Top public service award goes to Veterans Affairs Department

An innovative patient care program at the Veterans Affairs Department drew top honors at the Innovations in American Government Awards ceremony in Washington Thursday. VA's National Center for Patient Safety made it possible for staff members at 173 medical centers to improve health care delivery, said David Gergen, chair of the award selection committee and director of Harvard University's Center for Public Leadership. Created in 1998, the National Center for Patient Safety examines how and why medical mistakes happen and encourages health care professionals to report errors. Now, health care professionals share what were once traditionally unreported errors, so that other VA health care professionals can learn from their mistakes. "The message that the VA is really serious about fixing the problem seems to be getting through," Gergen said. The Innovations in American Government Awards program began in 1986 when the Ford Foundation decided to counteract distrust of government by highlighting good works in public service. Widely recognized as one of the most prestigious public service awards in the country, the awards honor creative government programs that help solve economic and social problems. Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government and the Council for Excellence in Government administer the program. This year the Ford Foundation guaranteed the program's future by creating the Institution of Innovative Government through a $50 million endowment. The new institution now houses the Innovations in American Government Awards program. Approximately 1,300 applicants from federal, state, county and city governments, school districts, tribal governments and government corporations compete for the Innovation Awards. Finalists each receive a $20,000 grant by the Ford Foundation, and winners get $100,000 awards. The funds are intended to help the organizations replicate their efforts in other areas. "This program is even more important today than it ever has been before," Gergen said. "These programs improve the lives for so many people across the country." Two other federal programs were finalists: The Child Welfare Outcomes Initiative, a program of the Health and Human Services Department's Children's Bureau and the General Services Administration's FirstGov Web site. FirstGov was recognized for providing citizens one-stop access to government services, allowing them to search the millions of federal government Web pages available on the Internet. FirstGov was financed at no cost to taxpayers through a foundation created by Eric Brewer, co-founder of Inktomi, a widely used Web search engine. Child Welfare Outcomes Initiative was chosen as a finalist because it helps states deliver services to protect children, providing stability for children in foster care. Since its inception, foster care adoptions have increased by 64 percent.