Home > From the Ranks to the Street. Nearly a fourth of the homeless are veterans.
From the Ranks to the Street. Nearly a fourth of the homeless are veterans.
by Open-Publishing - Monday 31 May 2004Reasons vary, but many fail to adjust to life’s randomness
after the order of military service.
By Jocelyn Y. Stewart Times Staff Writer
After the homecomings are over and the yellow ribbons
packed away, many who once served in America’s armed
forces may end up sleeping on sidewalks.
This is the often-unacknowledged postscript to military
service. According to the federal government, veterans
make up 9% of the U.S. population but 23% of the
homeless population. Among homeless men, veterans make
up 33%.
Their ranks included veterans like Peter Starks and
Calvin Bennett, who spent nearly 30 years on the
streets of Los Angeles, homeless and addicted.
Or Vannessa Turner of Boston, who returned injured from
Iraq last summer, unable to find healthcare or a place
to live.
Or Ken Saks, who lost his feet because of complications
caused by Agent Orange, then lost his low-rent Santa
Barbara apartment in an ordeal that began when a
neighbor complained about his wheelchair ramp.
"I’m 56 years old," Saks said. "I don’t want to die in
the streets…. This is what our [soldiers in Iraq] are
coming home to? They’re going to live a life like I
have? God bless them."
Studies indicate that some will live such a life. Male
veterans are 1.3 times more likely to become homeless
than non-veterans, women 3.6 times more likely.
According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, the
estimated number of homeless Vietnam veterans is more
than twice the number of soldiers, 58,000, who died in
battle during that war.
In the past, data quantifying homelessness among
veterans did not exist, said Phillip Mangano, who heads
the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness. "It’s
been precisely the lack of research that had us groping
in the dark as far as what our response should be," he
said.
But in 1996, a comprehensive study on homelessness by
the Census Bureau, co-sponsored by the VA and other
federal agencies, offered a disturbing look at the men
and women who once wore uniforms.
Although 47% of homeless veterans served during the
Vietnam era, the study found, soldiers from as far back
as World War II and as recent as the Persian Gulf War
also ended up homeless.
It is impossible to know exactly how many U.S. veterans
are on the streets, but experts estimate that about
300,000 of them are homeless on any given night and
that about half a million experience homelessness at
some point during the year.
Now, as fighting continues in Iraq and Afghanistan,
social service providers wonder what will happen to
this generation of service men and women returning home
from war.
"What are they going to do for these guys when they
come home … other than wave a flag and buy them a
beer?" asked Paul Camacho, a professor of social
science at the University of Massachusetts Boston and a
Vietnam veteran.
Nobody can pinpoint a single cause for homelessness
among veterans. As with non-veterans, the reasons vary:
high housing costs, unemployment, substance abuse, poor
education. Veterans may also contend with war injuries,
post-traumatic stress syndrome and frayed family
relations.
The transformation from spit-polish soldier to urban
nomad is as much a question of what does not happen in
a person’s life as of what does. The strict, orderly
world of military life - where every soldier is housed,
fed and treated when ill - does not necessarily prepare
veterans for the randomness of life outside. Even the
VA loan guarantee, which has helped generations of
veterans purchase homes, is useless for those too
troubled, or earning too little, to take advantage of
it.
Homelessness among veterans is currently the topic of
joint talks between the departments of Defense and
Veterans Affairs, said Peter Dougherty, the VA’s
director of homeless veterans programs.
"Traditionally, what happens to you after you leave has
not been a concern of [the] service," he said.
The Defense Department has created a Transition
Assistance Program - designed to help smooth the switch
from military to civilian life - but such efforts lag
far behind the problem, experts say.
Thousands of veterans struggle every day for survival
in a fight that most are not prepared to wage.
Being a soldier made Sgt. Vannessa Turner proud. The
petite 42-year-old, who holds an English degree from
St. Mary’s College in Moraga, Calif., and a
sharpshooter’s badge from the U.S. Army, loved wearing
the uniform, serving her country, being a part of
America’s might.
The military offered her a chance "for something better
for myself and my daughter," a shot at leaving "the
’hood."
Since 1997, the Boston native’s addresses had been U.S.
military bases, some in Saudi Arabia, Korea and
Germany. But the certainty of shelter crumbled last
year 40 miles outside Baghdad.
On May 18, Turner was waiting in line at Camp Balad’s
post exchange in 130-degree heat when she experienced
difficulty breathing, then collapsed. Doctors at a
nearby medical center put tubes down her throat and
nose and inserted IVs into her arm.
As Turner lay in a coma, doctors reported that her
death was imminent and officials medically retired her.
