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U.S.
Senator Member: Agriculture, Energy, Veterans' Affairs, Ethics and Aging Committees |
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For Immediate
Release April 6, 2006 |
CONTACT: Cody Wertz – Comm. Director 303-455-7600 Andrew Nannis – Press Secretary 202-224-5852 |
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WASHINGTON, D.C. – In a hearing today before the Senate Veterans Affairs committee on capital construction projects, United States Senator Ken Salazar stressed the importance of providing the Department of Veterans’ Affairs (VA) with the necessary resources to move forward on construction of a new VA medical center on the Fitzsimons campus in Aurora. Senator Salazar is a member of the committee. “Aurora, the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center, the VA and others have worked together toward the shared goal of a new VA medical facility for Denver,” said Senator Salazar. “I am confident that, working together, we can make this project one of the crown jewels of our veterans’ health system.” The Capital Asset Realignment for Enhanced Services (CARES) process, an infrastructure assessment that VA conducted two years ago, identified as part of its final plan submitted to Congress in May 2004 the hospital at Fitzsimons as one of its top medical construction priorities. “The Fitzsimons project has seen incremental, but positive, progress over the past two years, most recently reaching a purchase price agreement on 24 of the 31 acres for the Fitzsimons project earlier this year,” said Senator Salazar. “The journey ahead on Fitzsimons is still long. We cannot afford to lose this critical momentum on a project upon which so many Colorado veterans depend.” The next step towards realization of the Fitzsimons VA hospital will be when the VA submits a bill to Congress to authorize the necessary spending to complete the project. Current federal law requires an act of Congress for the VA to spend more than $7M on any capital project. The estimated price tag for Fitzsimons is over $600M. ###
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