Digital G.I. Bill Undelivered: Contracting Challenges and the Need for Acquisition Reform

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[Gavel sounds.] Good afternoon. The joint committee hearing will come to order. Today we're here to talk about the most important promises our nation makes to those who have served. Veterans make a commitment to our country, they make the sacrifice. And when our veterans come home, America needs to help them build the next chapter in their life, which is why we're here today. For millions of veterans and families, the GI Bill is not just a benefit. It is the bridge from military service to civilian life and it gives veterans a fair shot at building a future. It ensures veterans have the tools they need to get the education or job training they want, where they want it and without a bunch of bureaucracy standing in the way so that they can eventually be competitive in the American economy. That promise should be simple and it should be reliable. But over several years, the Digital GI Bill has struggled to meet that standard. The system was meant to modernize how education benefits are delivered. It was supposed to replace outdated systems, reduce paperwork, make payments safer. Instead, what we have seen are delays, confusion, and multi-million dollar rising costs to contracts. That's unacceptable. ...was expected to cost hundreds of millions of dollars. Today that cost is more than doubled, with a full life-cycle price now reaching into the billions. Meanwhile, veterans are missing housing payments, we've seen delays that have been unnecessary, schools are being left in the dark without clear guidance. There is not a single technical error. This is not about a single technical error, it's an accumulation of multiple errors. It's about leadership decisions, contracting strategy, and it ties back to a lack of accountability. The benefit system itself should never become a barrier to the benefits they are set to give. Veterans earned the GI Bill through years of service and sacrifice, they should not have to re-earn it by waiting in call queues, navigating backlogs, or praying the system works this time, or contacting their member of Congress to work through the problem with them. Today's hearing is about understanding what went wrong and just as importantly, what must change going forward. Because this problem is not unique to the Digital GI Bill. Across the entire department, large technology programs continue to struggle under vague requirements, weak oversight, contracts that balloon and cost taxpayers more while delaying the delivery of VA services to our veterans. When accountability is unclear, the costs always end up going up. Schedules slip and get delayed, and the veterans and their families these systems are meant to serve pay the price. That's why this hearing is also about acquisition reform. If we don't fix how these systems are procured and awarded, we'll repeat the same mistakes at the expense of veterans and taxpayers. I chair the Subcommittee on Technology Modernization. I know my friend and fellow subcommittee chairman, Representative Van Orden, shares this message that this doesn't work for us. The status quo isn't cutting it. President Trump and Secretary Collins share that commitment. Thank you again for all being here today. I look forward to a productive discussion on how we can move forward to create permanent changes. And I just want to say that I personally have benefited from the GI Bill. I've used that in my own personal life and I know countless other veterans who have as well, and it stands out as one of the biggest pillars of economic opportunity that our country has undertaken. Before I yield, please be advised that the chairman may declare a recess at any time. But with that, I want to yield to Ranking Member Budzinski for her opening statement as well.

Thank you very much, Chairman Barrett and Van Orden and Ranking Member Pappas. I value the oversight work our two subcommittees have done on the Digital GI Bill program in recent Congresses. As I mentioned back in December, it's unfortunate that the program's relative success has been impaired by recent mispayments and a lack of communication by the department. Even more unfortunate is that many have pointed the finger at IT hiccups or tech glitches when it appears that policy decisions, a lack of planning, and poor contract management were actually to blame. Issues that plague too many of VA's modernization efforts. While I appreciate our conversation today on the intricacies of government contracting and project management challenges within the Digital GI Bill program, these are systemic issues that we see across VA modernization efforts. Like supply chain modernization, electronic health record modernization, the Integrated Financial and Management System, or IFMS, just to name a few. To this end, I'd like to insert VA's Office of the Inspector General's recent report here analyzing VA's major management and performance challenges into the record, and specifically highlighting its section addressing challenges to the information systems and innovation.

Without objection.

Thank you. The report highlights the critical work VA employees do to provide world-class veteran healthcare, disability payments, education and survivor benefits, memorial services, and more. However, VA's OIG notes significant challenges in effectively deploying IT products within the same impediments rearing their heads over and over again. Inadequate planning, insufficient resource development, limited stakeholder engagement, and failures to promptly fix known problems. These are all issues that OIG has identified in their August 2024 report about contract management failures within DGIB, and there are topics we discussed in September 2024 hearing about that report. Despite the recommendations from that report being closed, I have two major concerns. Firstly, I worry about the status of these recommendations and the applied resolution in light of the significant personnel, contractual, and procedural changes that have occurred under Secretary Collins. Second, in light of this recent report on management challenges and our continued oversight, has VA systematically addressed these issues with contract management and can they apply them to future contracts, even with a depleted workforce? While I highlight this one report from OIG, there are dozens of more just like it from OIG, the Government Accountability Office, and other oversight watchdogs assessing VA's capacity for modernization. Many of these reports highlight that when these controls and processes break down, small errors turn into large losses and erode the public trust. Siloed conversations about how VA manages one contract will not improve the issues OIG or GAO raised. I believe our time would be better spent taking a holistic view at the high-level systemic issues that plague VA's IT modernization efforts rather than playing whack-a-mole on each individual contract. Lastly, I look forward to hearing from VA, Accenture, and VES today on VA's progress in processing beneficiary claims and delivering timely payments. While I believe the delays were caused by structural challenges and intentional policy decisions within the VA rather than contractor performance, I look forward to hearing how VA can improve its planning, execution, and communication and prevent added confusion, frustration, and further delays in benefits. Thank you, and I yield back.

Thank you, Ranking Member Budzinski. I now yield to our Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity Chairman, my friend Chairman Van Orden, for his opening statement. Sir.

Thank you, Chairman. Thanks for everybody for being here. I mean... I'm also want to thank the VA for finally sending the actual witness that we wanted instead of taking their pick, that's our pick, not yours. I believe that this topic can and needs to be approached in a non-partisan manner, and I appreciate your comments, ma'am. The ultimate goal of this hearing is to get down to brass tacks and figure out how the VA can continue its efforts to keep the Digital GI Bill program, excuse me, I need to correct that. It's not keep the Digital GI Bill on program or on track, it's get the Digital GI Bill on track. As chairman of the subcommittee, the economic opportunity I'm committed to providing our veterans with the resources that they need to pursue the education or employment opportunities. Veterans earned their educational benefits through their service to this great country and it's our obligation to ensure that these benefits are delivered reliably and on time. Now, the Digital GI program was supposed to be a multi-million dollar VA effort, it has now turned into a multi-billion dollar effort. And it's supposed to intended to streamline the education claims processing by consolidating outdated legacy IT systems and automating adjudication of most claims. And this should make it easier, not harder, for veterans to access and receive their educational benefits. However, the delays in benefit payments continue to impact student veterans. And guys, I swear, it was like two days ago was Groundhog Day, but this is like Groundhog committee with you guys. The, I will be very clear that the Veterans Affairs Administration has a zero, zero success rate of creating their own infrastructure like this. Zero. Have not got one right at all. And that goes into the health record and everything. It's a disaster. We're also going to hear about the real-world impacts of these delayed payments on students. Today's hearing is going to examine how contracting issues and lack of program oversight led to these delays, delays in payments, and how we move forward. The purpose of this hearing is to focus on the solicitation of contract administration of the GI Bill, Digital GI Bill, specifically how contracting decisions made in the early stages of this program have impacted delivery of the platform that is only, that has only ballooned the costs of contracting to over $2 billion. Imagine what we could do with a billion and a half. Let's say you needed $500 million for this. Imagine what we could do with the other $1.5 billion to provide services to our veterans. It's inexcusable. The costs of this project have increased over billions of dollars compared to the original estimates and during today's hearing, you have got to take responsibility. You have to take responsibility for the continued delays and the skyrocketing costs on behalf of the American taxpayers. Student veterans deserve a reliable, modern system and taxpayers deserve assurances that their investment is worthwhile. Period. Today we have witnesses from the VBA and the Office of Information and Technology and the Office of Business Integration. And with these different departments within the VA present, I look forward to seeing how all of you can work together to ensure the Digital GI Bill is in good hands and finally take accountability for the massive years-long failures. I want to end with a quote from General Omar Bradley. 'We are dealing with veterans, not procedures.' It's their problems, not ours. Meaning when you are focused internally on your own problem sets, you can't focus externally to the veterans. And again, that is unacceptable. So with that, I yield to Ranking Member Pappas for an opening statement.

