On Tuesday, Jen Kiggans, a Republican from Virginia, chaired a hearing focused on mismanaged incentive payments worth millions of dollars disbursed by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).
During the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations hearing, Kiggans highlighted that incentive payments meant for recruitment, relocation, and retention have been poorly supervised for several years. This was reported in a news release from the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs.
Chris Lovell, a retired Marine Corps Major and CEO of Lovell Government Services, a veteran-owned company, told Fox News Digital that these incentives, known as the “three Rs”—recruitment, retention, and relocation—offer additional pay to keep and retain staff, particularly those with specialized skills that the VA requires.
The VA currently has around 482,000 employees, the majority of whom work in the Veterans Health Administration, according to its website.
Earlier this year, the Department of Government Efficiency found the VA had paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a month for website changes before canceling the contract and having an internal staffer take over.
A metal plaque on the facade of the Department of Veterans Affairs building in Washington, D.C. (Robert Alexander/Getty Images)
While combing through loads and loads of data, DOGE discovered a previous contract by the VA for its website maintenance.
“Good work by @DeptVetAffairs,” DOGE said in a post on X. “VA was previously paying ~$380,000/month for minor website modifications. That contract has not been renewed, and the same work is now being executed by 1 internal VA software engineer spending ~10 hours/week.”
