Board of Veterans Appeals (Attorney Advisor)
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Anonymous
I guess what you alluded to eluded the poster. |
Anonymous
+1 For those considering BVA, keep your eyes open and use your critical thinking skills. If you are on a bad team and they think you are a complainer and aren’t helping you, keep job searching. If you hate working there, keep job searching. If you aren’t getting along with your judge or SSC, keep job searching. They say you have one year but if they aren’t going to retain you, they might start the paperwork as early as month 8. Read the signs and get moving before that if it is not working out for you. Good luck! For some people, it’s a good fit; if it’s not, don’t stick around. |
Anonymous
Unfortunately, management views anyone who voices any concern as a complainer. This is particularly true for those who report discrimination and/or sexual harassment. Be aware that if you report discrimination and sexual harassment to management during your probationary period, management will set you up to fail and claim that you are a poor performer. Case in point, see the EEOC case about William B. William was a probationary employee who sought a reasonable accommodation for his disability. However, management denied him his request for reasonable accommodation. When William voiced concern about discrimination, management viewed William as a complainer and quickly fired him using poor performance as a pretext. Fortunately for William, the EEOC recently found that such explanation was pretext for discrimination. This is not an isolated case. Just ask the union. Here’s the link to William’s case: https://casetext.com/admin-law/william-b1-complainant-v-robert-wilkie-secretary-department-of-veterans-affairs-agency Though William was a probationary employee, keep in mind that you aren’t safe even after your probationary period ends. Management has even forced non-probationary employees to resign after they reported harassment. |
Anonymous
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In case you can’t access William’s case using the link above, here’s a direct link to decision on the EEOC website.
https://www.eeoc.gov/sites/default/files/decisions/2020_12_07/2019003149.pdf |
Anonymous
I can’t believe pro-union Biden is going to keep allowing this kind of mismanagement continue. Maybe his team hasn’t received the memo? I guess only numbers matter and not employees. |
Anonymous
I have no doubt that the new VA Secretary will do his best to improve employee relations at the agency; however, we’ve seen this story play out before. During the Obama Administration, then Secretary McDonald installed a reformer at the Board to address the rampant culture of discrimination and sexual harassment. Carol was a great leader. She worked very hard to address these problems and allowed employees to voice concerns without fear. While Carol was in charge, the career VA managers parroted Carol’s actions and words. And, the known sexual harassers at the Board laid low. But, when Carol left in January 2017 with the change in administration, the management returned to their old ways. I fear for anyone at the Board who reports discrimination or sexual harassment to management. Ask the union about the problem managers and judges. If history is any guide, upper management will not discipline any manager or judge who has engaged in discrimination or harassment, unless the victims are upper managers (i.e., the Forum of Hate scandal, where five judges and attorneys were fired/forced to resign after they made racial slurs about upper managers). There can be no lasting change without removing the problem career managers and judges. Forum of Hate Scandal: https://abovethelaw.com/2020/07/forum-of-hate-emails-lead-to-suspensions-because-yeah-theyre-bad/ |
Anonymous
It does not appear that Biden or the Secretary plan on replacing the current BVA Chair. Numbers numbers numbers. Apparently, who cares about bad employee morale and ruined careers when you can get numbers? |
Anonymous
I’m pretty sure that the Biden Administration isn’t aware of the work environment at the Board. People who haven’t worked at the Board will never understand how terrible the place. Yes, there are many terrible work environments, but the things BVA management does to destroy those who report discrimination or sexual harassment is truly next level. For anyone experiencing discrimination or harassment at the Board, I urge you to go through the EEO Office. Do not go through the VA Harassment Prevention Office. While the Harassment Prevention Office seems to do their best to help, they have no power to stop BVA management from firing you for reporting harassment or discrimination. Case in point, a probationary BVA attorney contacted the VA Harassment Prevention Office to complain that her judge was constantly harassing her. Following an investigation, the Anti-Harassment Coordinator asked the attorney’s Chief Veterans Law Judge to reassign the attorney to another judge. However, within one week of receiving the transfer request from the Anti-Harassment Coordinator, the attorney’s Chief VLJ fired the attorney using poor performance as a pretext - the attorney had just received a good performance rating on her annual appraisal.. Shortly thereafter, upper management promoted the Chief VLJ to the ranks of upper management. Because the attorney who was fired was probationary, she could not appeal the firing. She has been unable to find a job as attorney. BVA ended her legal career. |
Anonymous
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I forgot to mention, if you think that BVA management is retaliating against you, think twice about reporting the reprisal to the VA Office of Accountability and Whistleblower Protection (“OAWP”, i.e., the VA office that is supposed to protect VA whistleblowers from reprisal). Instead, file a complaint with the independent U.S. Office of Special Counsel.