Well, thank you very much to both of our chairmen, and I would also like to echo the comments of Ranking Member Budzinski. I'm glad that we're here talking about VA education benefits, but I am confused a little bit about the approach. If we're discussing contracting issues, then VA's OIG should be at the table as a witness and our Oversight and Investigation Subcommittee should be represented at this hearing too. If we're going to be discussing VA management decisions, failure to communicate, and failure to pay benefits on time last fall, then we should have witnesses representing veterans, families, survivors impacted by these decisions who can testify to tell their lived experiences as well as VA political appointees to take accountability for these decisions. So instead we have a weird hybrid setup today. I wish that the majority staff had engaged with the minority staff before last Friday so that these issues could have been worked through and we could have had an even more productive hearing today. So when I look at what happened in the fall with Chapter 35 benefits, I don't see a contract or a contractor failure. No one in VA has accused Accenture of not delivering what they were asked to when they were asked to. The issue that sparked the delays was the decision to have a human reconcile beneficiary data between the old Benefits Delivery Network and the new VA corporate databases used by the Digital GI Bill. That being said, I acknowledge the fact that there were legitimate concerns about data integrity and processing of claims. VA's failure was not validating the assumption that this data reconciliation would only take about five minutes per beneficiary. In reality, it took up to three hours per file. A planning failure that compounded this mistake was VA's decision to roll out this change before the fall semester, the busiest time for VA education services and the largest number of veterans and survivors applying for education benefits. Previous reports and reviews of how VA implements IT upgrades have recommended that VA test changes at a small scale first and then roll out the full-scale change in non-peak months. VA didn't do that here. I understand why VA made that decision. Education Services was trying to get the last group of beneficiaries off BDN before the end of the fiscal year so that the system could be retired and the government wouldn't have to continue to pay the contract to sustain it. Nevertheless, we now see the consequences of doing it that way. Finally, the most impactful and inexcusable decision VA made was the failure to communicate with beneficiaries, with the public, and with Congress. And again, this was a decision made by the administration. Nothing prevented VA from communicating what was happening in real time. So saying that the lapse in appropriations and government shutdown prevented VA from communicating this critical information to beneficiaries is not true. Plenty of VA staff were at work, the Secretary was tweeting. It was a political decision to hide veterans, to hide this information from veterans, survivors, and the public and from Congress in terms of what was going on. That's unacceptable and it should be unacceptable to everyone on this bipartisan committee. Often times when we discuss events like these, we usually say VA did this or VA did that. But VA is the organization, the decisions are made by individuals. And I don't think that people who made the decisions that directly led to the failures last fall that I have outlined are in the room today. And that too is unacceptable, especially for a committee that prides itself on a reputation for focusing on real solutions to help our veterans without the partisanship that's seen elsewhere in Congress. Even if we want to say that Mr. Smith is the responsible decision-maker as the head of Education Services, I think Chairman Van Orden will agree with me from his time in the service that responsibility can be delegated down but accountability cannot be. For the record, we have exactly zero administration officials take accountability for these failures to date. I've been on this committee since 2019, I've seen all eight DGIB releases. I saw the issues with the original contract and VA's failure to understand their requirements and write the contract correctly under the first Trump administration. I saw the issues overseeing the contract under the Biden administration, the transition to Accenture and the growth in the scope of the contract, and I saw the massive failure to pay beneficiaries last fall. So I can tell you that VA could have absolutely written this contract better to start. I can point out that VA has had to rescope the contract several times because they didn't understand their needs up front and didn't plan correctly. And I can say that the cost estimates have been way off as a result. But I can also confidently say, and I want to underscore this, that the issues in the fall were not due to the contract. The issues were a result of decisions that VA made, and veterans, families, and survivors were the ones who suffered. So when are we going to have some, someone take accountability for the decisions that caused harm to veterans? When are we going to as a committee practice what we preach, rise above the partisanship regardless of who's in the White House and insist on some accountability? When are we going to force that accountability? And I hope we can hear a little bit more about that today. So Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you.

Thank you, Ranking Member Pappas. We'll now move on to introduce our witnesses from the Department of Veterans Affairs. We have Mr. Kenneth Smith, Executive Director of Education Services, Veteran Benefits Administration. Mr. Smith is accompanied by Mr. Raymond Tellez from VBA's Office of Business Integration, Mr. Jeffrey Neill from VA's Technology Acquisition Center, and Mr. Robert Orifici, did I say it correctly or is there a long E in there? Orifici, from VA's Office of Information and Technology. I ask the witnesses please stand and raise your right hands. [Witnesses stand.] Do you solemnly swear under penalty of perjury that the testimony you're about to provide is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

I do.

Thank you, and let the record reflect that all witnesses have answered in the affirmative. Mr. Smith, you're now recognized for five minutes to deliver your testimony and opening statement on behalf of VA.

Thank you, and good afternoon, Chairmen Barrett and Van Orden, Ranking Members Budzinski and Pappas, and distinguished members of the subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity today to discuss Digital GI Bill's program management and contract. Joining me today are Mr. Raymond Tellez, Executive Director, Veterans Benefits Administration, Office of Business Integration, Mr. Jeffrey Neill, Associate Executive Director, Technology Acquisition Center in VA's Office of Acquisition, Logistics, and Construction, and Mr. Robert Orifici, Executive Director, Benefits and Memorial Service, Office of Information Technology. VA's efforts to implement transformational changes through the DGIB platform have enabled VA to deliver benefits faster, enhance customer service, and strengthen compliance and oversight activities. VA has made tremendous advancements towards streamlining and automating systems and processes to increase efficiency and drive outcomes for veterans and their families. DGIB was envisioned as a fully integrated solution to restructure both claims processing for all education benefits programs and to enhance customer service for beneficiaries and external partners. To date, the program has successfully met mission milestones to maximize service delivery through end-to-end automation for millions of education benefits claims. Additionally, VA has exceeded initial goals by replacing and decommissioning several legacy IT systems, including the near half-century old Benefits Delivery Network and the long-term solution for Chapter 33, both replaced by DGIB. Along the road, VA has also addressed many other unplanned functionality changes as required by congressional action and court mandates. The progress was not without challenges. The original contract underestimated complexity, particularly transitioning from legacy COBOL systems. Delays occurred during integration issues and testing environment shortages, and VA acknowledged this in a hearing on September 26, 2024. Increased scope equals increased cost. For example, legislative changes such as the Johnny Isakson and David P. Roe Act, the Elizabeth Dole Act, and court decisions like Rudisill v. McDonough and Perkins v. Collins each require significant work and technical reprioritization within the DGIB program. Since implementation of the DGIB project, the MITRE Corporation has assisted VA with acquisition planning and program support. To ensure full multi-year understanding of cost and the strategic impact of both delay and external factors, MITRE prepared a life-cycle cost estimate. The LCCE enables Education Service to consider tradeoff decisions, such as new claims processor functionality versus greater automation. VA monitors these costs closely and prioritizes increased service delivery for veterans while ensuring good stewardship for taxpayer dollars. Since 2021, VA has processed 37 percent more claims. And as of December 2025, VA is automating and delivering 65 percent of all claims without any human action in a day, reducing costs and improving service delivery. As of January 22, 2026, the average days to complete education claims was 5.6 days. For Chapter 33 and 35, claims completed through automation, accuracy was 97 percent, which is on par with human processing. VA has taken further steps to improve program management. First, VA moved from a fixed schedule to a scope-driven priority process called the Agile software methodology. Second, since VA has consistently processed more claims than originally forecast, VA was forced to add additional funding annually to its claims processing contract, but has now shifted to a fixed cost per month to improve predictability. Finally, since 2021, the DGIB initiative has successfully implemented eight major releases and hundreds of minor releases. Our focus has always been on the veteran. Delivering benefits easier and faster through simplified application interfaces and increased automation. Thank you for your continued support and collaboration as we work to honor the service and sacrifice of veterans. My colleagues and I are prepared to answer any questions you or other members of the subcommittee may have.

Thank you, Mr. Smith. The written statement of Mr. Smith will be entered into the hearing record and I assume your opening statement stands for the rest of the panelists with you today, so we'll be able to move on to questions. And I'm now going to recognize myself for five minutes for questions. Mr. Smith or Mr. Orifici, the program management office is tasked with requirements planning and developing cost assessments prior to solicitations for these contracts. Do you believe it would be beneficial if VA established an independent office to provide expertise in cost estimates and program evaluations for large modernization efforts like the one undertaken by the Digital GI Bill?

