The Secretary’s War on Homelessness

We can talk all we want about how bad it is for average Americans out of work, losing their homes and suffering in an economy that has left them behind the eight ball, but as bad as it is for us, we need to understand when it comes to our veterans, they were willing to die for us. We don't stand a chance of getting help if we allow them to suffer after they served this country.

We have problems with health insurance and the struggle to pay for care. They come home and then have to fight for care from the VA, when they wouldn't need it if they didn't serve.

We have problems in our own homes with relationships, our kids, bills, the list goes on, and so do they, but they have another problem too often fought in silence against PTSD.

When they end up homeless after all they did for the sake of this country, it is a testament of how shallow our words are when we say we support the troops or claims we are a grateful nation. Our veterans are a minority in this country. We have about 24 million veterans out of this nation of over 300 million, even less are combat veterans. If we can't take care of them, what does that say about the rest of us?

The Secretary’s War on Homelessness
Shinseki vows to get America’s veterans off the streets within five years. Even the homeless aren’t sure it can be done.
BY JAMES V. CARROLL - August 1, 2010

Three strangers approach a slender man curled up on the sidewalk. They ask his name. He squints into the early-morning sunshine.

"I'm Paul," he quietly replies, rising to his feet, his finger stuck between the pages of a hardbound book he's been reading. He offers his other hand. "And you gentlemen are ..."

Paul, the men soon learn, is a veteran, a former sergeant in the U.S. Air Force. He stands out among the others living on this particular Las Vegas side street. His clothing is clean, his hair neat, his face shaven, his fingernails dirt-free and trimmed. He is soft-spoken and articulate.

He appears to be here by some kind of mistake. Paul is one of hundreds of homeless veterans living and sleeping on the streets of Las Vegas, and one of the tens of thousands of former military men and women across America seeking shelter at night under bridges or in cardboard boxes, tents, sleeping bags or abandoned cars.

Recent VA surveys estimate that more than 100,000 U.S. military veterans are homeless on any given night - a situation VA Secretary Eric Shinseki has vowed, like no other Washington official before him, to correct. "The current estimate for 2010 is that 107,000 veterans remain homeless - a decrease of 18 percent from 2009, and down from 195,000 six years ago," Shinseki said at the 50th American Legion Washington Conference in March. "It's a start, but that's not good enough. We need a full-court press to keep driving those numbers down. It is unacceptable for a single veteran to spend the night on the streets of America."

Shinseki unveiled an ambitious plan last November to eradicate homelessness among veterans within five years. Speaking to more than 1,200 service providers at a VA summit in Washington, the secretary backed up his promise with a pledge to spend $3.2 billion during fiscal 2010 in a move toward fulfillment of the goal. Of that, $2.7 billion would be earmarked for medical services and $500 million for housing programs.
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The Secretarys War on Homelessness