The article below states that the number of homeless vets have gone down but there is an alarming trend to report as well. In addition to the older Vietnam vets you might see on the street corners, there is a rising number of young men and women who served in Iraq and Afghanistan homeless on the streets.
Many, if not most, of these people are victims of circumstances fighting hard to get back on their feet. Let’s stop stereotyping the homeless as losers who can’t pull themselves by their own bootstraps. I challenge anyone who thinks that way to spend six months volunteering with a homeless agency and get to know these people as individuals. Maybe then you will understand that our system and lack of compassion plays a huge part in keeping fine young men and women from getting on with their lives.
“It’s alarming,” said Leal, an Iraq War veteran who founded the Vet Hunters Project in 2010. His group, funded by private donations, has worked to place more than 2,600 veterans in temporary or permanent homes, he said.
“We house more Iraq and Afghanistan and younger veterans than older veterans. It used to be where a homeless vet was typically about 60 years old. Now, they’re 22 years old,” Leal said. “And a lot of them are female veterans who have witnessed combat. They are coming back messed up. They are coming back homeless.”
Tweetable Points:
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Advocacy group sees ‘alarming’ rise in younger ex-service members http://clicktotweet.com/wQSdU
in December 2011, there were 67,495 homeless veterans in this country http://clicktotweet.com/VL99m
I challenge anyone to spend six months volunteering with a homeless agency to know these people as individuals http://clicktotweet.com/H3Yc5
Debra R. Borys 