Thank you for the question, Mr. Chairman. If the question is whether program management office should be outside of the business line, I would say no, because the subject matter expertise to deliver that benefit is within the, within the program within the program, which is Education Service.

Would you, would you say that the program management, I mean, what I'm looking at is the actual implementation of an IT system agnostic to the actual area under which it's going to be covering, but covering the actual implementation of the program, the program management and the implementation of that technology. You know, the computer doesn't know if it's processing education benefits or health benefits, yet it feels like we've drifted from actually getting these things implemented in a reasonable amount of time for a cost we can anticipate at the beginning. And to Chairman Van Orden's point, there hasn't been a successful launch of an IT system in a large scale in as far back as we can remember, and perhaps part of that is due to the localized effort of those that are managing it versus those that may have the expertise in implementing systems regardless of what they're used for. It sounds like you disagree with that though.

Yes, so thank you for that question. In general, we believe that we have the necessary support between IT and the business program offices, as IT works to partner with the business on integrated roadmaps, on making sure that we have the outcomes that the business needs identified as we enter into these. Of course, there's never going to be perfect as we look at requirements, as we look at towards schedule, but we want to make sure that we, we do work towards good enough to be able to move forward and drive outcomes for our veterans.

Yeah, I don't think any of us on this committee have perfect as our expectation. We want, you know, we want outcomes that are going to benefit the veterans that we serve at costs that are not two to three times more than our advertised and sometimes even greater than that. With serving the people that have earned these benefits, you know, we've seen chronic issues within this and it seems to all come back to IT systems that are an overhaul, a massive overhaul of a legacy system moving to an IT system or an accumulation of a bunch of different systems in the Digital GI Bill to put this under one umbrella and then implement it. And it just seems to chronically have issues that arise from that, and moving it out into an office dedicated to this purpose perhaps would bring about a better result. It sounds like you disagree with that though.

Sir, the, the program has delivered tremendous results for veterans. We are currently automating 65 percent of all of our claims. This was originally envisioned as a managed service contract, it is a managed service contract. It's not an IT contract. And while we work closely with IT on integration with VA systems to issue things like payments and ensure that we have integrity across our environment, we work with our acquisition staff to make sure that contract has strong oversight and we are fair and equitable with the contractor. But then the program management service is also responsible for making sure that we achieve those outcomes in terms of the number of claims that we processed, as well as we've decommissioned eight legacy systems and have addressed countless other unplanned requirements in our with within since 2021.

Okay. With the one minute I have left on my time, can you help me understand, you know, a lot of these things are siloed between the parts of the department that they are contained within. Is there any collaborative effort or sharing of information, best practices, lessons learned? I mean, in the Army we had a whole safety center that shared, hey, this thing happened and now we're going to change our protocols the next time we go and do a scenario or an exercise this way. Is that happening within the VA or are there really siloed offices and practices going about this that may make the same mistake as another office did two years ago or 10 years ago?

I'd like to ask Mr. Neill or Mr. Orifici to respond.

Yes, sir, thank you for that question. And we definitely have lessons learned that we share up through the IT organization as we work with this effort.

Is that a formal process or just like a, you know, you call somebody you know in the other office and tell them?

It is more of an informal process, but it happens where we share lessons learned, we have regular meetings between the program offices and portfolios that work on these efforts and there is lessons learned shared across these groups.

Okay. My time is up. I want to make sure I go through the proper protocol of who I'm supposed to recognize. Is it Chairman Van Orden next? Or Ranking Member Budzinski? Budzinski. Okay. Go ahead, Ranking Member.

Actually, I'm going to pick up where you, I think you left off, Chairman Barrett. I just wanted to put a finer maybe point on I think his questioning. One of the things I'm still kind of confused by by your responses is who's actually leading this acquisition? I, you know, I can understand that VBA, the business line, OIT is involved, the Office of Acquisitions, Logistics, and Construction. But I think what Chairman Barrett might have been asking and I'm also still curious about is that work being siloed? Who is kind of overarching in charge of the acquisition itself?

In terms of the actual acquisition and the DGIB system, I as the executive director for Education Service, I am the responsible official.

Okay. And, and I think just asking kind of again for you to maybe further elaborate on, you know, the confusion that did seem to have occurred here between these multiple different entities that led to some of these issues. In looking back on this, was there anything in retrospect you would have handled differently that could have mitigated some of the confusion?

I'm not sure which confusions you're referring to, ma'am. I, I would say that as I said in my opening statement, there were unclear expectations around the timeline and level of effort for decommissioning legacy systems and coming out of the COBOL system into a modern database, as well as unplanned scope. We had to address new requirements within the same budget.

Yeah, and I guess what I mean is like cost overruns, issues with delays, that those kind of confusions, if there was anything that you might have done differently specifically. So in terms of cost overrun, it technically was not an overrun, it was a cost expansion. So we added cost because we added scope to the contract to address new functional requirements. These functional requirements were as I said, the Isakson Roe Act, the Dole Act, Rudisill and Perkins, to name a few. Okay. I'll move on. I think one of the issues though is getting the scope right is so important so that we don't see these projects continue to balloon in cost. And so confusion and a lack of communication so that the scope gets done right the first time and it doesn't continue to expand and taxpayers continue to pay for a larger price tag for implementation. So I'll move on from there. But Mr. Smith, MITRE, who is joining us on our second panel, has been a contractor to conduct the VA's life-cycle cost estimate for the DGIB program since 2021. I understand that the VA ended that contract after MITRE delivered its last estimate in April. How does the VA plan to perform these estimates without this contract?

Thank you for the question. We are looking at ways to manage that, either to in-house it or find another solution.

Okay. It seems like a big part of the cost growth with the DGIB program has not been fully understanding what you need, again as I mentioned before. One of the surest ways to underestimate acquisition costs. Are you confident the VA understands all the elements of your requirements so they will stop growing?

Yes, I think we do have an understanding of our scope. We do understand that there are new requirements that we still need to work in while also executing the final components of that we had actually planned in the original contract.

Okay. And my next question is who will be responsible for revising the cost estimates going forward? Is that you?

It would be under the direction of my office, but I'll the actual whether we contract it out or do it in house is something we'll have to evaluate. ...decide still.

Okay. Are you confident that whoever that will be will have the expertise to actually come up with that robust estimate and get it right the first time?

We will come up with the cost estimate and we will be happy to share it with you and the subcommittee.

Okay. How did VA come to decide that taking this task in-house is the most appropriate considering numerous reports about VA's inability to accurately and reliably perform LCCEs?

We believe that having worked with MITRE over a number of years that we should be able to transition some of that work and while again it may not be perfect the first time with government personnel take it over, we would be looking forward to getting that correct.

Okay. I will go ahead and yield back.

Thank you, Ranking Member Budzinski. I want to recognize Representative Hamadeh for five minutes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to also thank my colleagues on the other side of the aisle too. I think we've got a lot of bipartisan support in trying to make sure that the veterans are taken care of here today. The Trump administration has prioritized dismantling the bureaucratic paralysis and "contractor entitlement." Both bureaucratic paralysis and contractor entitlement have stalled progress during the previous term. Now these reform efforts face a critical test with the Digital G.I. Bill despite VA's reported backlog reductions. The program's rollout remains a flashpoint for mismanagement and systemic payment failures that continue to affect veterans. Secretary Collins has been doing a commendable job carrying out President Trump's mandate. And I appreciate the VA's timely submission of their written testimony by Monday morning for today's oversight hearing. Now, Mr. Smith, thank you for being here today and I want to focus on August 2024. The VA's Office of the Inspector General issued a report on the Digital G.I. Bill platform that found the VA did not effectively manage the contract. And all of these problems started during the planning stages for the project. The VA awarded the contract before it understood exactly what was needed. This resulted in subsequent contract changes that more than doubled its cost. Now, going off of what Congresswoman Budzinski was talking about, what steps has the VA taken to ensure its cost estimate is accurate, reliable, and complete? And did you rely on the Government Accountability Office's estimating guide for your determination?

Thank you for the question. MITRE completed the last version of the life cycle cost estimate and yes, they did follow the GAO's guide for that.

And it was just inaccurate?

The life cycle cost estimate is a range estimate, so there should be an upper bound and lower bound and the DGIB actual costs are within that range.

What part of that range?

I'd have to get back to you.

But it would be on the higher end of that range for the range that you were discussing?

I can't recall exactly. I just know it was in range, sir.

