Two North Carolina residents are currently working hard to honor fallen Vietnam veterans by putting a face to their names.
According to The News & Observer, brothers Jim and Tom Reece, along with their friend Rosa King, have been tracking down families throughout North Carolina to collect photographs of their loved ones who were killed during combat in Vietnam. So far, the trio has gathered together photographs of most of the 1,820 fallen North Carolina soldiers, but are still 174 short, the news outlet reported. Once they have all the photographs collected, they hope to feature them on veterans and genealogy websites so that they can be viewed by the public.
However, that's not all. The photographs will also be included in a project for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. According to the memorial's website, the Faces Never Forgotten exhibit will project the images of every fallen servicemember on a two-story screen located beneath the monument.
"Four million people a year visit The Wall, and 40 percent of them weren't alive in 1982 when it was dedicated. More than half weren't alive when the war was going on," Tim Tetz, director of outreach for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, told the news source. "We've got all these people who look at that black granite and see the names, and they say, 'How does this really impact me?'"
The fund announced in November that New Mexico is the first state to have a complete photograph archive.
Despite a drop in veterans homelessness nationwide, Pennsylvania has experienced an increase in its homeless veterans population over the last four years.
According to NBC Philadelphia, there were 46 percent more veterans in Pennsylvania living without permanent housing in 2013 than there were in 2009. About 440 of the state's more than 1,400 homeless veterans reside in Philadelphia.
The state's sizeable increase of its homeless veterans population strays considerably from the national rate, which dropped 24 percent since 2009, the news source stated. Several veterans said that a reason for the increase might be Philadelphia's high unemployment rate, which is currently 10.8 percent, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
"Jobs would be the No. 1 thing," Darryl Halsell, a homeless Philadelphia veteran, told the news source. "A lot of vets here want to work. It's hard to find work."
A recent report from the Department of Housing and Urban Development found that there were more than 57,000 homeless veterans in January 2013, marking an 8 percent decline from 2012 and a 24 percent drop between 2009 and 2013. Approximately 60 percent of the nation's homeless veterans reside in shelters or transitional housing programs.
A British photographer set out on a nearly impossible task in 2005 – to capture the faces of the last living veterans of World War I.
In a series titled "The Old Guard," U.K.-based photographer Giles Price displays Britain's last remaining WWI veterans, many of whom were well over 100 years old by the time they sat down for their portrait. According to Slate, when Price came up with the idea to track down the veterans, only 23 of the roughly 9 million British military members who served in WWI were living.
"I was aware that very few were still alive and wanted to document them while they were alive," Price told the news source. "I was 20 minutes from taking one sitter when the home rang me to say he had passed that morning. He was 106."
Price traveled to each veteran's home to take their photo. A Royal Marines veteran who fought in Iraq in the early 1990s, Price added that being a former military member influenced the way he shot and edited his subjects, some of whom chose to wear their service medals for the photo shoot.
The New York Times reported in 2012 that the last known World War I veteran on either side of the conflict, Florence Green, passed away at age 110.
Two veterans organizations have found themselves facing off in a defamation lawsuit.
The Indiana Star reported that the Wounded Warrior Project, a national nonprofit that empowers returning servicemembers, filed a lawsuit with a U.S. District Court last week, claiming that the organization was publicly defamed by Dean Graham. The Indiana resident and Army veteran runs the local veterans organization Help Indiana Vets Inc. with his wife, Patricia, who is also an Army veteran, according to the nonprofit's website.
In the lawsuit, lawyers for the Wounded Warrior Project claim that Graham called the organization "a fraud … that needs to be investigated immediately" in a post published on the Help Indiana Vets website. The news source stated that the lawsuit also alleges that Graham emailed major broadcast news outlets, including CNN and Fox News, with attacks on the Wounded Warrior Project. The Help Indiana Vets founder also reportedly sent similar messages to government departments at both the state and federal level.
A recent post on the Help Indiana Vets website outlines the Wounded Warrior Project's alleged "fraudulent behavior," claiming that the nonprofit exploits veterans through its TV ads.
According to the nonprofit's website, Help Indiana Vets gives 100 percent of its donations directly to veterans.
Michigan veterans with disabilities will now be exempt from paying property taxes on their main residencies as a result of new legislation.
According to The Marquette Mining Journal, the Dannie Lee Barnes Disabled Veteran Property Tax Relief Act applies to veterans who are permanently and entirely disabled, unable to gain employment and currently receiving special housing assistance. Former legislation only exempted veterans who received housing assistance due to their disabilities.
The news outlet added that former servicemembers must have been honorably discharged in order to be eligible for the tax exemption.
"Michigan's military veterans, particularly those who are disabled, have sacrificed more for us than we can ever repay," Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder said in a statement, as quoted by the news source. "They have served to protect our way of life and our freedom. This property tax break will be available to their families, will help them afford homes, and stay right here in Michigan."
