Category Archives: Government Oversight

The Loudoun Way — School Rapes by a Member of a Progressive Protected Class

Posted on October 21, 2021 by | 16 comments

Loudoun County Commonwealth’s Attorney Buta Biberaj

by James C. Sherlock

Any time you think there is only one system of justice in America, consider these two stories I offer below, one a progressive dream and the other true.

The true story will show some progressives care more about their dogma than kids.

And any time you think only big city progressives don’t give a damn about child victims of crime, like in Chicago or New York, read the true one below.

It is underway in Loudoun County. Continue reading →

16 Comments

Posted in Children and families, Civil Rights, Courts and law, Culture wars, Education (K-12), Government Oversight, Individual rights, LGBQT rights, Money in politics, Parental Rights, Scandals

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Virginia Preschool Initiative (VPI+) Pilot – Hidden Data, Disappearing Value — Thanks for Nothing

Posted on October 21, 2021 by | 5 comments

by James C. Sherlock

This is a follow-up to my Monday report on VPI+, a federally funded four-year pilot program to assess the value of the Virginia Preschool Initiative.

Today we will discuss what was not reported to the public. We will also assess the dreadful results of the pilot participants after those kids graduated and went on the kindergarten and first grade.

Clearly, SRI International (main report) and RAND (cost-benefit report) were directed not to disaggregate the results of the data they collected by division and school. Those, of course, are the levels that give parents enough information to evaluate the program.

What was revealed, at the very end of the main report, was that disadvantaged kids participating had made learning gains compared to their disadvantaged peers who did not attend, but

“like other state public preschool programs, by spring of first grade the differences were no longer statistically different.”

That heart-breaking outcome was left un-assessed.

The mandarins at VDOE (and perhaps the federal DOE) appear to believe that pre-school is too important for parents to get involved.

If given full information, some might challenge the program or decide it is not appropriate for their own children in their local school district.

Like the domestic terrorists some of them are considered in certain circles to be. Continue reading →

5 Comments

Posted in Demographics, Education - Early Childhood, Education (K-12), Governance, Government Oversight, Parental Rights, Political Influence, Politics

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Big Lessons from Government Data on Virginia’s 286 Nursing Facilities

Posted on October 13, 2021 by | 8 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Nursing facilities in Virginia offer an incredible mixed bag. There are heroes and villains. Much to see here.

This column will offer expansive  views of government data on each of the 286 nursing facilities in this state.  

I found out a lot things that really matter to the quality of a nursing facility in Virginia. And a lot of things about government oversight.  nd government insurance payments.

From the visualization aids I provide, so will you.

  • You will find absolutely outstanding facilities.  
  • You will find others that have fallen so short of government standards for so long that you will wonder why Virginia does not revoke their licenses.  
  • You will see the nursing homes in your region.  
  • You will see which chains deliver excellent facilities and which do not, apparently as business models in both cases. Many chains tend to be consistently good or consistently bad. They are color coded in the “Group Ownership” column based upon the overall performance of the chain.  
  • Take a look at the staffing star ratings. Those are based on quarterly filings of data that is linked to payrolls, so it is relatively up to date and relatively accurate. One- or two-star staffing is a very bad sign.
  • You will see the stunning outperformance of nursing facilities in continuing care facilities in Virginia, also as a function of business models.
  • Nursing home inputs — people — enter nursing homes in much different physical conditions and ages. You will see that where you live is a statistical predictor of health. And therefore of the nursing home challenges in areas of poor health. Which tracks with areas of poverty. And low government insurance payments.

Finally, take a look at the Inspection activity.  

It reflects the massive understaffing of the VDH inspectors. Look at the “Last standard (full) health inspection” column. You will see coded in red that 42 (15%) of Virginia’s nursing facilities have not been fully inspected since 2018.  The federal requirement is once a year.  

You will be convinced by the data that strict and timely government oversight is required to ensure, and ensure Virginians of, of nursing facility quality.  

