Director Moreland:
Welcome to the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System.  I'm Mike Moreland, Director of the VA Pittsburgh.
We are honored to have with us some very distinguished guests today; Senator Specter,
Congressman Schuster and Secretary Principi.  I have the honor of introducing our first
speaker today, Secretary Principi.  He is the head of the VA, my boss, a distinguished
Vietnam veteran and a tremendous leader at the VA.  Please welcome the honorable
Anthony Principi.

(applause)

Secretary Principi:
Thank you, thank you very much Mike and thank you for your great leadership of really one
of our premier medical institutions in the VA; and I thank you and I thank your staff for
the wonderful job they are doing.  I feel very fortunate to be secretary of the VA and to
know that we have 218,000 people who provide wonderful care and compassion to our nation's
veterans. I want to express my deep thanks to the chairman of my committee, the man who
makes it possible for us to function each year, Senator Arlen Specter, Chairman of the
Senate Veterans Affairs Committee and thank him for the kind invitation to spend some time
with him in Pennsylvania today touring several of our VA Medical Centers to talk about
some of the issues and some of the plans that we have in place for the future of the
VA Health Care System.  He has been truly a great advocate for my agency, for the men and
woman who serve our nation in uniform. Congressman Bill Schuster, also a great friend of
the VA, a great friend of veterans and it has been a pleasure to tour the facilities
with him as well.

Regrettably, I don't have a decision to announce today with regard to the CARES Plan.
I had hoped to have had that decision today but unfortunately because of the President's
important responsibilities in dealing with Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation
Iraqi Freedom, we have not had an opportunity to sit down and to go through the entire plan,
which is very, very comprehensive and will be the blue print for the VA Healthcare System
in the 21st century.  However, I can tell you that I am excited about the recommendations
contained in the CARES Commission as they relate to this fine institution and that I am
seriously in much agreement with what the CARES Commission has recommended and although
again no final decision has been made, I believe that it will be the foundation for a
world class health care system here in Pittsburgh.  It will require the investment of well
over $100,000,000 to do the things that are necessary here in Pittsburgh before any action
is taken to close down or change the mission of the Highland Drive campus. It means that
we will have to add roughly 300,000 square feet of new clinical and research space here at
this facility.  A new parking structure, which is sorely needed here at this facility as
well as a significant investment in the Heinz facility as well.  Approximately 252,000 feet
of additional space to modernize that facility as well as this one.

I'm absolutely committed to the mental health care needs of veterans throughout our nation
and certainly those in Pennsylvania and with the change that the commission recommended,
we will build new inpatient psychiatric care space here at University Drive, a great
affiliation with a wonderful medical school UPMC.  So all and all I believe that with
this CARES recommendation we do indeed have a blueprint, if-you-will, to move us into the
21st century to modernize the VA Healthcare System.  I want to stress that CARES is not
about saving money to send back to the treasury.  CARES is about investing in the future,
looking at this vast infrastructure we have, to modernize it, to meet the new methods in
health care delivery, to meet the demographics of the veteran population and to invest
about a billion dollars a year, every year over the next several years to modernize
infrastructure. It is a plan that will call for approximately five billion dollars or
more over the next five years to make the changes that I believe are necessary if the VA
is to continue to be a national resource in health care delivery in the 21st century.  I
am pleased that Senator Specter is my partner in this effort to improve the delivery of
health care to our nations veterans, not only in Pennsylvania but across the nation and
he is a stall worth ally of mine and I thank him for all he has done to make it possible
for the VA's budget to increase over the past several years.  Senator Specter.


Senator Specter:
Well thank you very much Mr. Secretary for coming to Pittsburgh and to Pennsylvania again
today.  It had been our hope that there would have been a final decision but that was not
possible because the President has been so heavily engaged on Iraq and other matters and
there is a chain of command, which the Secretary has to observe obviously.  As a Senator
and Congressman we don't have chains of commands under separations of powers but the
Secretary has made it pretty plain that he feels that the CARES Commission recommendation
is a solid one and will vastly improve medical care for veterans here and I think it is
just a matter of the finishing touch and the finishing signature but the CARES Plan will
be carried out with very, very important provisos which the Secretary has talked about
and that is that there will be very substantial funding.  There is a talk of a
hundred million dollars.  That will not be sufficient from what I have seen.  It may
go as high as a hundred and seventy million dollars.  No one is in the position to say
that with certainty.  We have had very considerable analysis and, as you may know, I have
chaired the Veterans Affairs Committee as stated by the Secretary.  My committee held a
very detailed hearing on the Pittsburgh facility and on Butler, and Highland Drive is
going to be maintained and it will not be altered or changed.  The veterans can be assured
that Highland Drive and those facilities will remain intact until there are satisfactory
facilities at University Drive and at Heinz Care Center so that the concerns that the
veterans have expressed should be allayed.  There is not going to be any problem with what
they want to have maintained until there is a vastly improved substitute.  May the records
show that what the Secretary said, "correct". (laughter) When I have a witness testify
I like to (laughter) put it all on the record.

