Listen: Welcome to Day 3 of 50 in our Meet The Need campaign, which falls on the day before Veterans Day. In our efforts to honor veterans and Veterans Day, we'll be spotlighting some veterans issues -- yesterday Jordan had Shelly Bertholf, Volunteer Coordinator from YP Impact into the studios for an interview about her effort organizing care packages for soldiers serving in Afghanistan. Today, we feature an interview with Mark Foreman from the Veterans For Peace Homeless Veteran Initiative.
-In this first piece, Mark discusses their two pronged approach to helping homeless veterans in Milwaukee, which includes a meal program and a shelter:
-Homelessness is not one thing -- people arrive there for one of a million reasons. So while homeless veterans are certainly not one thing, I asked Mark if there were any commonalities. Mark's answer is not the one we usually hear (that it's solely the result of PTSD) -- he introduced the idea of poverty into his answer, which was quite eye-opening for me:
-When Mark decided to start a program to help homeless veterans, he had passion, but there was a great deal to learn about the problem and trust to earn:
-If you'd like to get involved in volunteering, you can help out with their meal program, delivering food -- this led to a question, "If the veterans are homeless, where does the food get delivered?"
-Finally, a piece of unedited tape -- Mark tells the story of an individual veteran that he was able to help:
This year, we ask you to adopt one or two organizations that connect with you. Want to get involved with the Veterans For Peace's Homeless Veterans Initiatve? Donate, volunteer, or check out their work yourself. And you can start with their website.