Los Angeles Veterans Can Connect to Help After Coming Home

Coming home from war, these veterans often have nothing. 
Here’s how you can help.
LA Daily News
By Dennis McCarthy
POSTED: 11/19/15

“I know there are hundreds of veterans out there living hand to mouth who have no idea we exist, that they can come to their local VA and get clean, used clothing for free.”

Mort Schecter and Wynn Van Citters help veterans in need of clothing at the Veterans

Administration Sepulveda Ambulatory Care Center, Wednesday, November 18, 2015.

(Photo by Hans Gutknecht/Los Angeles Daily News)

He was a young soldier with an empty duffle bag and a hard luck story.

His girlfriend left him while he was serving in Afghanistan, taking everything of theirs she could fit in her car. Their landlord took the rest.

He cleaned out their apartment and put everything she left behind in paid storage, including all his clothes. The young soldier had no idea this was happening. He was too busy 7,500 miles away in a desert looking for people who want to kill us.

When the storage rental fee went unpaid after six months, all his possessions were sold at auction to pay the bill. He had come home earlier this year to find everything he owned gone.

And now he was standing in a cramped clothing room in Building 22 at the Sepulveda VA looking a little embarrassed as he handed Wynn van Citters a voucher saying he qualified for free, used clothing because he was a low-income veteran.

It was not exactly the homecoming he expected.
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