Hundreds of Iraq Vets Are Homeless

[AnarchyBurger]

Hundreds of Iraq Vets Are Homeless
Hundreds of U.S. soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan are ending up homeless. How could this happen?
WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Sarah Childress
Newsweek
Updated: 2:41 p.m. ET Feb 24, 2007

Feb. 24, 2007 - Kevin Felty came back from Iraq in 2003 with nowhere to stay, and not enough money to rent an apartment. He and his wife of four years moved in with his sister in Florida, but the couple quickly overstayed their welcome. Jobless and wrestling with what he later learned was posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), Felty suddenly found himself scrambling to find a place for himself and his wife, who was six-months pregnant. They found their way to a shelter for homeless veterans, which supported his wife during her pregnancy and helped Felty get counseling and find a job. A year later, he's finally thinking his future. "I don't want to say this is exactly where I want to be—it's really not," he says. "But it's what I can get at the moment."

Young, alienated and often living on their own for the first time, Iraq and Afghanistan veterans increasingly are coming home to find that they don't have one. Already, nearly 200,000 veterans—many from the Vietnam War—sleep on the streets every night, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. But young warriors just back from the Mideast—estimated around 500 to 1,000—are beginning to struggle with homelessness too. Drinking or using drugs to cope with PTSD, they can lose their job and the support of family and friends, and start a downward spiral to the streets. Their tough military mentality can make them less likely to seek help. Advocates say it can take five to eight years for a veteran to exhaust their financial resources and housing options, so they expect the number to rise exponentially in a few years. "Rather than wait for the tsunami, we should be doing something now," says Cheryl Beversdorf, president of the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans.

The problem is mainly a lack of resources, advocates say. There are only about 15,000 beds available in VA-funded shelters or hospitals nationwide, and nearly every one is taken. In some smaller cities there simply aren't many places for a homeless veteran to go. And as affordable housing units shrink nationwide, veterans living on a disability check of, say, $700 a month, (which means a 50-percent disability rating from the VA), are hard-pressed to find a place to live. Most shelters require veterans to participate in a rehabilitation program, but a "fair amount" of veterans just go back to the streets once they leave, says Ed Quill, director of external affairs at Volunteers of America, the nonprofit housing group for veterans that helped Felty.

The VA says it's making a concerted effort to reach out to vets before they hit bottom, says Pete Dougherty, the VA's coordinator for homeless programs. Intake counselors are trained to ask questions, especially of newer veterans, to seek out mental health or other problems that could lead to homelessness. "We're much more sensitive than we were 40 years ago for signs of problems," he says. And they have expanded some services. Last week, the VA approved $24 million to boost aid for the homeless, which will allow them to add about 1,000 more beds and increase the number of grants to help the growing population of homeless women veterans and those with mental illnesses.

Much of the work with new veterans is being done one soldier at a time. At New Directions in Los Angeles, a center that rehabilitates homeless veterans, Anthony Belcher, a formerly homeless Vietnam vet who now works at the center, looks out for one particular Iraq veteran who shows up at the center about once a month, filthy, drugged out and tortured by PTSD. "He's a baby," Belcher says. "You can see it in his eyes." So far, the young vet is too wary to accept more than a night's bed or a hot meal. But as Belcher says, at least he has a place to go. That's more than many of the thousands of vets on America’s streets can say tonight.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17315490...week/from/RSS/
© 2007 MSNBC.com

[Oldtimer4267]

Veterans in the US represent about 8.9 percent of the population but make up between 30 and 40 percent of the homeless depending on whom you talk to.

Whats up with that? We keep being told to support our troups, wave the flag, etc. but when the troups come home, they often come with mental and physical disabilities they did not go in with. The time delay and complexity of being diagnosed properly is so long that often the returning veteran is on the streets w/o any help, individuals and families alike.

I am particularly angry at the sheer number of returning heros that are ending up on the streets. They are all volunteers and heros for being so. It is a terrible shame that our heros are tossed out and pushed into the street after serving our country so valently. They often ask for nothing and will tell you that we owe them nothing, but that does not make it right to allow them to have to sleep on the streets and go without the help they need for their disablilities.

The US could reduce the homeless population by 30 percent over-night by doing the right thing for our veterans. Auuuuugh!

Jim

this is absolutley disgraceful...

out of the more than 200,000 homeless in the u.s.,1 in 3 are vets, with 47% of those being vietnam vets. it breaks my heart to see how vets are treated.we should be kissing their feet for what they have done for us.

where the fuck is amnesty international now ? supporting terrorists, thats where...

[Oldtimer4267]

Actually there are about 750,000 homeless in the US, not 200,000 just to correct an unintentional typo.

The 200,000 the Veterans Administration (VA) talks about are homeless vets, the ones they actually know about or admit to. However, the number is much higher. Most estimates outside of the VA is 300,000 homeless vets, which is about 1 in 3.

The problem I cited is that veterans represent about 1 in 12 Americans, but 1 in 3 homeless. That is to sas that the homeless veterans are 4 times as likely to be homeless as a person that is not a veteran. There is a good reason for that and it is lack of compassion, and lack of honor for those that have faithfully served, coupled with injury and mental problems due to shock and damage to the head and other ailments of war. We are not treating them right. Not even close.

The problem with the recent census in the US, is most homeless encountered in the field were never asked the question: Are you a veteran? Many veterans have given up on the VA and dropped out of their system, whereabouts unknown.

If you go to Google.com,
select Images,
then enter
Homeless Veterans
you will get 93,000 hits on pictures alone.

Jim

[ObiOneCoyote]

I went into the Army Reserve just out of high school,and missed the first Gulf War by an eyelash. I have not looked into services for Vets myself,as most Reserve members are excluded.(A travesty,in my opinion..)

[rufusdawg]

DEAR SIR COULD YOU PLEASE SEE WWW.GREENRECOVERY.ORG
PLEASE ADVISE IF YOU CAN BE OF ASSISTANCE WITH DILIVERING MY
MESSAGE TO TROOPS IN NEED. THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME.

[hopeful]

Yes, it is not right that these vets fight for our country to protect us
and get shot at..maybe lose and arm, leg, or both..and then
the ones who make it and come home...lots of them are
homeless...wake up someone..impeach the damn president
if he does not do anything about this...I am so angry about
this!

[Konstantìn]

The problem is mainly a lack of resources, advocates say.

Oh piffle, it's not a lack of resources.
The US government has plenty of money to fund the war and the veterans.
It just doesn't see any value in it.
It's not a lack of resources, it's a lack of will.

And it's not just the current admin either, this treatment of veterans has a long and ignoble history in the US.

Konstantin