VA's technology budget would remain flat under 2012 funding request

The Obama administration's proposed 2012 technology budget for the Veterans Affairs Department, $3.161 billion, represents only nominal growth from the 2011 budgets that the Senate and House Appropriations Committees approved in their continuing resolutions awaiting floor action this month.

The proposed budget provides only a minimal growth over the $3.160 billion funding line that the Senate Appropriations Committee approved in December 2010 and a $14 million increase from the information technology budget that the House Appropriations Committee approved last Friday.

The 2012 budget request for Veterans Affairs IT is 4.5 percent, or $146 million, below the $3.307 billion enacted in 2010.

VA requested $183 million to develop a paperless benefits claims processing system in 2012, up 21 percent from the $144 million it requested in 2011. The department said the budget increase will allow it to move away from its reliance on paper records, improving the speed and efficiency of claims processing while simultaneously enhancing the security of veterans' personal information.

The department reported last June that it faces a flood of new claims from Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. Claims nearly doubled from 578,773 in 2000 to 1.014 million in 2009, and officials projected that claims in 2010 would hit 1.2 million, and climb to more than 1.3 million in 2011.