Please get back to me on that. Now what steps have you taken to ensure all requirements have been identified?

We use an Agile software development methodology to ensure that the high-level functional requirements are captured and we work in three-month increments to develop and deploy functionality and ensure that we have good integration across our system.

Is there a risk that the requirements can keep growing?

There always is, particularly as new legislation is developed or court cases are found against the VA and we have to make adjustments to system to account for those changes.

Now in August 2024, the VA OIG report also laid out how the VA has repeatedly not been ready to support the work of the contractor. This includes failing to finalize system requirements on time, not developing the test environments needed by the contractor, not doing their due diligence to make sure the system worked. Can you confirm whether any outstanding payments to the VA contractors are preventing the release of new capabilities or improvements that would directly benefit veterans?

I'm sorry. Are you asking if there's if we've withheld payment from the vendor?

Yes.

No, we have not.

But does that for the contractors, so you pay them before and the requirements are being delivered on time?

No. We always pay contractors in arrears.

And do you have the staff and expertise you need in the Office of Information Technology and the program office to manage and support the program?

I have high confidence with Mr. Orifici and his staff.

Thank you for that question. We have an adequate staff that is supporting this team who's dedicated to support the Digital G.I. Bill for IT infrastructure and related concerns.

Well, I know you say that you have adequate staff, but it's been delayed, it's over cost. So how could you say that right now to the committee?

So as we look at the program and where it's gone, we have successfully decommissioned BDN, which was a 50-year-old legacy system. It was a big lift and as we went through that implementation, we faced challenges. We worked with VBA to adjust for those and we made some adjustments to the contract as we went through to make sure we delivered. But as Mr. Smith said, through this cycle there's been expansion of scope in terms of new features that were being delivered and were delivered on time. There's also been an expansion of claims that are processed underneath this contract and that this contract is a managed service contract which is paying for claims outcome which also goes accounts for the cost increases.

Well, something seems wrong if it's on it's not on time, it's over budget, there seems to be an issue. With that, I yield back.

Thank you, Mr. Hamadeh. I now recognize Ranking Member Pappas for five minutes. Go ahead, sir.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Smith, I have behind me a slide that VA provided to Congress that shows a timeline of the payment issues last fall. And we've placed sticky notes on that that show the times that VA communicated with beneficiaries specifically. As you can see, a lot of Post-its for August, many Post-its for November, and in between we want to get into that area where we saw a lack of communication with veterans. So it's clear that you and VA as a whole understood that there was a significant issue with Chapter 35 payments in early September because you were taking action to speed up the process like waiving enrollment verification requirements on the 7th of September, the BDN authoritative data memo on the 17th, and the reconciliation automation requirements being improved on the 23rd of September. Yet the only communication from VA to beneficiaries that entire month was the G.I. Bill newsletter that hit on December or that was sent out on September 9th. The next communication doesn't occur until October 29th and even that communication didn't address the processing delays. It wasn't until November 14th that VA chose to publicly acknowledge the payment delays. So in September and October, did you want to communicate with beneficiaries to explain what was happening?

Thank you for the question. Yes, we would have always preferred to communicate, but we were prohibited from doing so because of the Anti-Deficiency Act.

So you clearly knew something was wrong back in early September before the shutdown. It took 70 days to communicate with veterans, more than halfway through the fall semester. So what prevented you from communicating the issue to the public any earlier? Were you directed not to?

In September, we as I as you indicated, we developed requirements to automate and reverse the manual processing requirement. We thought we would have that solution in hand and delivered and the government shutdown happened and we are unable to deliver that. But we thought we would be able to catch to basically remediate the problem and avoid any payment delays.

Do you dispute those dates at all? September 9th, I'm sorry, September 7th when waiving enrollment verification happened through the 17th and the 23rd when other steps were taken by the department to understand this problem and work to address it? Do you accept those dates?

The the decision to waive enrollment verification was not related to the the reconciliation process. That was related to the inavailability of a web application called Verify Our Your Enrollment. Because that was not available, I made the decision to waive verification of enrollment at that time and on that basis. We continued to get more information about the difficulties of processing due to that manual reconciliation requirement and we were prepared to brief Congress when the government shutdown happened and that prevented us.

So you you fully were aware that there was a problem in September. And there wasn't communication that was happening from VA and I don't accept the claim that VA couldn't communicate during the shutdown. Number one, the White House's own guidance said that employees supporting funded programs like VA education benefits were to be considered exempted employees and working. Second, the Secretary was communicating. He was tweeting during this time. All that is publicly available and I can put that out with the timestamps if you want to dispute that fact. And third, VA communicated with veterans and beneficiaries during previous shutdowns. The difference was a different leadership that was in place. So I want to know which VA senior leader told you not to communicate with veterans, families, and survivors.

As I indicated, we we were following the Anti-Deficiency provisions required of us by the Anti-Deficiency Act. We were only providing information and doing work directly tied to protection of life and property.

So this caused a lot of issues with veterans, families, beneficiaries. We heard about this directly in our office and they're still frankly confused about this and the direction that VA has taken. And I think it's broken trust. So we've heard from beneficiaries and service organizations about widespread confusion around the implementation of enrollment verification requirements for Chapter 35. And I'm wondering what's the current requirement and are students receiving their benefits? Can you provide us with an update?

Yes, sir. So we did enact verification of enrollment processes for Chapter 35 starting this month. Those communications went out and so far we've had 142,000 responses out of about 170. Just this week, in fact yesterday, we sent notes to help students remember that they have an obligation to verify their enrollment. We let 37,000 individuals know that they needed to verify their enrollment still, but we stand ready to verify it for them this month so that we can ensure that they adapt to that change.

Thank you. You said in your testimony our focus is on the veterans. You're not focused on veterans when you're not communicating with veterans. I appreciate the work that goes on in the department, but I can't get over this lack of communication. It's inexcusable. I yield back.

Thank you, Ranking Member Pappas. Now recognize Representative King-Hinds from the Northern Mariana Islands. I assume the weather is much better there than it is here today.

It's gorgeous. I wish I was back home. Thank you for that.

Thank you.

Thank you for the opportunity to have conversation about this issue today because the G.I. Bill represents access to opportunities for so many of the veterans in the CNMI. And I was going over your written testimony, Mr. Smith, and you know, I think there were outright admission, but there were some things that was not immediately addressed, right? I think from what I read, the requirements were not mature at the time of award. Schedule discipline did not exist. Scope was allowed to grow without governance. The BDN was decommissioned before the replacement was was complete, right? And in your testimony you describe DGIB as exceptionally successful, yet it also acknowledges underestimated complexity, missing systems, and displaced functionality. And I just want to know at what point did the VA acknowledge internally that this program was at risk? And at what point was Congress notified because I'm new into the conversation?

I'd like to ask Mr. Orifici to assist me with that question.

Yes, so thank you for that question and we've had a number of hearings and testimony on this since 2018 when we first did the Colmery Act. So we have had regular engagements. We also meet monthly with staffers and get provide them updates on the status of the Digital G.I. Bill and other issues surrounding the education service area. And so through this process there have been a number of times when issues have been raised to staffers and we have discussed this at numerous hearings around this topic.

Okay. And just just for me because I'm new to the conversation as I stated, the contract more than than has doubled in cost and what you're basically saying it has not doubled in cost, you're adding components to the system itself, right? Is just for clarity's sake?

We have undoubtedly added costs from the the initial base contract, but it is due to both complexity of converting and decommissioning legacy products as well as new scope related to both congressional initiatives as well as court requirements.

Hmm. I guess it's curious to me that the decision-making process, right, at which point do you basically consider pausing the program rather than than engaging in in renegotiation? And so I because that's a significant amount that we're talking about. I mean we're talking about $479 million in addition. That could build the CNMI a whole new hospital system, a whole new police department, and a whole new community college. That's a huge amount of of money. I know that there is an OIG report that was issued with regards to this issue. Has the recommendations been fully addressed?

Yes, we have closed all the IG's recommendations.

Okay. And at where we at in terms of the full implementation of of the program itself now?

So we have just recently implemented release 8, which removed us from dependency on the legacy BDN system and we are now working to increase our automation outcomes while also making the veteran-facing services better so that veterans can get the information they need and communicate with us through that My Education Benefits program.

And so at what point can you say that this program has been fully implemented where our veterans are not going to see the disruptions in these services because I was reading through some of the testimony and you know there's been complaints to certain members that folks are are getting notices of eviction because they rely on this money to be able to support not just their tuition but you know their cost of living?

