Volunteer army to build house for veteran

The title of this post should be along the lines of when supporting them is real because this is exactly what it is. We can talk all we want about supporting them but if we just wait for the VA or the DOD to do it all, they are the ones suffering for it.

A while ago I had a conversation with a man claiming the "phony PTSD claims" were 50% and that the VA would take care of the legitimate ones. While we know that only a fraction of our veterans seek help for PTSD, that there is no where near enough being done, this man thought they were the problem of the VA and not citizens. He is clearly missing the point that it is the citizens funding service organizations and these organizations exist because the government is not meeting the need.

We can fight all we want to have the VA change but this takes years to do. When a budget is presented, it takes a long time for the funding to be voted on and then even longer for it to work into the system. Yet when people step up, they can write a check and get it done a lot faster. They shouldn't have to do it but because they care, they do and a veteran no longer has to ask himself/herself if anyone cares.

They risk their lives for the entire nation, doing what we ask of them and what few others are willing to do. The least we can do is to answer the call to help them.

An "army" is showing up to help this veteran and it happened after a radio station made his need public. Bless the radio station for making this public and Homes for Our Troops for all the work they are doing to live up to the words "a grateful nation" but also be aware of the thousands of other stories you will never hear about.

Volunteer army to build house for veteran
Mary Umberger
On Real Estate
February 21, 2010
Frank Pierson recalls the moment clearly: One day in March 2008, he was in Baghdad, behind the wheel of a truck that was part of an Army convoy.

"We were driving past a checkpoint, and a big puff of smoke came up — we didn't even know we were being ambushed," the Cicero resident says. "When we drove out of the smoke, I went to stop the truck and didn't know why I couldn't stop it.

"I looked down and noticed my right leg was completely gone and part of my left leg was severely injured."

The "big puff of smoke" had been caused by an electronically fired projectile. What followed were 27 surgeries and 19 months of rehab in Germany and at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Today, minus his legs and dealing with other injuries from the blast, he lives with his wife, Arielle Carroll-Pierson, at her mother's home in Cicero.

It's home, but it's not easy. Even though the family has adapted the house to his needs somewhat, there are huge physical inconveniences. The only bedroom in the home that's vaguely accessible to him, for instance, is in the basement, and to reach it, Pierson climbs out of his wheelchair and scoots down the stairs and gets into another chair.

It will be a contribution from Homes for Our Troops, a Taunton, Mass., charity that since 2004 has built 51 houses for disabled veterans and has 32 others in various stages of construction around the country, at an average cost of $250,000 to $300,000, plus the cost of land.

The organization, which aids military veterans who have been severely injured while serving in a combat zone after Sept. 11, 2001, receives funding from corporate sponsorships and private donations, according to Vicki Thomas, a spokesman for the group.

But the projects depend on labor donated by contractors and skilled workers and from donated materials, she said. There are ways for friends, neighbors and total strangers to help too.

Homes for Our Troops got the word out recently on a Chicago radio station that it needed help for the Piersons' house. It will be the group's first effort in the Chicago area, though it recently completed a home for another veteran in Mahomet, Ill., near Champaign.

Though the organization is used to fielding an outpouring of support in the communities where the organization is building homes, Thomas said she was surprised at the immediate response from Chicago after the radio plea for help, when 548 individuals and companies responded.

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Volunteer army to build house for veteran