Gift Drive For Homeless Vets Gathers Strength

Gift Drive For Homeless Vets Gathers Strength
Bristol Herald Courier - Bristol,TN,USA

By Gary Gray
Reporter / Bristol Herald Courier
Published: December 5, 2008

BRISTOL, Tenn. – Gift packages are piling up inside the city’s Parks and Recreation Department, which hopes to pass along the holiday spirit by giving the donated items to homeless veterans.

The department is joining forces this year with Bristol’s own recording artist, April Taylor, who on Dec. 12 will help deliver the packages to the Mountain Home Veterans Administration Medical Center.

Currently, nearly 280 homeless veterans reside at the center.

“I want the veterans to know that our community respects them, and we’ve had a great response so far,” said Mallory Cross, a recreational programmer for the parks department. “Some of the boxes delivered here have personalized letters attached to them. And we also have had several high school clubs get involved in the project.”

Cross said there is no “cookie-cutter answer” for why the veterans are homeless.

“Sometimes they come home from Iraq or Afghanistan and have no family to stay with,” she said. “Also, they may have post-traumatic syndrome when they return and they need therapy and medications.”

Ben Spencer, executive director of the Appalachian Regional Coalition on Homelessness, works with the Veterans Administration to transition homeless people, including veterans, from temporary housing to a more secure situation.

“We work together with the Salvation Army in Kingsport, which currently has 15 veterans in temporary housing,” Spencer said. “This enables them to have a place where they can seek jobs or education – but only for a 24-hour period.”
click link for more

This is one of my videos. It's about homeless veterans. Watch it if your heart has not already been touched by our veterans. If it has been touched, then do something about it please. Let them know in this season of love, "For God so loved the world that,,,,,,,,," and remeber what His Son came to teach all of us about taking care of each other. My heart is touched by all our homeless but it is tugged by the homeless veterans. These men and women were willing to give their lives for the rest of us.