WASHINGTON -Complaints raised on behalf of Kansas veterans to the Veteran’s Affairs Administration rarely get a response.

That was a message from Senator Jerry Moran, who talked with Kansas radio stations on Friday.

“Earlier this week on the Senate floor I spoke about this ongoing problem, it’s increasing consequence to Kansas veterans and their families, with a real desire to see that we have change top to bottom at the Department of Veteran’s Affairs. So I asked Secretary Shinseki to submit his resignation to the President, and I asked President Obama to accept that resignation.”

Moran stated the frustrations veterans are experiencing with the Department that is designed to care and provide benefits promised them when they enlisted or were drafted is failing them. He added nothing seems to change at the VA.

“Most of the attention has previously been on the benefits side of the Department of Veteran’s Affairs. And national stories have been ongoing for now years about the significant backlog in outstanding claims at the VA. As of April, as of last month, there are 596, 061 outstanding claims. Fifty-three percent of those are more than 125 days old.”

Moran added in Kansas concerns have been raised on the closing of the emergency room at the VA Hospital in Topeka, on what’s happening there at the Colmery-O’Neil VA Clinic to meet the needs of veterans in this state, and he noted the outpatient clinic in Liberal has been without a physician for three years.

“If the department of Veteran’s Affairs can’t better manage the circumstances it’s in now – if it can’t care for our current set of veterans and their families – we know that there are more coming with significant physical and mental challenges, I’m quite convinced that in the abscence of dramatic change at the VA, we are not prepared for the servicemen and women who are returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan, and we’re not capable of caring for our aging World War II veterans as we promised we would and as every American knows we should.”