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The Crisis The painful truth is that in Georgia, as in most states, a substantial number of returning veterans are unwillingly channeled into homelessness, due to a lack of Employment, Family Support, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Mild Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), and the long-term consequences of war. They reside on the streets, where they can suffer from Sleep Deprivation as well as as a whole host of other physical and emotional problems. Homeless service organizations, particularly emergency shelters, are often the point of entry for people suffering from serious mental illness or substance abuse, which is often magnified (and un-medicated) after the stress of living on the street. 2000 Veterans already reside on the streets of Atlanta. With an estimated 2,000 additional veterans returning to Georgia from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (OEF/OIF) over the next several years, the number of veterans in urgent need of housing and other support to keep them off the streets will substantially increase. Simply providing shelter is not the answer to our homeless veteran problem - we have to provide an environment where our veterans can begin to put their lives back together and become productive citizens of our community. VEO Client Education: We help our clients with enrollment in community based programs, life skills training, basic home management, budget counseling and self-care skills. We encourage our residents to better themselves through obtaining a higher education or career training certification. We participate and host many veteran career fairs throughout the year to help provide our veterans access to community programs and companies that will assist them in acquiring meaningful work in Metro-Atlanta. In addition to training and education, VEO of Georgia provides several internal workforce programs that are run by our veteran clients that reside with us. We take pride in providing our veteran clients the tools they need to succeed in our community.Learn More | The Solution We accept homeless veterans from the streets of Atlanta into our unique Rapid Rehousing to Permanent Housing Program. Our veterans are provided with safe, accesible, emergency housing until permanent housing is available to them. The only requirements are that they be homeless and have their DD214. ( The DD214 is discharge documentation from the military,which we help our veterans obtain a copy of) Each client is assigned to a case manager which provides immediate assessment to identify needs and make proper referrals. Referrals are made to our partner agencies that assist clients with job searches, psychiatric/medical evaluations, and prescribing of medications, if necessary. All referrals and appointments are made to professional counseling and day treatment programs. VEO is a Drug and Alcohol FREE Residence Men and Women with substance abuse problems requiring detox are referred out to Grady Hospital. Those not requiring detox are referred to Westcare who provides out-patient substance abuse and addiction treatment on-site. Learn More About Our Wrap-Around Case Management Support |
What Are Our Soldiers Coming Home To? |