The state must fix the statutory and budget issues that have resulted, purposely, in Office of Licensure and Inspection staffing shortfalls. Continue reading →

8 Comments

Posted in Demographics, Government Oversight, Health Care, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes

Nursing Home Ads Pose As Official State Advice

Posted on October 12, 2021 by | 9 comments

by James C. Sherlock

The Virginia state government has a Department for Aging and Rehabilitative Services. 

Who wouldn’t want one of those?  

But in the case of recommending nursing homes, it would be better if it would either stop or fix its broken system. Which it pays a nonprofit, VirginiaNavigator, to run.

It is offering nothing more than free, self-written advertisements for good and bad nursing homes alike under the guise of a state recommendation to seniors. Continue reading →

9 Comments

Posted in Efficiency in government, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes

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More Proof Virginia Disclosure Laws are Crap

Posted on October 9, 2021 by | 22 comments

Former Sen. John Watkins, R-Powhatan

by Steve Haner

In 2020, according to documents filed with the State Corporation Commission, Dominion Energy Virginia paid former state Senator John Watkins $92,297 for lobbying services. At the end of the reporting period, it officially claimed spending only $1,641 for him to influence the legislative process.

In a similar manner, former Fairfax Delegate John Rust was retained over four years for a combined $265,000. But for his services in 2020, the year of the massive Virginia Clean Economy Act, Dominion’s lobbying expense disclosure listed his fee at $7,679.

The full payments to both former Republican legislators, all perfectly legal, are the subject of an online article on the Richmond Times Dispatch website, probably awaiting print publication. It also focuses on large payments made to a Hampton Roads journalist and former Democratic gubernatorial aide, which Dominion never had to disclose on any state report since buying friendly editorials isn’t covered by disclosure laws.

Add up the reported payments to all the other outside law and lobbying firms Dominion hired, compare them to the official disclosures, and a similar pattern of under reporting will be evident. The reporter missed the best part of this story — that information gap.

What do we learn here?  Anything we didn’t know? Continue reading →

22 Comments

Posted in Energy, ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Money in politics, Political Influence

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Virginia’s Self-Inflicted Nursing Home Crisis – Part 4 – the Worst Facilities in Virginia

Posted on October 4, 2021 by | 7 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Today we are going to take a look today at a snapshot of Virginia’s worst nursing homes as rated by the Centers for Medicare/Medicaid services.

Medicare rates 54 of the total of 386 nursing facilities in Virginia as overall one star out of five.  By definition of the way that Medicare compiles records and assigns scores, they have been bad for a long time.

Don’t use them. If you have any friend or loved one in one of these places encourage them to re-locate if they can. Either way, visit them often. It helps.

The ratings are established in considerable part by the inspections conducted by the Virginia Department of Health Office of Licensure and Inspection.

Continue reading →

7 Comments

Posted in Government Oversight, Health Care, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes

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Virginia’s Self-Inflicted Nursing Home Crisis – Part 3 – McAuliffe & Herring

Posted on October 2, 2021 by | 4 comments

by James C. Sherlock

In the first two parts of this series, I wrote about the shortage of state inspectors for nursing homes in the Virginia Department of Health Office of Licensure and Certification (OLC)  and the continuing danger it poses to Virginia patients.

The problem, unfortunately, is much wider than just nursing homes.  So is the scandal.

That same office inspects every type of medical facility including home care agencies as well as managed care plans. Except it cannot meet the statutory requirements because it does not have sufficient personnel or money. And it have been telling the world about it for years.

Terence Richard McAuliffe was the 72nd governor of Virginia from 2014 to 2018. Mark Herring has been Attorney General since 2014.

We will trace below that they can reasonably be called the founding fathers of overdue inspections of medical facilities in Virginia.

VDH has been short of health inspectors since McAuliffe and Herring took office and still is .

Both of them know it. And they know that lack of inspections demonstrably causes unnecessary suffering and death.

Continue reading →

4 Comments

Posted in Consumer protection, Ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes, Money in politics, Political Influence, Public corruption, Regulation, Scandals

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Virginia’s Self-Inflicted Nursing Home Crisis — Part 2, the Business

Posted on October 1, 2021 by | 8 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Nursing homes are businesses.