OAWP is well known for attacking whistleblowers to protect management. If you file a complain with OAWP alleging reprisal for whistleblowing, OAWP will accuse you of misconduct and begin an investigation into you. Don’t believe me? See the links below: https://www.govexec.com/management/2019/10/va-office-meant-protect-whistleblowers-actually-retaliated-against-them-ig-finds/160847/ https://www.govexec.com/management/2020/03/vas-whistleblower-protection-office-again-faces-allegations-retaliation-intimidation/163538/ |
Anonymous
Early on, I was warned that, as a probationary employee, I should do my best to keep my head down and stay off of anyone's radar. |
Anonymous
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Yeah, I received the same advice when I joined the Board - see something, say nothing.
I hate that upper managers at BVA, most of whom have no military experience, run the place like the military (or rather their messed up view of the military). While the real military is making strides in addressing sexual harassment and discrimination in the ranks, BVA management turns a blind eye to managers who engage in discrimination and sexual harassment and retaliates against employees who report the misconduct. |
Anonymous
It’s comical that they act like it’s the military. |
Anonymous
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Comical and sad, as the employees aren’t the only ones who are being hurt. While the Chairman tells Congress that Board attorneys review tens of thousands of pages of evidence AND write a decision every 10 hours, the reality on the ground is that Board attorneys only review 10 percent or so of the record in each case.
Management knows of this practice, as new attorneys are told by the training staff to only review the most recent evidence and ignore the thousands of other pages in the case file. That’s the dirty little secret that Board attorneys know and try to tell Congress, but Congress ignores. It’s comical that the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims remands 80 percent of BVA decisions due to errors in law and fact. Just think about that - out of every 100 BVA decisions, 80 of them are erroneous. The result is that VA cases are stuck in an endless cycle of remands that take decades to resolve. It’s also a huge waste of taxpayer money. I’ve seen so many veterans die before the conclusion of their case. But, management doesn’t care. It’s all a numbers game. https://westdunn.com/va-law/stanford-study-shows-bvas-accuracy-claims-are-misleading https://news.stanford.edu/2019/03/06/new-research-finds-flaws-veterans-claims-system/ https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/432196-when-the-va-misrepresents-performance-veterans-suffer https://siepr.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/publications/19-005.pdf |
Anonymous
What's worse? Congress, the people with the "power of the purse" and who have oversight responsibility over the executive branch, is well aware of what goes on and how it hurts Veterans. In fact, during one hearing, a Congressman asked a question regarding how it as possible for Board attorneys to read every page of a claims file and yet crank out that many decisions. That's wonderful that he asked the question in a public forum, but there was no follow up. None of his colleagues bothered to dig deeper into the issue. They all know the truth and would rather pat themselves on the back because of the increased number of decisions pumped out. It was very disappointing to see that. |
Anonymous
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Ah yes, I remember that Congressional hearing:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=6148&v=AACgoVzBKKg&feature=emb_logo It was funny to hear the BVA Chairman testify to Congress under oath that Board attorneys are able to review tens of thousands of pages of evidence and write an entire decision with 10 hours. While I saw a few members of Congress react in disbelief, I was surprised that no one asked follow up questions. I don’t think Congress is concerned with the fact that 80 percent of BVA decisions contain serious errors in fact and law. They just want BVA to crank out decisions. I’m even more confident that Congress doesn’t care about the rampant discrimination and harassment at the Board. I mean, Congress took no action against Trump’s VA Secretary, who retaliated against a woman who reported sexual harassment. He was also a staunch Confederate sympathizer. I don’t expect anything to change even under Biden, as the same career managers are in charge - I fully expect BVA to promote the BVA managers whom EEOC recently found had engaged in discrimination against an employee (in line with BVA’s practice of promoting managers who engage in discrimination and reprisal). https://www.cnn.com/2018/12/07/politics/va-secretary-confederate-president/index.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/va-chief-wilkie-sought-to-dig-up-dirt-on-woman-who-complained-of-sexual-assault-agency-insiders-say/2020/02/08/c5823e44-49e1-11ea-9164-d3154ad8a5cd_story.html https://www.eeoc.gov/sites/default/files/decisions/2020_12_07/2019003149.pdf |