Thank you and that's a great question. And this is why we continue to press automation. Currently we're at 65 percent automation. We're looking to further increase that. We've got planned work this year to continue to develop.

I guess the timeline, Mr. Smith, because it seems as some of these rollouts are happening right when school starts and I'm just kind of wondering, right, like what full implementation looks like and how we ensure that we don't disrupt these benefits from getting to where it needs to go.

Absolutely and we would absolutely prefer to avoid high enrollment, you know, like fall enrollment was not our design. It was not something we wanted to do. We would look to avoid that.

Thank you. I'm out of time.

Thank you. I now recognize Ms. Ramirez for five minutes. Go ahead.

Thank you. And I want to thank the chairs and ranking members for holding today's hearing and the very familiar faces I've just seen recently. But let me start by saying that today's hearing feels a little misdirected. And I'll tell you why. Asking us to look in one place while something important is happening elsewhere feels misdirected. My colleagues claim they want to conduct oversight, but we haven't even had a oversight committee hearing since July 22nd. That was 90 degrees and it's about 20 degrees now, right? And they won't invite the Government Accountability Office, GAO, or the VA Office of Inspector General, the OIG, who are directly responsible for providing oversight of the VA. You see, my colleagues want us to believe that the only problem is contracting, but we're not addressing the previously identified patterns of failure stemming from staffing issues, from acquisition governance, and fragmented oversight. And also from a lack of sustained capacity building. Look, I think we should be seeking to learn from and correct systemic failures that harm veterans and that robs them of their benefits, not keep passing around the blame like it's a hot potato of some sort. And as ranking member of the Oversight and Investigation Subcommittee, it is my priority to ensure that the VA is fulfilling its mission to support our veterans and provide them with the benefits that they've earned. So I want to get into some of these questions. First, I'll tell you modernization only really works if the institution itself is ready. And there are some really serious questions about whether the VA meets that basic threshold. A January OIG report formally identified systemic staffing vacancies and weak conduct oversight across the VA. Even as the department was pushing forward with the Digital G.I. Bill, the DGIB we call it modernization. At the same time, the VA experienced workforce disruptions through deferred resignation program, the DRP, voluntary early retirement authority, the VERA, attrition, and furlough decisions during the shutdown. So, Mr. Smith, hi, good seeing you again. What concrete steps did the VA take to confirm it had the staffing and the institutional readiness to execute a $2 billion IT modernization effort without harming the beneficiaries?

Thank you for the question. You know, obviously staffing was increased. I believe in 2024 we testify that they were adding 15 additional people. We do have 15 those 15 people still on a term assignment. And clearly we have about 25 people managing the project.

How many?

About 25 people managing the project, but also supported by our IT colleagues and you know the acquisitions team.

And you think that's enough?

I do, with our contractor support.

And you said your contractor support of 15 people that you've added?

Contractors, no. That would include both MITRE who assist us with acquisitions planning and project management, but also the assistance from the Accenture team.

So, Mr. Smith, you're saying that the tangible actions you took is to add some staffing to be able to help with the rollout. Let me keep going. I want to talk about Strategic Acquisition Management Initiatives, SAMI. It was created within the Office of Acquisition, Logistics, and Construction to build acquisition and cost estimating capacity across the VA itself. We now understand that SAMI has been dissolved during this reorganization. So this question is for you, Mr. Neill. Why was an office created to address a known GAO finding eliminated before its mission was complete?

[Inaudible.]

Thank you for the question, ma'am. I'm not familiar with the the rationale for eliminating that office, but I can say that...

Doesn't make sense.

It may make sense if I know the explanation for it, but I think I can take that back and I can get an answer to that question for you.

Yeah, I think it's really important and I do want to make sure I know there's some questions that I've asked in the past that we're going to follow up with, but this one certainly is one of those. I want to also make clear the DGIB isn't an isolated failure. It reflects systemic acquisition weaknesses. So in these last 30 seconds, Mr. Orifici... I'm sorry. What roles does oversight and investigation now play in ensuring major IT programs have credible cost estimates before acquisition decisions are made? How has this changed after SAMI's dissolution?

Thank you for that question. And so we still work closely with the TAC when we're putting together cost estimates and the TAC helps us validate to make sure that those estimates are accurate according to industry standards and the expectations around the programs and the acquisitions.

We'll follow up. I know my time is up, so Chairman, I'll yield back.

The gentlelady yields back. The chair now recognizes Ms. Cherfilus-McCormick for five minutes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you guys so much for being here. Our oversight when it comes to IT is something that has been near and dear because for the last four to five years, we've been trying to get it right. And it hasn't been right, so that's why we're really hunkering down on how can we make sure that when we're going through acquisitions that we're actually thinking it through and making sure we're following steps to make sure that we're not going to have systems that are in place forever that we can't get up and running, that are hurting our veterans having access, and making sure that no one is hurt at the end of the day because although we're having this conversation about making sure all the procedures are here, we know that if we get it wrong, veterans get hurt. And so I wanted to talk more about your Digital G.I. Bill and the oversight that you guys have taken or the steps you've taken to make sure that there aren't going to be issues that we've seen before. Have you guys been using the acquisition lifestyle framework when it came to acquiring this contract? And that's for anybody who can answer it.

Yes, we did.

Please tell me more about it because the whole design between the acquisitions lifestyle framework is to make sure that there's a system in place. So when you applied it to this specific G.I. Bill platform, what did it change in how you were going to apply it? Did it have any significant improvement to what you were doing?

So I'd like to ask Mr. Neill to help me with that question. Obviously the the acquisition life cycle framework is something that is across the entire organization and I think he'd be best able to address the details of that.

Mr. Neill?

Well, thank you for the question. That's something that is in progress. It's being developed currently within OALC. But if I could speak generally about what the acquisition life cycle framework does, it...

So before we go into it generally, we wanted to make sure that before the acquisition that this actually the framework was applied. Is there a reason why the framework wasn't applied beforehand?

I would have to go back. Thank you for the question first, but I would have to go back and understand not knowing because the TAC actually didn't participate in this acquisition, so I'm not sure how it was coordinated with respect to the acquisition life cycle.

That's very important because a lot of times we have different frameworks and we realize that they're not working after we apply it the next time around. So if there is any reason why it wasn't being applied earlier on, I think we'd want to know that to see if there's anything we would want to change. But in the sense of the actual development of the framework, it was to prevent us going into systems, spending a whole bunch of money on different platforms or technology that wasn't able to become compatible to the VA. So could you tell me more about where you are in steps of the application of this framework?

We are actively developing the system right now. Some of it is obviously into sustainment, but it's very much an active development process right now.

And so if you didn't use this framework, what framework did you actually use to make sure that there was basic which created a well-defined milestone and accountabilities? What framework were you using? I'm assuming Mr. Neill's going to take that question since you reached for it.

Thank you for the question. I was actually muting myself, but I don't know the answer. I'd like to let, you know, Mr. Smith answer that question.

The general project management framework for acquisition planning, acquisition development. So we worked on the the requirements. We're in development phase right now and then we will look to move into full-time sustainment and maintenance for that application.

Now is there a reason why you chose that framework? Because that framework hasn't had success in the past of helping us avoid putting a whole bunch of money into different programs that didn't fit the VA. So is there a reason why you chose that framework instead of using the acquisition framework?

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding something, ma'am, but I'd certainly be happy to get back to you.

Okay, thank you. And if there's anything else that you wanted to well, let's get back to Mr. Neill. You said that you went to talk about it in general. Now if you talk about it in general, can you tell us how you're planning on applying it? Because you are planning on applying it, correct?

Yes, thank you for the question. We are intending to apply it to, you know, major programs and it covers a lot of the things that you mentioned where the the requirements can be better understood, the the estimates related to those requirements can be more thoroughly explored, and it allows greater engagement and consideration of alternatives when considering those.

So do you have any of those quantifiable matrices for the framework that you used before acquiring this platform?

Again, thank you for the question, but I wasn't a participant in the acquisition, so I don't know what was utilized.

I'm certain that those that documentation is maintained in both the files for the contracting officer as well as our contracting officer's representatives.

Well, we look forward to receiving it. My time is running out, but we would like to see that just so we could compare the two.

The gentlelady's time has expired.

Thank you.

You're welcome. I now recognize myself for five minutes. Okay. So what was the original budget for this supposed to be, Mr. Smith?

