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Operation Welcome Home

STOCKTON - Veterans returning home from abroad will have more help making the transition from life in a war zone to their homes in California through a new program launched Wednesday as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger delivered his annual State of the State speech Wednesday.

Operation Welcome Home promises to bring together state agencies, volunteers and nonprofits to better link veterans with health care, job training, housing and other support.

"We have a fundamental obligation to anyone who has shed or risked blood for this country," Schwarzenegger said during a speech, which otherwise focused on economic issues facing the state. Troops have lost homes, spouses, limbs and even their lives, and California has more returning veterans than any other state, he said. Some suffer from post-traumatic-stress disorder, and the suicide rate is "disturbingly high," he said.

Paid for with $20 million in Employment Development Department funds, outreach teams statewide will help veterans through a collaboration that includes the state Department of Veterans Affairs and other state, federal, local and nonprofit entities.

The new California Veteran Corps volunteer network will supplement the 300 recent veterans who make contact with troops three times in their first year after returning to civilian life, according to the state.

Most of the San Joaquin County's 44,000 veterans are at least 60 years old, but there is a steady stream of new discharges - more than 400 in 2008 and less than 200 in the first half of 2009, San Joaquin County Veterans Services Officer Ron Green said.

It's not uncommon for younger veterans to put off seeking help for physical and mental health issues, he said. Future problems can be averted by getting in touch with service providers early, he said.

The new statewide program can boost the number of veterans making that connection, as well as getting help finding jobs and receiving an education, he said. "It's an outreach to make sure people don't fall through the cracks."

It looks like the program's use of staffers and volunteers who are veterans, themselves, will make it easier for returning service members, said Brandon Biegert, 28, a co-founder of the Student Veteran Alliance at San Joaquin Delta College and now a student at University of California, Berkeley.

Returning veterans may feel they relate better with someone who has had the same experiences - both with combat and navigating the bureaucracy - said Biegert, who returned from Iraq in 2004.

"It's good to talk with someone who has been through the same thing."

 




FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) --

Details of the Governor's 20 million dollar plan called Operation Welcome Home will have 9 regional offices. Fresno County will be one of those nine tasked to carry out the plan which calls for more than 3 hundred current returning combat vets to be trained to offer support, training, assistance and guidance as the transition back into civilian life. His words came in a joint session of the California legislature where a number of returning veterans were given a standing ovation and lengthy applause when Governor Schwarzenegger introduced them saying, "To these men and women welcome home, welcome home." They are no longer in a combat zone. Their current tour of duty is over but Governor Schwarzenegger, who visited the troops just this past November, told the legislature California's obligation to them isn't, "Many have served tour after tour and as a result have lost homes, spouses, limbs and even their lives." To honor and serve that sacrifice the governor has ordered the state to launch "Operation Welcome Home": a new veteran to veteran outreach that will employ 325 current era combat veterans. The goal is to assist, educate, support and find employment for other returning combat veterans of current conflicts. The program will operate in nine regional areas including one with headquarters in Fresno. The need - says Charles Hunnicutt - Fresno's veterans' service officer is very real, "You're coming from a hostile environment to a calm environment and they're just dropped off." Hunnicutt's office assists many older vets with claims, benefits and services. Today's combat vets he says often feel lost when they get home, "They just feel out of place and want to turn around and go back to combat because they feel more comfortable in that environment." And he believes the Governor's plan for current combat vets' reaching out to other 'current combat vets, will work, "Where you build a bond or a rapport with somebody and at that point you trust 'em and at that point they are going to be more willing to go into that office and apply for benefits." PTSD or post traumatic stress disorder is a rising reality in today's returning veterans. Governor Schwarzenegger is convinced that relying on each other on the home front, as they did on the battlefield, may be just what they need to succeed in the Golden State.

FOR MORE INFORMATION Operation Welcome Home - California
http://www.veterans.ca.gov Operation Welcome Home U-TUBE
http://www.youtube.com/user/CaliforniaEDD VETERANS SERVICE OFFICE -

http://www.veterans.ca.gov/