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ter and their development partners have created over the
years,” says Steve Peck, president and CEO of the United
States Veterans Initiative, based out of Los Angeles. “It’s not
only housing, but the solution to homelessness is housing
connected to services, which is critical.”
SOCIAL SUPPORT
It’s a supportive network that’s missing on the streets. Vet-
erans can lose their ties to friends and family when rela-
tionships fray as a result of substance abuse, mental illness
or other fallout.
Such an example is the Veterans Village of San Diego,
which with five locations throughout the county, has been
operating since the early ‘80s and provides a “continuum
of care” for homeless veterans just coming off the street, to
those with substance abuse and trauma issues, to those in
permanent housing.
“One size doesn’t fit all, so we’ll build a specific program
that’s determined by a needs analysis when you get here,”
says Phil Landis, president of the VVSD. “No one has a long-
term residential trauma center like ours, but you’ll find
commonality in all the major California service providers.”
Ground was recently broken on a permanent housing
project in Escondido, Landis says, which aims to serve 100,
with 54 units of one, two, and three-bedroom units. He an-
ticipates occupancy by early 2018.
Another example is in Long Beach, Calif. – the Centu-
ry Villages at Cabrillo – which offers 572 affordable homes
throughout the 27-acre campus community.
“All of us have a social network of friends and family,
and all that support is even more important to veterans,”
Peck says. “Those who have been homeless have lost that
social network. Part of what we want to do, after we get
them stabilized, is to rebuild that.”
Because California has so many large military bases,
and many veterans are discharged here, too many end up
on the streets, says Peck, of the United States Veterans Ini-
tiative. The challenge, he says, is to get government agen-
cies (such as the state, counties, cities, Veterans Affairs and
HUD) involved and working together to address the home-
less situation.
“We share this common philosophy that housing with-
out services will not solve the problem,” Peck says.
One of the Veterans Village’s simplest features, a few
benches in the courtyard, have facilitated healing, says
Rancho Cordova Councilman David Sander, who was piv-
otal in the early development stages of the project.
“They can wake up in the middle of the night, and they
find those benches in the courtyard are the best therapy
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they can find,” Sander says, who was serving as the mayor
of Rancho Cordova when Phase 1 was completed. “At any
time of the day there’s someone there ... nobody planned
that — it’s a total accident — but to see it work that way is
pretty gratifying.”
Peck says Mather Veterans Village and other housing
projects in the state (such as in San Diego, Long Beach, Los
Angeles and the Bay Area) with built-in services are the best
model to serve the chronically homeless vet population.
While many have income from disability and/or Social Se-
curity, many don’t remain housed due to “the variety of is-
sues that got them homeless in the first place.”
With case management, “it gives us the ability to work
with them, stabilize them, and make sure when they get
into housing, that they remain there,” Peck says.
In the meantime, Walker says services continue to ex-
pand at Mather Veterans Village, including the recent ad-
dition of an on-site 12-step recovery meeting. The Ameri-
can Red Cross recently signed on to facilitate classes such
as employment coaching, resume building, CPR training,
finance management, nutrition, stress management, par-
enting and more.
Tenant retention has been relatively high, Walker says,
with only four or five moving in the last year. “Most of the
time, people want to stay here forever,” he says.
McChesney says as the United State’s military activity
around the world increases, so will veterans’ needs when
they return home. “There’s been this historical, steady in-
crease in the exposure of veterans to combat circumstanc-
es, which leads to both PTSD, traumatic brain injuries,
and other physical disabilities,” he said. “A lot of painkiller
abuse is common.
“I’m a Vietnam veteran, and the typical veteran served
one year in combat, came home and got out of service. The
current soldiers are serving, two, three, four and five tours,
and exposed to much in that combat theater.”
For Vercelli, the permanent apartment and access to re-
sources has made life more manageable, though he’s cau-
tious to say he’s got anything solved. “I still battle demons
every day,” he says. “I got dragons I need to slay.”” n
Karen Wilkinson is a journalist, writer, communications con-
sultant and yoga teacher. She gained newspaper experience
along California’s North Coast.