Veterans Outreach, at 20 years, set for Saturday
Iwas catching up with someone who, in Army lingo, would be called a “battle buddy,” but quite often just shortened to “battle,” as in, “I got to hang out with one of my ‘battles’ the other day.”
Her name is Dalia Sanchez. She is the director of the Vet Center in Palmdale and is responsible for another Vet Center in Chatsworth.
Vet Centers are underwritten by the federal Department of Veterans Affairs and are refuges for vets who have served in combat zones or experienced military sexual trauma.
Sanchez is the director of this nocost option for combat veterans because she is a combat veteran.
That’s why, informally, we are “battles.” In Afghanistan she commanded the 1498th Transportation Co., California National Guard, the same unit I embedded with, twice, several years earlier in Iraq.
Sanchez was a company commander, one of the military’s most demanding jobs. For years now, she has also been an energetic clinician, administrator and leader in the field of mental health for veterans.
We were shaking our heads that those wars, Afghanistan and Iraq, began 20 or more years ago. Babies born when 9/11 happened could be graduating from a military academy now, or taking their non-commissioned officer stripes and serving overseas.
“Has it been that long?” my battle sister mused. “I guess it has.” This matters a bit because the Veterans Outreach set for Saturday is a helping event that has been running for more than 20 years. It’s at Grace Chapel, 44648 15th St. West. Doors open at 9:15 a.m. for signups and check-ins.
The Outreach gathers about 20 service providers and veteran volunteer groups who make sure that their brothers and sisters in need can come in from the cold for a meal, get signed up for VA healthcare and benefits and socialize with each other in a no-pressure environment for a few hours on a Saturday.
The event usually serves more than 100 veterans, many of them at-risk, others just wanting to connect with friends.
The Outreach, which will include Vet Center representatives, along with other veteran nonprofits, got its start when a bunch of Vietnam War veterans saw the need to help their own, but also knew that soon, a new generation of veterans would return from our post 9/11 wars in the Middle East.
“We wanted to make sure that what happened to the Vietnam vets never happened again to a new generation of veterans,” George Palermo, a Vietnam vet with the Marines, said when the Outreach got started.
You have to hand it to the Vietnam generation of veterans. The volunteers have done their best to ensure that subsequent returning veterans feel the love. They also help out with housing assistance, shelter, mental health, food security and medical care but one of the signature benefits of the Outreach hosted at Grace Chapel is that people can come in and have fellowship with each other.
“This is our responsibility,” Steve Baker, a Navy veteran jet mechanic who serviced F-4 Phantom fighter-bombers at Miramar Naval Air Station during the Vietnam War, said. “This is what we owe to our brothers and sisters.”
Some progress on curbing veteran suicide is marked by VA estimates that the count has reduced from 22 veterans daily to 17. Who wants a daily suicide rate of 17?
Similar progress is marked in reducing veteran homelessness. But the work goes on. Nobody in the community of people who served in the armed forces believes the work is anywhere near finished.
Dennis Anderson is a licensed clinical social worker at High Desert Medical Group. An Army veteran who deployed with California National Guard to cover the war in Iraq for the Antelope Valley Press. He serves on the Los Angeles County Veterans Advisory Commission.