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January 11, 2013 By AMK

Georgia Tech improves voting accessibility for injured veterans

More than 50,000 men and women have been wounded in military service in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Many of these recently injured veterans are in rehabilitative centers where they face barriers that prevent them from voting independently, securely and privately.

Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology, along with the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation and the Operation BRAVO Foundation, are developing ways to provide a more accessible voting system for service members to use within treatment facilities.

“Veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan have different types of injuries than the general population with disabilities,” said Brad Fain, head of the Human Systems Engineering Branch at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI). “The range of accommodations they need to participate in elections differs. We need to better understand the barriers faced by veterans with disabilities to make the electoral process more accessible.”

After two years of study and hundreds of interviews with recently wounded vets, Fain and the research team found veterans with disabilities are likely to experience difficulty with voting because of inaccessible polling places, complicated ballot design and voting technologies that are not compatible with their needs.

Traumatic brain injury, the “signature injury” of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, can impact cognitive ability, independence, memory and attention span. Other common injuries among service members include mobility impairments or amputation of limbs, visual and hearing loss, sensation changes and post-traumatic stress disorder, all of which can affect voting activities.

Researchers recommend taking simple steps to improve voting access such as simplifying the ballot design and removing distractions during the voting process.

They also recommend implementing a portable, tablet-based voting system with numerous control options. Fain is developing a marking tool that would be able to read the ballot in a format the individual could understand, allow the person to mark the ballot and then export it to the voting commissioner in an acceptable manner.

While this innovative technology shows potential, the researchers point out that advancements in technology alone will not solve the problem of voting accessibility for wounded veterans.

“A technology solution is not going to be useful unless we have the policy solutions, security issues and support services that allow people to vote privately, securely and independently,” Fain said.

Georgia Tech researchers will continue to study these issues in a larger study on voting among the general population with disabilities.

“It’s an honor to help solve this problem so all Americans with disabilities have the best opportunity possible to cast a private, secure and independent vote, especially veterans since those injuries were obtained in service to their country,” Fain said.

In 2010, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, in partnership with GTRI and the Operation BRAVO Foundation, received a grant from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission for this project.

For More Information:

Read the “Making Voting More Accessible for Veterans with Disabilities” report.

Filed Under: Georgia Tech News Tagged With: Georgia Tech, GTRI, research, technology, veterans

February 20, 2012 By AMK

VA accused of excessive outsourcing of vets’ jobs

The Veterans Affairs Department is being accused of undermining its own goal of hiring more veterans by expanding its outsourcing practices that eliminate many federal jobs currently, or historically, held by veterans, according to the union representing 205,000 employees at the VA.

In November, President Barack Obama signed into law the “VOW to Hire Heroes Act,” which included language to set up an expedited process for hiring returning solders for federal jobs.

But the VA’s own outsourcing, which began to grow under the Bush Administration and are continuing to expand, are abolishing many federal jobs currently held by veterans, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), an AFL-CIO union, said in a Feb. 8 news release.

For example, the Veterans Benefits Administration recently entered into a $54 million three-year contract with ACS Government Systems to perform claims processing work.

That work currently is being performed by “large numbers of veterans,” the union said. “To add insult to injury, the VBA employees are being asked to volunteer to train the contractors to do their work.”

“Contract claims processors working for profit will now handle the most personal information of our veterans.” AFGE National President John Gage said in the release.

In several other outsourcing contracts in recent years, the VA also has gotten rid of many government jobs historically held by veterans, AFGE said.

Other jobs recently outsourced by VA medical centers and cemeteries, which historically had been held by veterans, included cemetery caretakers, laundry and food service workers, housekeepers, groundskeepers and transportation assistants.

The VA also has failed to comply with a 2009 law that requires the agency to do a cost-benefit analysis before each outsourcing contract is awarded, to determine whether the contract is cost-effective for taxpayers, the union said.

“The agency continues to violate federal law by contracting out work that has been traditionally performed by veterans,” the union said. “The outsourced jobs include many entry level jobs that disabled veterans rely on to get back on their feet after returning from the battlefield.”

The union also claimed the VA conducts “excessive contracting” of physician and nursing services rather than hiring clinicians from within the military.

“Contract physicians and nurses lack the specialized skills and best practices of clinicians who dedicate their lives to serving the veteran population as VA employees,” said AFGE National VA Council President Alma Lee.

VA officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Feb. 9.

Complaints about VA outsourcing have arisen on a regular basis in recent years. In 2009, the president reversed course on a proposed third-party billing initiative for veterans medical care following negative media attention about it.

About the Author

 Alice Lipowicz is a staff writer covering government 2.0, homeland security and other IT policies for Federal Computer Week. This article appeared on Feb. 9, 2012 at http://fcw.com/articles/2012/02/09/va-accused-of-excessive-outsourcing-of-va-jobs-held-by-vets.aspx.

Filed Under: Government Contracting News Tagged With: acquisition strategy, outsourcing, union, VA, veterans

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