Board of Veterans Appeals (Attorney Advisor)
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Anonymous
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I don’t think they want to increase the backlog or break the system. They probably think that they can maintain the same pace of work by retaining the “best” and then increasing the quota.
The problem is that you won’t get a linear decrease in the backlog just by increasing the production requirements, as attorneys are likely to remand more often and write sloppy denials that will get sent back by the court just to meet their numbers. |
Anonymous
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It depends on how they're looking at the numbers. By the numbers, if we're judging the number of decisions alone, the production of a newer attorney and a 15 year veteran attorney aren't that different, and that old attorney costs a lot more.
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Anonymous
The newer attorney and the older attorney are doing completely different cases. Generally, more experienced attorneys get larger case files in terns of records and issues. So you can't really just compare the number of decisions when comparing the work of the two groups. |
Anonymous
| I know that. You know that. But the people making decisions may not know or care. The backlog is measured in cases, not complexity of cases. |
Anonymous
They don’t care about the mission. |
Anonymous
| The quota will most likely be raised from 3 to 3.5 - 4 cases per week within a few months to offset the firing of around 300 decision writers. |
Anonymous
Trust me, bro. |
Anonymous
| Why are you thinking it would be firing 300 decision writers? |
Anonymous
Folks have been looking at historical staffing levels and the Secretary's public statement about the intent to reduce to pre-PACT Act numbers. |
Anonymous
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An increase in the quota will happen irrespective of any reductions in staffing. The way the union has told the story, for the past couple of years leadership has sought an increase in the quota, but was unwilling to bargain with the union and ended up just keeping the current quota. We are now effectively without union protection, so leadership will have its way.
I was at the Board when the quota went from 2.25/week to 3.25/week in FY17 or FY18. Chairman Mason testified with a straight face at a Congressional hearing that, to tackle the backlog, the Board was simply asking attorneys to write an extra decision each week. The only advice we were given on how to actually do that was, "Write shorter decisions." It's going to be up to attorneys to figure out how to change their work habits and style to meet the new quota. It will probably involve things that make the attorney uncomfortable because they will mean doing less for the Veteran in each case. Of course, the hard truth is that attorneys will need their VLJ to be on board with any changes they intend to make. If you think that your VLJ will refuse to accept a new normal, then it may be time to start thinking about a career change. |
Anonymous
| Is there any hope for newish hires (hired within last 2-3 years) who don't have Veteran RIF preference or prior federal service? This blog is sounding bleak... |
Anonymous
I think there's hope. The figure being thrown around is a 15% reduction agency-wide. I've seen no indication (other than speculation here) that the reduction will be proportionate in all bodies within the agency. We've shown over the past several years that more employees at the Board means more productivity. So, more people means more service to the Veterans, which is our mission. There are people in high places that still believe in VA's mission and the Board's mission. We'll have to wait for official word. Until then, everything is just speculation. |
Anonymous
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I think people here are catastrophizing. We don’t know what will happen, so I’m suspicious of anyone who announces they know the number with certainty. But we are in a better position than a lot of people. Clearly we are vulnerable to the RIF, some will probably lose jobs, but I do not think we are the priority for deep cuts. Yes, a lot of agencies have cut past the point of functioning, but VA is cutting less than other agencies percentage wise. That tells me this administration cares about our mission enough to not want to destroy it. We are mission critical. The project 2025 conservative agenda for VA is to privatize VHA and automate VBA. We don’t feature. So my guess is the RIFs focus on VHA to break it to the point of facilitating privatization. I think there will likely be a push to utilize AI more at VBA with an eye towards automation, but I don’t think it will get far because AI hallucinates. I don’t think they’ll make moves to automate our jobs unless it works at VBA and there’s no big pushback.
My most hopeful prediction is maybe they fire non vet probies, and maybe won’t even get that far if enough people take the DRP 2.0. I don’t know what will happen, but that’s my hopeful speculation. |
Anonymous
The thing about the quota going up in 2017 is that we got prorations for leave. We never had any credit for leave until then. Prior to 2017 if you took leave, you have to make up all the cases for the time that you were out. There was no point in taking leave because you had to kill yourself to make up the cases. The only thing that stopped your quota from accruing was FMLA. |
Anonymous
| Now they’re asking us to report our coworkers who may vaguely have some anti-christian bias. I’m sure that won’t be abused at all. |