Seventy percent of those in Virginia are for profit. They are run not by doctors but registered nurses with physicians on call. 

Nursing facilities very widely in size in Virginia, from the 300-bed Mulberry Creek Nursing and Rehab center in Martinsville to facilities of less than 30 beds, especially the long-term care units of a few mostly rural hospitals.

They include facilities designated as skilled nursing facilities (SNF), often post-op care and rehabilitation, and others designated as long-term-care nursing facilities (NF). Most nursing homes in Virginia have facilities and certified beds for each.

Insurer mix and staffing costs are keys to profitability.

Many of these businesses are worth what they get paid, but many are not. Continue reading →

8 Comments

Posted in Children and families, Consumer protection, Efficiency in government, Ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes, Money in politics, Public safety & health

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Virginia’s Self-Inflicted Nursing Home Crisis – Part 1

Posted on October 1, 2021 by | 15 comments

by James C. Sherlock

None of us ever knows when we will need a nursing home for ourselves, our parents or our kids. Yes, kids.

While long-term nursing care is mostly for older patients, skilled nursing facilities are needed for patients of all ages, including children, for shorter term post-op treatment and recovery.

The patients in many of Virginia’s nursing homes suffer greatly from a combination of known bad facilities and a lack of government inspections. The health and safety of patients in those facilities are very poorly protected by the state.  

In this series of reports I am going to point out some nursing homes (and chains) whose records will anger you. Government data show some have been horrible for a very long time in virtually every region in the state.

Those same records show that Virginia is years behind on important, federally mandated health and safety inspections.

VDH’s Office of Licensure and Certification doesn’t have enough inspectors — not even close. And the government of Virginia — officially based on budget data — not only does not care but is directly and consciously responsible.

When I am done reporting on my research I suspect you will demand more inspectors.

You will also  reasonably ask why the worst of them are still in business when the Health Commissioner has the authority to shut them down.

Good question. Continue reading →

15 Comments

Posted in Children and families, Efficiency in government, Ethics, ethics, General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes, Money in politics, Public safety & health, Uncategorized

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Covid Benefits – Yet Another Massive Government Program Gone Awry

Posted on August 16, 2021 by | 46 comments

Image by Pete Linforth from Pixabay

Stolen without a gun. NBC News is reporting that hackers and scammers have pulled off “an epic theft” of COVID benefits. Foreign and domestic criminals have looted tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars. As reported, “The federal government cannot say for sure how much of the more than $900 billion in pandemic-related unemployment relief has been stolen, but credible estimates range from $87 million to $400 billion — at least half of which went to foreign criminals, law enforcement officials say.” In other words, more money could have been stolen from the jobless benefits program than the U.S. spends on K-12 education in a year. Continue reading →

46 Comments

Posted in Business and Economy, Government Oversight, Science & Technology

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An Energy Reform Agenda for Virginia

Posted on August 13, 2021 by | 37 comments

Virginia City Hybrid Energy Center, St. Paul, VA. Dominion Photo.  Always a good political investment, never a good energy investment.

By Steve Haner

What should Virginia’s energy policy be?  What should the next Governor and General Assembly do? What should candidates be promising?

Based on what has now been my 15 years of close observation and direct involvement, here is the policy outline I would suggest to any candidate who asks (not that the phone is ringing).  Continue reading →

37 Comments

Posted in Elections, Energy, Environment, Government Oversight, Regulation

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The Accelerating Scale of the Legislate-Regulate-Spend-and-Repeat Cycle Has Broken Government

Posted on August 4, 2021 by | 23 comments

by James C. Sherlock

Virginians – the state and individual citizens – have received over $81 billion in COVID-related federal funding. That comes to $9,507 for every man, woman and child in the Commonwealth.  Big money. 

That was Virginia’s share of $5.3 trillion in federal spending just on the pandemic (so far). A trillion dollars is a million million dollars. A thousand billion dollars.

For comparison, GDP was about $21 trillion in 2020  It is projected to total just short of $23 trillion this year.  The national debt is $29 trillion and growing. A little over $86,000 for every American. That figure does not include the $5 trillion in additional spending pending in the Congress.

