VA Kicks Off Innovation Competition

Last month, President Obama suggested the Veterans Affairs Department tap its employees for ideas on how to cut the claims backlog at the Veterans Benefit Administration. Today, VA Secretary Eric Shinseki kicked off the "Innovation Competition," open to VA employees on an internal Web site.

Shinseki said "The men and women of VA know that many Veterans are often asked to wait too long for the critical services they have earned while defending our Nation."

He added that VA "employees who grapple with the claims process every day have the first hand knowledge and experience necessary to help us understand inefficiencies and improve the system. We are confident that our team will come forward with many creative and original ways to accelerate processes and better deliver services for our nation's Veterans."

Meanwhile, for anyone who likes to count, the number of education claims pending as of this Monday - two weeks into the fall semester - has hit 276,704. Last week's total was 254,657 and a year ago, when the VA did not have to deal with claims under the new GI Bill, the total was only 66,261.