$453 million.

Okay. From the time you said you were told you had $453 million to develop a Digital G.I. Bill, how long was it from you got that email to you awarded a contract?

I am not certain what the timeline was on that, sir. I'd have to...

Okay. I want, I'm not asking, I'm telling you. You're going to give me that answer because you guys have a zero, zero percent record of doing this stuff on time. And here's what you did again at the VA. You got a ton of money available to you and you said, "Oh my gosh, I got to spend this money. So let's pretend like we did actual mission planning and then and then crap on the American taxpayers." That's exactly what happened. You you failed to plan again. And the American taxpayer and the veterans who earned these benefits are paying the price for your guys' basic inability to do mission planning. You mentioned that there's legislation and some court cases that made you have to change what you're doing, correct?

That's correct.

Okay. What was the first one?

The Isaacson and Roeak.

Okay. What was what was the goal prior to that passing?

The goal for the DGIB managed service contract is to deliver claims faster to veterans.

Okay. And then so you changed that after this act.

We had to we had to change how we paid the monthly housing allowance.

Okay. And then and then that came into play and you're like, "Oh, okay, we better think of a new thing that we have to do, a new goal." What was the goal following the Isaacson legislation?

It has always been to to replace the benefits delivery...

What was what was the next piece of legislation or court action that made you change?

We implemented the Vet-Tec 1 capability.

I think you see what I'm so I don't believe that you actually had any type of metric of success. I don't think that you did. And then you're pawning this off on Congress and the courts because you again failed to do mission planning and set attainable quantifiable goals for this program. And this has happened again and again and... ...and again and again. So what is the goal right now? Can you put it on a piece of paper? Other than it's we're going to speedy service.

Again, we are working to deliver claims in one day.

And I'm working to get my hair back and neither one of this is turning out properly. Okay, so that's unacceptable. Now listen. Do you know what this is?

I cannot read that from here.

This is the current VHA organization chart. And you have a little bit in all of these little things. They're all over the place. Your contract nostrils, all through here. All these little nodes. Now these guys are moving this to this. You see that? Can everybody see the difference between the two? Okay, where is your line and block chart, sir?

I believe we sent that over to your office.

I believe I don't have it. Yeah, we need theirs. Yeah. So no, we don't have it. So I want to see this because everybody here, you know, hey Bob, I got six bosses. And you guys got six bosses. We need one boss or maybe two at the most. And you're never ever going to get this right until you actually have a clean line, until you have a line and block chart where everybody knows exactly what they're doing and when they're supposed to do it and who they report to and who can be held accountable by who. I mean this is a fundamental issue that we have. Mr. Tellez, who's responsible for not including the Office of Acquisition Logistics and Construction into the original contract negotiation? Who?

Thank you for your question, sir. I was not, I am not, as my role as executive director for the Office of Business Integration, I have a small role in Digital GI Bill. I provide support to them.

Does anybody know the answer to this question? Who's responsible for not including the Office of Acquisition Logistics and Construction into the original contract?

Sir, the Office of Acquisitions was involved in that we leveraged their contract vehicle, the T4NG contract, but VBA's acquisitions team actually managed the task order.

So who put together the team? Who invited people to the table?

The team would have been led by the Education Service Director and...

That's not leading. I'm asking you who put the actual team together. Okay, my time has expired out of respect for my colleagues here. You're dismissed, this panel please. If you want to stick around, that'd be awesome. And then let's have the second panel come up. We will readjourn in seven minutes. [Gavel sounds.]

[Recess.]

Committee will come to order. On our second panel, we're going to be hearing from the following witnesses. Our first witness is Mr. Justin Parke, Managing Director, Digital GI Bill Program Manager, Accenture Federal Services. Our next witness is Mr. Troy Mueller, Managing Director, Integrated Benefits Operations and Technology Division at MITRE. Our final witness is Mr. William Hubbard, Vice President for Veterans and Military Policy, Veterans Education Success. Would you please all rise and raise your right hand? Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you're about to provide is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Very well. Let the record reflect that the witnesses have answered in the affirmative. Mr. Parke, you are now recognized for five minutes to deliver your testimony on behalf of Accenture Federal Services.

Chairman Barrett, Mr. Van Orden, Ranking Members Budzinski and Pappas, and distinguished members of the both subcommittees, thank you for inviting me to testify at today's hearing. I am Justin Parke, Managing Director at Accenture Federal Services, member of the Accenture Federal leadership team. I am also the program manager of our Digital GI Bill engagement, leading the implementation and operations of Accenture Federal DGIB systems. I'm honored to serve veterans and their families in my role on this important program. Accenture's work with VA Education began in 2019, when VA decided to reset after a failed Colmery implementation attempt with a different vendor. This reset included the release of a competitive outcome-based RFP that Accenture won. In partnership with VA, we delivered Colmery on time and on budget. After this, VA released another full and open competitive RFP for the Digital GI Bill implementation and operations. Accenture won this competition and since March 2021, we have supported VA's efforts to make it faster, easier for veterans to access and reliably receive life-changing education benefits. We have achieved the main objectives of this contract: to process claims uninterrupted, to develop new capabilities based on requirements defined by VA, while enabling the retirement of VA legacy systems. For example, DGIB has retired VA's nearly 50-year-old BDN mainframe, which has improved VA's operational resilience and for the first time in GI Bill's 80-year history has enabled fully automated claims processing for originals and new chapters. Through our DGIB automation efforts with VA, this January, more than 64 percent of all education claims are processed automatically same day, with the vast majority of these in seconds, with no veteran claim examiner effort. Chapter 35 is now running at 69 percent same-day automated claims processing, radically improving VA's posture for spring enrollment. Since March 2021, DGIB has processed over 16 million claims, delivered more than $43 billion in veteran benefits to 2.3 million unique beneficiaries. There have been challenges to overcome. As previously detailed by the OIG, additional requirements like new legislative mandates, new judicial interpretations, and additional systems integrations expanded the scope from the original contract and non-DGIB dependencies delayed the BDN retirement. During this BDN delay, VA reprioritized several other efforts, including VET TEC 1.0 and My Education Benefits, and we delivered those capabilities ahead of schedule, ensuring that new advancements were still delivered to veterans despite the BDN retirement delay. Most recently, the DGIB system was instrumental in automating one-time BDN claim reconciliation to address the fall VCE manual Chapter 35 backlog. The DGIB program's life cycle cost estimate details the baseline costs expected for the overall VA program across multiple contracts with multiple vendors and other VA expenses. A smaller portion of this estimate is for the managed service vendor costs, that is Accenture contract costs. The total Accenture contract ceiling is currently $1.08 billion, inclusive of increased scope. Accenture contract cost is squarely within the baseline cost range for the scope and schedule ultimately required. Moreover, DGIB results in significant cost avoidance, including an estimated $250 million for BDN, $400 million for other VA legacy systems, and $400 million of claims processing staff over 10 years. Without DGIB, VA would need to spend more on claims processing staff to keep up with the increased claim volume. All of these savings compound year over year and in total far exceed the $1 billion in managed service contract ceiling. As one of VA's most successful IT transformations, DGIB has overcome challenges and delivered on its commitments. Some conclusions to consider: One, VA can achieve ambitious transformation even when previous attempts over past decades have failed. Two, baseline life cycle cost estimates should include known unknowns like future legal mandates and other future fact-of-life changes that do not exist at program inception. And three, procurement organizations can tackle big business needs with veteran outcome-focused based contracts like DGIB. With the right procurement strategy, VA leadership can drive critical mission...

The gentleman's time has expired. Thank you. Mr. Mueller, you're recognized for five minutes to deliver your testimony. Mr. Parke, your testimony will be entered into the written record. Thank you.