Every day we spend $1 billion on interest with interest on the 10-year treasuries at 1.18% today. The Congressional budget office predicts 3.6% before 2027. Do the math. That is $3 billion a day — well over a trillion dollars a year — in interest. 

Relax. If you thought I was about to launch off on a discussion of drunken sailors, writing checks that our grandkids will have to make good, and the fact that inflation will drive interest payments ever upward, be reassured I am not.

This is about the demonstrated inability of many government agencies at every level to regulate, administer, oversee, spend and repeat with anything approaching efficiency or effectiveness.  Continue reading →

23 Comments

Posted in Budgets, Disaster planning, Education (K-12), Efficiency in government, Finance (government), General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care, Housing, Long Term Care and Nursing Homes, Mental illness and substance abuse, Money in politics, Politics, Public safety & health, Scandals, Social services

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No PAC for Disaster Preparedness and Response

Posted on July 31, 2021 by | 10 comments

Why is this man smiling?

by James C. Sherlock

Virginia’s responses to COVID were a continuing national embarrassment. 

  • Individual Virginia department and agencies had no operational pandemic response plans. They ignored specific and prescient directions to build and exercise such plans in the dormant Virginia Pandemic Emergency Plan. VDEM then attempted a coverup.
  • No PPE stockpiles. Last in testing. Last in vaccinations. Hospitals first, physicians last in every decision by the VDH. 
  • Last in distribution of unemployment checks. 
  • The General Assembly was given and took no role in pandemic response for 15 months.
  • The Canterbury nursing home scandal. State nursing home inspections that failed to report staffing shortages. The directly related shortages in staffing of state inspectors.
  • The failure to sanction teachers unions for strike threats in Northern Virginia during COVID. The officially sanctioned lapse in school accountability.
  • Poorly prepared official press conferences that often added confusion rather than clarity.

This was in its totality the biggest government scandal in Virginia history.

Continue reading →

10 Comments

Posted in Disaster planning, Education (K-12), Efficiency in government, General Assembly, Governance, Government Oversight, Health Care

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Clean Virginia Dissed Again, Dem Takes Dom Cash

Posted on June 3, 2021 by | 18 comments

An image of Hala Alaya’s answer to a question on Clean Virginia’s candidate questionnaire, released by it in response to her breaking of that pledge.

by Steve Haner

Prince William Democrat Hala Ayala, who had pledged not to accept campaign contributions from Dominion Energy Virginia and took money instead from its opponents, has now accepted $100,000 from the regulated monopoly. Heads are exploding.

Del. Haya Ayala, D-Prince William

The anti-Dominion activist group Clean Virginia had given her $25,000 in her bid for the Democratic nomination for lieutenant governor.  Now is has announced it will dump $125,000 into a last-ditch digital campaign to defeat her in the June 8 primary. Early voting in the primary has been underway for weeks, however. Early voters upset by this cannot call their ballots back.

Final pre-primary finance reports were released early in the week and word of the contribution quickly hit the Twitterverse, then sparked stories in today’s Richmond Times-Dispatch and Virginia Mercury. Continue reading →

18 Comments

Posted in Elections, Electoral process, Ethics, General Assembly, Government Oversight, Politics

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Vertically Integrated Health Providers/Insurers – Weak State Oversight But New Federal Authority

Posted on May 18, 2021 by | Leave a comment

by James C. Sherlock

In the contest between Virginia’s disorganized attempts to oversee vertically integrated health care and health insurance businesses, Sentara being the most prominent example, and Virginia’s regional monopolies’ defenses against effective regulation and legislation, the monopolies have won.  

This piece discusses Virginia’s failed legislative and regulatory oversight structures. I will recommend structural changes to both to deal with the issues that fall between the cracks.

There is, however, very recent good news.

A new federal antitrust law gives federal courts full authority over integrated healthcare/health insurance business structures operated in restraint of trade. I will briefly describe the potential effects of that change. Continue reading →

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Posted in Business and Economy, Consumer protection, Courts and law, Efficiency in government, Government Oversight, Health Care

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