Good afternoon, Chairwoman Miller-Meeks, Ranking Member Brownley, Congressman Bacon, and members of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, Subcommittee on Health. I am Dr. Jeffrey Gold, and I have the distinct privilege of serving as the President of the 榴莲视频官方 System which has campuses in Lincoln, Omaha, and Kearney, as well as a top ranked Academic Medical Center in Omaha. We educate approximately 50,000 students and do approximately $700 M in research. I am a physician and heart surgeon by training. For 10 years prior to my current position, I had the privilege of serving as the Chancellor of the 榴莲视频官方 Medical Center (UNMC) and the Board Chair of Nebraska Medicine, a world-class, statewide medical care and research campus approximately one mile from the current VA facilities. For many decades, UNMC has had broad and deep relationships with civilian and military federal departments, focused on training, research and clinical care. Over the past decade, there has been intense multidepartmental focus and key federal partnerships in the CBRNE global health security sector.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today in support of Congressman Bacon’s H.R. 217, co-sponsored by Congressmen Gottheimer and Wittman, which seeks to make permanent the CHIP-IN for Veterans Act. This bill supports our service members through innovative approaches to develop and finance VA facilities through public-private partnerships.
In 2016, a former colleague of yours, Congressman Brad Ashford of Nebraska, was instrumental in passing new legislation creating a pilot program that would allow for public-private partnerships with the VA. This opportunity led to a remarkable improvement in care for our local veterans’ community, including construction of a new ambulatory center that today serves as the key resource for outpatient diagnostic, procedural and interventional veterans care services in local the Nebraska-Western Iowa region. This project, funded through a combination of federal dollars and private philanthropy, has been recognized nationally as a true pillar of success.
Over the past years, the 榴莲视频官方 Medical Center identified a significant needto replace several of our own aging academic medical center facilities on the Omaha campus. Among these improvements is a forthcoming $2.19 billion project, known as “Project Health,” that will serve as a state-of-the art medical facility, with unique training opportunities focused on meeting Nebraska’s growing need for medical professionals. This project will also provide access to high-quality advanced medical care, a unique interprofessional multidisciplinary learning environment and access to life saving clinical trials for patients across the state. Project Health is a collaboration with the state of Nebraska, the city of Omaha, the 榴莲视频官方, the academic Medical Center, and Nebraska’s philanthropic community.
UNMC’s history of successful partnership with the VA, combined with the forthcoming construction of Project Health facilities, present a unique opportunity for further collaboration to better serve our nation’s veterans and a model for the future.
We have proposed that a new VA hospital, positioned on the UNMC campus to better meet the needs of veterans in Nebraska and Western Iowa, would be constructed to replace the aging structure currently in use. This new free-standing facility would be branded, staffed and operated by the VA with physical connectivity to Project Health for potentially shareddiagnostic, interventional, laboratory and support services. This would also provide proximity for university clinicians and learners from UNMC, while remaining open to staffing and training of other private academic medical center professional staff.
This state-of-the-art facility, leveraging private construction and adjacent resources, would be significantly more cost-effective than renovating or replacing the existing VA hospital thatwas opened in 1950. In this scenario, both the new medical facility and adjacent academic, research, and clinical facilities, could potentially share state-of-the-art diagnostic and procedural equipment suites and leverage future generations of healthcare professionals and other strengths of the university.
This approach is not only cost-effective, but also ensures veterans receive the highest standard of care. By utilizing private sector efficiencies and philanthropic support, we can significantly reduce construction timelines and costs, ensuring timely delivery of quality services to those who have served our country.
The permanent authorization of the CHIP-IN Act through H.R. 217 is essential to expanding these successful partnerships nationwide. Additionally, expanding CHIP-IN to allow minor construction projects and leased facilities could further enhance VA service delivery and flexibility in meeting veterans’ needs.
Our community has demonstrated the potential of highly successful public-private partnerships in veteran healthcare, and the CHIP-IN Act, born in your committee, is one example of a proven success. By making this program permanent, we can empower other communities to replicate our achievements, providing long-overdue facility upgrades and improved access to care for veterans across the country. By effecting the proposed partnership in Omaha, we together can set the standard for the future of care for those who wore the cloth of our nation and protected our freedom.
Thank you for your time, and I look forward to your questions.