Chairman Barrett, Chairman Van Orden, Ranking Members Budzinski and Pappas, and other members of the subcommittees, thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today on matters relating to the VA's Digital GI Bill program. Successful modernization of legacy IT is critical to improving the veteran experience. MITRE very much appreciates the opportunity to testify today. MITRE is a not-for-profit systems engineering, applied research, and advanced technology organization that operates federally funded research and development centers for multiple federal agencies, including the Department of Veterans Affairs. Currently, I'm the managing director responsible for our support to modernization of benefits and service delivery across all VBA lines of business, the VA's Office of Information and Technology, and the Social Security Administration. MITRE's role is focused on providing strategic advice, guidance, and assistance in the areas of systems engineering, program integration, and organizational change. Our work included completing the annual update of the life cycle cost estimate for the DGIB program from 2021 with version 1.0 through 2025 with version 5.0, which was delivered in April of 2025. The LCCE calculates the total cost of the government for acquiring and owning a system throughout its lifetime, far beyond any specific contract, and is updated annually per the GAO recommendations and their guidance. To reflect changes in technical, economic, and programmatic assumptions and fact-of-life changes such as new legislation and court decisions impacting the agency, veterans, service members, and beneficiaries. It supports financial decision-making and informs future budgetary needs. As of April 2025, with update version 5.0, the program has an estimated total cost of $2.3 billion in base year FY 21 constant dollars over a 10-year period, rising to approximately $2.6 billion when adjusted for inflation or then-year dollars. The program is large and complex and accordingly has inevitably encountered challenges, unanticipated complexities, the realization of risk. Over the past five years, it has also had many accomplishments, delivering eight successful releases, the migration of all benefit chapters to the platform, and retiring of the BDN 1970s mainframe system, and additional automation capabilities that result in dramatically faster claims processing. Recognizing that there will always be challenges, complexity, and risk, I have two recommendations to share with you today. First, a dedicated enterprise-level cost estimating capability at VA would give Congress and VA leadership consistent, independent, and defensible life cycle cost estimates that strengthen budget information, formulation, and major investment decisions. By validating program office estimates, establishing authoritative cost baselines, and providing transparent affordability analysis, the organization would reduce cost and schedule risk while improving oversight readiness and ensuring resources are aligned to outcomes that matter for veterans. And second, the cost estimating capability should be paired with a streamlined early acquisition model that accelerates delivery of capability while generating the structured data needed for credible cost estimation. Rapid operational need definition, minimum viable requirements, early risk scans, and lightweight architecture work would shorten pre-award timelines and produce clear inputs such as preliminary requirements, solution concepts, and early cost drivers that feed the enterprise cost estimating organization or capability. Together, these reforms enable VA to deliver modern capabilities faster while grounding every major investment in transparent data-driven analysis. In closing, let me just note that MITRE's roughly 6,500 personnel, over 1,100 are veterans, including myself. Few duties feel more noble to our employees than honoring the service and sacrifice of our nation's men and women in uniform through the support that we provide to the VA. On behalf of the entire MITRE team, I greatly appreciate the opportunity to come before you today and look forward to your questions.

Thank you, Mr. Mueller. The written statement of Mr. Mueller will be entered into the hearing record. Mr. Hubbard, you're now recognized for five minutes.

Chairman Van Orden and Barrett, Ranking Members Budzinski and Pappas, and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today on behalf of Veterans Education Success, and thank you for your continued oversight of VA on issues that directly affect veterans, survivors, and their families. It's our organization's mission to advance higher education success for veterans, service members, and military families and to protect the integrity and the promise of the GI Bill and other federal education programs. It is with this perspective that we approach today's hearing, with focuses on the Digital GI Bill, contracts, and payment disruptions. Modernization at VA is necessary. Nobody disputes that. But modernization that fails to deliver benefits on time is not progress. It's disruption. And the people who pay the price are students who plan their lives around the benefits that they were told they could rely on. The Digital GI Bill was intended to replace aging systems with a more efficient, unified platform. Instead, it has joined a long list of technology rollouts that VA launched without proper safeguards or contingency planning, and the result was all too predictable. Recently, housing payments were delayed or reduced without warning, leaving thousands of students scrambling to cover rent, food, and basic expenses. This pattern has plagued VA's technology transformations since the beginning of the Post-9/11 GI Bill, when tens of thousands of veterans went months without payments. Then, during the Forever GI Bill rollout in 2018, nearly 180,000 students experienced delays to their housing payments. In 2023, another modernization effort resulted in more than 280,000 students receiving late payments, and VA resorted to mailing paper checks to process some of those. As you can plainly see, last fall's failures were not an anomaly. One student told us that her benefits were missing for nearly three months. Her car was repossessed and she was facing eviction while attending school out of state with no family support nearby. Another student received less than $900 for the month, barely enough to cover rent, leaving him with almost nothing for food and transportation. These are real consequences of leadership decisions. Adding to the stress of missed payments was the noticeably loud silence from VA. VA was aware of the possibility of these issues before students felt the impact, yet there was no proactive warning and no reliable channel for students to get answers. During the government shutdown, the GI Bill hotline was classified as non-essential, leaving students unable to ask for help. It's also important to note the timing of these major technology updates, which were inexplicably scheduled to start at the beginning of the academic term, when even short disruptions can quickly snowball into housing issues or enrollment challenges. We implore VA to stop doing significant technology deployments at the beginning of major academic periods. Based on what we have heard from veterans, their families, and survivors, we offer the following practical solutions to mitigate these issues moving forward. First, education benefits delivery must be treated as an essential function. Second, VA should be required to conduct rigorous testing and independent certification before any update goes live. Third, when VA identifies a risk to on-time payments, it should be required to notify students, schools, and Congress in plain language. Fourth, major system changes should not be scheduled during critical academic windows. Fifth and finally, we encourage Congress to mandate transparent performance metrics that reflect the veteran experience, not VA's internal processes. Student veterans and survivors do not view these benefits as optional. They plan their lives around them. When payments fail, trust in the system erodes, and once lost, that trust is difficult to restore. Thank you for your attention to these issues and your continued oversight. I look forward to your questions.

Thank you, Mr. Hubbard. The written statement of Mr. Hubbard will be entered into the hearing record. We're now going to proceed to questioning, and the chair now recognizes Ranking Member Budzinski for three minutes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Mueller, thank you for joining us today. I appreciate your recommendation that VA should work to strengthen its internal enterprise-level cost estimating capability. However, with VA losing at least 405 contract specialists in fiscal year 2026 so far, I worry the VA does not have the skills in-house right now to perform these estimates accurately and reliably. What are the dangers of not having enough highly trained staff to perform these estimates?

So the need for qualified staff, which are not contracting officers for this, these are true professional cost estimators, that's a critical need. I think that they would have to be planned and resourced for in order to actually bring those in. I can't speak to what capability exists there today. I do not directly support that particular part of the VA organization.

Okay. Let me move to Mr. Hubbard. Mr. Hubbard, we heard at our hearing in December that VA has not held a monthly stakeholder call for the DGIB program since December 2024. Is that accurate?

That's correct.

What concerns do you have regarding the lack of engagement from the VA with veteran stakeholders as it continues to modernize the DGIB program?

Thank you for the question. We have significant concerns about that. The lack of communication in general is only exacerbates any issue that comes up. As an example this past fall, when we saw these payment delays with Chapter 35 and others, if there was an exchange of information, organizations that support veterans could have anticipated that, planned accordingly, worked with schools even to make sure that these students weren't, for example, facing eviction. Unfortunately, there was no exchange, and this year to date, there have been zero of these calls.

Okay. Let me try to fit in one more quick question. Mr. Hubbard, your testimony also highlights numerous times that the burden to work around VA contracting and IT failures has fallen on veterans and beneficiaries. This is simply unacceptable. And as I mentioned in my opening, these seemingly small errors often result in large losses and degraded veteran trust. Can you share more about the impact of these delays on your membership and how we as Congress can better support veterans and their family members who receive these benefits?

Thank you for the question. Historically, there's a lack of trust when it comes to veterans coming to VA for, for example, their mental health needs. Imagine if you're a student who doesn't even get your payment on time when VA's got your social, they've got your home address, your phone number, your blood type, probably your favorite color, and yet they can't even deliver the benefits that you deserve and earned.

The gentlelady's time has expired. The chair now recognizes Representative King-Hinds for three minutes.

My question is Mr. Mueller. So you made a couple of recommendations, one of which is the creation of a sufficiently resourced enterprise-level cost estimating capability, and second, the development of a streamlined early acquisition model. For the vets who are listening in who don't speak your language, can you please explain that in layman's terms?

Sure. So when you stand up, before you stand up a program, there's a certain amount of analytical activity that should happen prior to that. And that's where you understand your mission need, you start to understand your requirements and look at your options of how do you fulfill this need. And part of that is you want obviously determine what is going to be the cost to do this, an initial understanding of that cost estimate. And so you need this analytical activity paired with the capability to complete those estimates. And just to go back to that analytical activity, that would be made up of users that use the system, be your contracting people, your contracting professionals, the business leaders that are responsible for operating at the IT organization, all these different skill sets come together to help bring this program to life in an informed way so decision-makers can make an informed decision and have an idea of what the cost is going to be. And all of this contributes to a better contract, a better acquisition activity as well. So in the most layman's terms I can put it is you're bringing people that understand the ingredients to bring to a great meal so you can have a good meal.