The new legislation has been met with approval from many of the state's veterans, including Dave Eling, director of the Muskegon County Department of Veterans' Affairs. Eling told the Muskegon Chronicle that the law is a sign that Michigan is improving its veterans benefits.
Despite a slight drop in overall homelessness in West Virginia, a recent report found that there are now more veterans without permanent shelter in the Mountain State.
The Charleston Daily Mail reported that recent data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development shows that there were 329 former servicemembers in West Virginia without a long-term place to live in 2013, an increase from the 268 veterans living in similar situations in 2012. It's the highest number of homeless veterans without permanent housing in the last three years.
Amanda Sisson, the assistant director of the West Virginia Coalition to End Homelessness, noted that most of the homeless veterans in the state served in the Vietnam War.
"It's that era of veterans who are experiencing homelessness," Sisson stated to the news source. "But I also think we are going to see a lot of younger veterans coming back who suffer from traumatic brain injuries (and other issues) become homeless."
According to the HUD report, there were more than 57,000 homeless veterans in 2013, with 60 percent of them staying in shelters or transitional housing programs.
Thanks to a $1.8 million grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the New Jersey Hospital Association will now be able to help uninsured Americans gain health care coverage while also providing employment opportunities for former servicemembers.
According to The Trentonian, the hospital association will use the grant to hire 25 veterans to counsel those interested in purchasing new health insurance plans under the Affordable Care Act. Created through a partnership between the NJHA and the N.J. Department of Labor, the new role of certified application counselor requires veterans to be placed at hospitals throughout the state.
"Because veterans offer a unique set of skills, discipline and leadership abilities developed during their years in the military, they are ideal candidates to fill the role of [certified application counselor] CACs," Aline Holmes, RN, director of the NJHA Institute for Quality and Patient Safety, told the news source.
Hiring veterans as CACs is the latest step New Jersey is taking to alleviate its high unemployment rate for veterans, which, at 10 percent, was the highest in the nation during 2012, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. Current data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that the unemployment rate for veterans nationwide is currently 6.9 percent.
A group of Pennsylvania-area veterans have been volunteering their time to lay to rest late servicemembers with a proper military funeral.
Called the Guardians of the National Cemetery, the group of about 350 veterans arrange daily services at the Washington Crossing National Cemetery in Newton, Pa., for every former servicemember buried there. A daily honor guard composed of seven riflemen provide a 21-gun salute each day. The organization's members also serve as the sole witnesses at the burials of many late veterans, and dedicate a special Thursday ceremony each month to those who were laid to rest without family present.
"It's a remarkable outpouring of American patriotism and American citizenship and the sacrifice the veterans have brought to our community," Guardians of the National Cemetery founder and U.S. Army veteran Antonio Albano told the news source.
Established in 2008, the Guardians of the National Cemetery has interred nearly 6,000 veterans in the Pennsylvania cemetery, Albano stated to the news outlet. The organization's website notes that the guard's membership has been steadily increasing since 2009. Volunteers are recruited through various veterans service associations, and also accepts honorably discharged veterans who are not affiliated with an organization.
New legislation could grant Utah veterans who received either honorable or general discharge benefits and services from the state. According to The Salt Lake Tribune, the legislation was proposed during a meeting of the Utah Veterans Reintegration Task Force and was unanimously upheld by the committee. However, the bill will not be officially voted on until the state legislature resumes its session in January 2014.
According to the news source, the proposed changes would help make veterans benefits more consistent across the state's available services. For example, veterans applying to college can receive special preferences if they had an honorable or general discharge, while only servicemembers who were honorably discharged can have their skills test waived when requesting a commercial driver's license.
"By requiring a lot of [benefit qualifications] just be honorable, we're denying some of our military members benefits," Esther Cheslea-McCarty, the state's legislative associate general counsel, told the news source.
Utah is not the only state attempting to expand its benefits for veterans. The Winston-Salem Journal reported that North Carolina is increasing its cost of living benefits by 1.5 percent for disabled veterans and their children starting Jan. 1.
A new report from the Department of Housing and Urban Development found that veteran homelessness has decreased by 24 percent since 2010, a much higher drop than the mere 6 percent decrease of overall homelessness. There were nearly 58,000 homeless veterans in January 2013, with 60 percent of them staying in shelters or transitional housing programs. Only about 4,400 of the homeless veterans were women.
"We are on track in the fight to end homelessness among veterans" Secretary of Veteran Affairs Eric Shinseki said in a statement. "While this trend is encouraging news, we know that there is more work to do."
The Department of Veterans Affairs has been working to end veteran homelessness by 2015 through various programs. According to The Washington Post, the VA partnered with HUD to issue $70 million in grants for clinical services, case management and rental assistance for veterans. This week, the department also announced that $14 million in funding has been put toward renovating shelter for homeless veterans, as well as transportation services and funding for special groups, such as the elderly and mentally ill.