With respect to Highland Drive, it will be a very, very valuable piece of property and
current law allows the Secretary to lease but not to sell, lease the land and retain the
funding within the Pittsburgh Veterans Care Center and we’re looking at legislation which
I think can be enacted which will expand the Secretary's authority as to Highland Drive so
that if and when it is sold the money will stay for veterans care in Pittsburgh and that
could be quite a considerable amount of money because that is a big piece of real estate
and could have a very, very substantial value. So I think that carrying out the CARES
Commission will be highly desirable for the veterans here. 

With respect to Butler, I believe that that facility will remain intact pending negotiations
with the Butler Memorial Hospital.  They want to use the land and have their campus there.
The nursing home will remain, the domiciliary will remain.  Let the record show that the
Secretary nodes in the affirmative and in the negotiations with Butler, we may also be able
to have a new nursing home constructed. That remains to be seen but those facilities will
not be altered or downgraded pending discussions with Butler.  Again we would of liked to
put the ribbon on the package.  We've got the package, just without the ribbon.  We had
considered not coming today and if we had cancelled the plans to come here and to Altoona
and to Erie, where we are heading next, then somebody would of said well there is something
wrong, nothing is going to happen. There would have been ominous overtones to that.
So we decided that it was preferable to come and to say as much as we could.  I am delighted
to be joined by my partner in this venture from the House of Representatives, Congressman
Bill Schuster, who represents a good bit of his district within the geographical bounds of
the service by these areas.  He has been a stall worth for veterans care, a standing
congressman and I am pleased to turn over the microphone to Congressman, Bill Schuster-Bill.


Congressman Schuster:
Thank you Senator, it is great to be here in Pittsburgh today and traveling around with
Secretary Principi.  This hospital, here in the Pittsburgh, and the Altoona facility really
straddle the 9th district and they are important, not only to the veterans here in Pittsburgh,
but the folks from Indiana and Fayette County and Somerset County travel into Pittsburgh
so it is extremely important that we continue to improve our veterans facilities.  Our
veterans are extremely important to this nation and the Senator and myself and this
administration has worked very hard to improve funding and improve programs and
Secretary Principi's leadership in this administration deserves a great deal of credit
for making those improvements.  We in the Congress have fought to increase funding over
the past four or five years and the champion for the veterans in the United States Congress
is Senator Arlen Specter.  Arlen Specter is chairman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee,
has lead the charge year in and year out.  I have been there just to assist him but he is
the guy that has made it happen for the veterans and as I said, my last three years in
Congress, every year we have voted to increase funding for veterans programs and that is
due to Arlen Specter and his leadership.  So I am grateful to be here and I want to continue
to support this administration and our veterans not only here in Pennsylvania but around the
country. Thank you.


Secretary Principi:
I would just like to emphasize one point that Senator Specter did make that I failed to make
and that is with regard to when the CARES decision is announced, hopefully next week, and
assuming that the recommendation as I indicated to you is in fact part of the package that
no change to Highland Drive will take place until we have in fact taken the steps to modernize
the University Drive and Heinz Care Campus.  Those are very, very important to me and I want
the veterans of this community to be assured that no change is going to take place until the
funding is intact and I have a billion dollars, so-to-speak, in the bank for this year and
next year to begin the CARES process which is a very, very substantial first year investment
so that we can begin the advanced planning and design and Pittsburgh, because of legislation
passed by the Congress with Senator Specter inspector, replacement facilities have a very,
very high priority.  So I am hopeful that later this year we will begin the advanced planning
and design for the new facilities that will have to augment the care here at Pittsburgh and
at Heinz as well.


Senator Specter:
Any questions?


Press:
What kind of time frame are you looking at if all those as you would hope for the renovations
here to be in place before Highland is ultimately closed?


Secretary Principi:
The planning would be that the facilities, the new addition, the 300,000 square feet here
and the 252,000 square feet approximate now at Heinz Care would be completed by 2007.


Press:
What do you say in response to veterans who say that they don't want to have to travel
farther to get their care?


Secretary Principi:
Well, what we are trying to do is transition the VA from a very hospital centric health care
system to a patient focused health care system.  Prior to 1995 the VA of 1994 - mid-90's
did not have any community based outpatient clinics, had very, very few free standing
multi-specialty outpatient clinics.  Today we have 800 so we are trying to bring care
closer to the veterans home by having superb tertiary care hospitals like Pittsburgh and
smaller secondary care hospitals supported by a large network of community based outpatient
clinics.  So, indeed, you're correct, we are trying to bring care much closer.  But when you
have to come in for open heart, or neurosurgery or a transplant you want to come to the best
and Pittsburgh is the best and Philadelphia is the best.  We want to ensure that those facilities
are enhanced and supported and are state-of-the-art for the 21st century.  We don't want to
send our kids to Iraq and Afghanistan with 20th century weaponry and we certainly don't want
them to come back when they need our care to 20th century facilities. They should be 21st century,
they earned 21st century care and that's what CARES is all about.


Senator Specter:
Thank you all very much.


Secretary Principi:
Thank you very, very much.