Veteran's office pleads for more funding in South Carolina

Veteran's office pleads for more funding in Williamsburg County
By: MATT MCCOLL
SCNow
Published: July 24, 2012
KINGSTREE, S.C.

With less than a year left on the job before he retires, Gusta Ganes, the Williamsburg County Veteran’s Affairs officer, gave one last plea for more county funding with backing from the county’s state delegation.

Currently, the Williamsburg County Veteran’s Affairs Office is allocated $72,586.05 through the county’s budget, with $55,827.52 going to Ganes and an assistant’s annual salary.

Ganes wasn’t there to plead for a raise, though. He said he would prefer if the county could help the office facilitate more of a marketing and advertising campaign when the office has a veteran’s event.

With two events headlining the office’s programs, Ganes said it’s often difficult to find sufficient funding to not only facilitate the events, but also to get the word out to the more than 3,000 veterans that reside within the county.

“Since I’ve been here, we’ve been with basically that same budget, except for maybe a two percent or three percent raise,” Ganes said. “I don’t have any money for advertising or marketing… I’ve got to pay to get a good speaker [for our programs].”
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