I ask that question, right, because we're talking about how do we look at contract reforms and acquisitions reform. And I think I was reading Mr. Parke's testimony and he suggests that baseline estimates should include known unknowns, right? And in this process, right, to include future legal mandates because the VA has pointed out that there are different components that needs to be tinkered with given all these lawsuits and that has to be all accounted for. And so where does that fit in with regards to just the contracting process and who should bear that risk? Because some of this cost inflation is directly attributed to that.

Sure. So the early analytical activity will give you what the requirements are known in that moment and what's the objective for that system. Where this issue, where what Mr. Parke brought up comes into play, the known unknowns is actually in a cost estimate, you develop an LCCE, and I want to be clear about it, an LCCE, not an independent government cost estimate for a contract. For the bigger program LCCE, you account for that in the range and sensitivity analysis. However, you can only account for so much. There are just some of those unknowns you're not going to know. So it comes down to how much do you budget for if you think about the range. So if we say that we have a confidence level at of $1 value and we have a range, do you have to budget more on the other side? So normally GAO says budget at the 50 percent confidence level to account for some of that, but you're still going to have things come up along the way, especially when you're thinking...

The gentlelady's time has expired. The chair now recognizes Ranking Member Pappas for three minutes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Parke, did Accenture provide DGIB release eight on time and on budget?

Thank you for the question. The original deadline for BDN retirement, which is equivalent to release eight, was September 2022. We delivered it in August 2025 for the reasons that I think you've heard in a number of testimonies.

How quickly did Accenture respond to VA's request for assistance in automating the data reconciliation last September?

If we're talking about September 2025, as soon as VA was aware that there was an issue in the amount of time it was taking to manually reconcile or validate BDN data coming into Chapter 35, we were with the VA taking new requirements for automation. We were able to then build that and have it ready for deployment in October, but of course there were some mitigating circumstances that prevented folks from validating that it was working as expected.

So it couldn't go live right away because some of the employees VA needed were furloughed. Do you know how long the release was delayed while VA waited to get those employees back in the office?

The eventual deployment of that improvement to automation was November 14th, as I recall, two days after, you know, November 12th.

And when did you or Accenture writ large become aware of the backlog issues with Chapter 35 beneficiaries?

I don't know the exact day, but essentially as soon as VA was aware, they came and, you know, notified us that we would need to be ready to address it with some form of automation. That was the best idea we had and as you can see, it worked.

Mr. Hubbard, in previous hearings I've shared some of the stories that our office has received from impacted Chapter 35 beneficiaries from payments being delayed. I appreciate you giving voice to that as well. I know you ran out of time on a previous... ...answer. I didn't know if you wanted to add anything else just to the impacts on veterans' families and survivors and the stresses that some of these issues at VA cause them. And I appreciate you talking about prioritizing the veteran experience.

Yeah, thank you for the question, Mr. Ranking Member. The reality is when VA asks you to come to them for mental health, which is a big thing for your well-being, your existence, and they can't even get the small things right, like getting your payment on time that you've already earned and already deserve, how do you expect veterans to have that trust in the institution? That's a real loss for America and frankly, it's a disservice to taxpayers as well.

Yeah. Thank you very much for those comments. I yield back.

The gentleman yields. The chair now recognizes Ms. Ramirez for three minutes.

Thank you, Chairman. We know that the VA is still struggling to meet expectations on delivery of the Digital GI Bill. We talked about it in the previous panel, but I want to look at the facts a little closer. Despite millions of dollars and ample opportunities for the Digital GI Bill to be implemented smoothly and efficiently, a backlog remains and rollout continues to be a problem. It is especially concerning because we know that many veterans rely on these GI Bill benefits to remain housed and to access these basic necessities. So we know this clear: any delay in receiving these funds could prove to be dire. You know, I find it unacceptable that the public and Congress do not have better insights into why the Digital GI Bill program continues to face challenges, but it is also unconscionable that in the face of those challenges, veterans, families, and survivors were left in the dark facing financial instability. And look, I know that setbacks happen, failures are learning opportunities, but continuing to allow this program to falter when veterans rely on it for stability is not an option. So I want to talk a little bit about contractor oversight since we've talked about it here quite a bit. The key to addressing the challenges the DGIB is facing is by listening to the perspectives of all those involved in its modernization and integration. So this question is for you, Mr. Parke. Did Accenture flag risks related to release timing, testing capacity, or manual reconciliation to the VA? And if so, how did the VA respond to you?

Thank you for the question. Certainly, we collaborate with VA to identify risks and issues. These types of risks and issues were flagged. I think, you know, as an overall institution, VA is balancing many different priorities and in some cases, certainty as to whether a risk will be realized is not clear. You know, as you heard, we did go live in August. It was August 4, 2025. The assessment at the time was that that was early enough.

So is your assessment that the VA responded as best as it could to the red flags that you flagged?

Based on the information they had, I think they made a reasonable decision. Obviously, with 20/20 hindsight, you know, more time would have been helpful. That would have pushed the go-live a whole year based on what we were hearing from finance.

Got it. Well, let me ask you one last question. I have 35 seconds left. Do you believe the process in which you communicate the issues you find with the VA is working as it should, given the hindsight, and in considering how to advance acquisition reform, what are the specific areas that you offer that have the greatest potential for improvement?

I would say that the process had issues in the past. It has improved. There has been, you know, a new engagement with new leadership. Ken Smith, as you heard, Mr. Ken Smith came in recently. I think this has drastically improved some of that. And as it relates to acquisition...

The gentlelady's time has expired. The chair now recognizes myself for three minutes. Mr. Parke, what is the average amount of time where a veteran was not paid?

In general, I think the last statistic we have is it's an average of 5.6 days to complete each claim. I don't have more information than that for you today.

Hold on one sec. We're going to do some quick enlisted math up here. Okay. This is going to be really exciting. No pressure. How much does the VA spend on education benefits a month?

I think it averages to about a billion per month, 1.2 billion in terms of benefits to veterans.

Okay, so 1.2 billion divided by 30 is what?

I'd have to get a calculator and make sure I do it right in terms of public math.

Okay, so check me out. If the average amount of time is five days where vets aren't getting paid, and I understand what Mr. Hubbard's saying, there's been catastrophic things, but so why can't the VA have moneys set aside for when inevitably you guys screw this up again? Because it's going to happen. Why can't there be money here to pay to our veterans so they don't have to wring their hands because again, the VA has a zero percent record of getting something done like this on time and on budget. Zero.

Is the suggestion that there might be some contingency money set aside that could be...

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. And then I don't care if it goes, you know, electronically, mail them a check. Because hopefully by the time the check gets there, the system's back online again. So if that's where we're just talking, Ranking Member Budzinski and I, if we need to, we can legislate that. Because I mean, this is just dumb and we keep doing it again. What, two days ago was Groundhog Day. We keep doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. That's the definition of insanity. So I want you from your side to look at that, and from our side we'll look at that. I do have to say that there is a potential for success, however small it is. We've seen on the VHA side a 57 percent reduction in the claims under Secretary Collins' leadership. That's in a year. So within one year, there's almost a 60 percent reduction in claims. So these things are attainable, but you need to have the right people working. And one of the things, just take this for what it is, who the hell's been held accountable for any of this? Who's lost a job? Who lost a contract? That first guys? What about you guys? You know what I mean? The cost overruns, I think, are exponentially greater under your purview than it was under the first guys that got fired. So I mean, if a civilian company ran this like you guys have been running this, they'd be out of business. And maybe some people need to get out of business in this business. My time has expired and I want to thank you all for coming, being here today. And Ms. Budzinski has waived her closing comments, and which I thank you very much for coming everybody. We can agree that there's an absolute accountability problem. So until people start, you know, worrying about whether or not they're going to have a paycheck, our veterans are going to have to worry about whether or not they have a paycheck. And I will remind you, and I am echoing the comments of our current Secretary, Mr. Collins, it ain't about you. It's about the veteran. And every time you put the bureaucracy above the veteran, which has happened consistently since I've been in Congress for 25 minutes, it's unacceptable. And we're going to do everything we can to help the Secretary root out this bureaucratic inertia so that our vets get what they deserve. And with that, [Gavel sounds.] this hearing is closed.