This bill reorganizes how the Department of Veterans Affairs handles major purchases, programs, and related staff. It defines a "major acquisition program" (programs with lifecycle costs above $1,000,000,000 or $200,000,000 annually). The bill creates an Assistant Secretary for Acquisition who will serve as the Chief Acquisition Officer and lead a new Office of Acquisition. That office will include deputy assistant secretaries for logistics, procurement, and program management and performance. The Assistant Secretary must appoint at least four Program Executive Officers to oversee major acquisition areas (medical, information technology, professional services, and other areas).
The bill requires a manager be named for each major acquisition program. Managers must hold advanced project-management certification or an equivalent. Managers must create and maintain a program baseline that shows phases, requirements to move between phases, and life-cycle estimates for cost, schedule, and performance. Major acquisition program offices must report to the Assistant Secretary for Acquisition and be independent of other VA administrations.
The bill directs the VA to consolidate all acquisition, procurement, contracting, logistics, and supply chain activities under the Assistant Secretary for Acquisition within one year (without forcing physical relocation). It requires that the Office of Acquisition budget appear in the Department's budget justification materials.
The bill requires competitive contracts for independent verification and validation (IV&V) services for major acquisition programs. It sets experience and past-performance rules for entities that provide IV&V and bars entities with unmitigable conflicts of interest. Funding for IV&V contracts must be shared proportionally by the VA organizational units that use the contracts.
The bill creates a Director of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation who reports to the Secretary. That Director must develop cost-estimation policies, perform independent cost estimates and analyses for major acquisition programs, provide independent cost estimates before full-scale acquisition decisions, evaluate program effectiveness, and submit annual reports to the Secretary and relevant congressional committees. The Chief Financial Officer must provide needed support for this office.
The bill directs an increase in use of acquisition internship programs. The Secretary must at least double, and at most quadruple, the number of annual internship participants compared with fiscal year 2025 levels, until the Secretary certifies that the program will meet the Department's hiring needs. The bill also requires a systems engineering analysis of the VA acquisition process by the Defense Department's Acquisition Research Center and a standardized requirements development process for major programs. The bill includes reporting requirements to Congress at several steps.
The bill says the Office of Acquisition budget will be included in the Department's budget justification materials and that VA organizational units must proportionally contribute to funding IV&V contracts. The bill does not include cost estimates or specific appropriation amounts. No publicly available information on total costs or projected federal budget effects is provided in the bill text.
No publicly available information.
No publicly available information.