incentive may not be provided to an employee of the department employed in a senior executive service position, or a position in another comparable system for senior-level government employees,” according to the amendment.

Moran’s amendment was based on other legislation — the Stop Government Rewards Enriching Executives in the District, or GREED Act — that he introduced with Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Sen. Thom Tillis, R.-N.C., after the IG findings were published. The bill did not advance to a final vote.

Executives who received bonuses were ordered to pay them back, the VA said. Most of the payments have been recouped, according to Moran’s office.

The program correctly paid a total of $230 million in bonuses to rank-and-file workers by May 2024, according to the VA.

But the VA also has identified 22 senior executives who did fully repay the bonuses that they received, according to Kasperowicz.

Congress had authorized the bonuses for rank-and-file workers under the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act, also known as the PACT Act.

Under the PACT Act, the Critical Skills Incentives Program was created as a tool to hire and keep VA workers who are essential to the operations and maintenance of VA hospitals and clinics, according to the VA.

“We know things aren’t as they should be at the Department of Veterans Affairs,” Moran said last week on the Senate floor. “The Department of Veterans Affairs does need reform. The status quo is not acceptable.”