But Turner held on. Flown to Landstuhl, Germany, then
to Walter Reed Hospital near Washington, D.C., the avid
weightlifter was bloated, discolored, rigid and on life
support. For three months she fought an illness that
baffled doctors. As she recovered, she discovered a new
life that baffled her.
With her return stateside in July, Turner
unsuccessfully sought housing while still recovering
and coping with post-traumatic stress syndrome, which
keeps her up at nights and edgy. She and her teenage
daughter relied on relatives and friends. They lived
with her mother, then an aunt, next a cousin. Once they
shared a one-bedroom apartment with eight people.
This kind of return home she could not have imagined as
she drove a five-ton truck in Iraq, facing down angry
crowds. "Never in my wildest dreams," she said.
She soon learned the limits of her monthly service-
related disability check of about $2,200. Realtors
suggested that she leave Boston for cheaper areas.
Still in pain and suffering nerve damage in one leg,
Turner sought help at the West Roxbury VA Hospital
shortly after her return to the United States. The VA
rep told her that she could not see a doctor until
after October, Turner said.
What am I supposed to do until then? she asked. Go to
the emergency room, she said she was told.
Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) learned about Turner’s
dilemma and stepped in to help. Previously, Kennedy,
the USO and Sen. John F. Kerry, another Massachusetts
Democrat, helped Turner’s family with the money needed
to fly to Germany to see her on what was presumed to be
her deathbed.
Turner appreciated the senators’ help. She did not
understand why it was needed.
"The point here is: I am a veteran of the war, wounded,
and I cannot even get an appointment without the
senator getting involved," she said.
The VA has acknowledged what "was probably a mistake on
our part," said Dougherty, the VA official. "A
returning veteran who comes back from the Iraqi freedom
campaign is to be seen on an expedited basis."
Since then, the "VA has responded appropriately," he
said.
It also took intervention by Massachusetts state Sen.
Diane Wilkerson, Turner said, to finally find an
apartment - in the same kind of rough-and-tumble
neighborhood she had escaped by joining the military.
As for her illness, the cause was never determined and
its effects linger. For now, Turner is still all
soldier, worrying about those she left behind in Iraq,
still proud of serving the country. But there is also a
feeling of dread she never expected to encounter.
"Growing up, you see Vietnam veterans on the streets,
some with amputated legs, some crazy…. Now you see
why," she said.
A wheelchair ramp allowed Ken Saks to navigate the two
small steps and get inside the Santa Barbara apartment
building.
Then the ex-Marine - who enlisted at 17 and stood 6
feet 2 when he was battling the Viet Cong - lowered
himself to his hands and knees and crawled up a flight
of stairs to his $550-a-month apartment.
Last year, Saks lost the apartment and, for the second
time in his life, was homeless.
The first time was in 1997. He was living in Palm
Springs and had already begun to suspect that the war
was making him sick.
In prior years, abscess sores covered his soles,
worsening until he could not stand. He had diabetes -
caused, he suspected, by exposure to Agent Orange.
At that time, VA doctors had found no link between
Agent Orange and diabetes and turned down his request
for help. His life buckled under the weight of medical
bills and poor health.
With his house in foreclosure and his job gone, Saks
filed for bankruptcy in 1997 and eventually ended up
living in an RV for five years.
"The mobile home was a last resort, because he would
have been on the street," said his mother, Mildred
Saks, herself a World War II veteran. "He’s a doer. And
he’s abrasive sometimes, but he’s got a lot of moxie.
He’s a good Marine."
Not until 2001 did the VA acknowledge that Saks’
diabetes and other health problems were service-
related, guaranteeing him medical care and a $2,100
monthly disability check. But the help had come late.
"I had lost both my feet by the time they said this is
Agent Orange," Saks said. "Here I am, 30 years down the
road…. It took my life savings. It took my home."
The Santa Barbara apartment, where Saks wrote poetry in
the solitude he craves, was a casualty of another sort.
Without a city permit, he had placed the wheelchair
ramp next to the building on a wide stretch of
sidewalk. Then a neighbor complained about the ramp.
What followed was a drama of court hearings and moral
appeals involving the city, the building’s trustee and
even the California Coastal Commission.
In the end, Saks was forced to move into a $300-a-week
motel.
Finding another place to live was complicated by his
disability and by the fight to keep his old apartment,
which left an eviction on his record.
"I just think it’s heartless of this community," he
said, sitting on Stearns Wharf. "You wouldn’t have all
[this] wealth and freedom if it weren’t for people like
me willing to put on a uniform and go to war."
In January, Saks finally moved into an $875-a-month
one-bedroom apartment after a friend, a fellow veteran,
spoke to the owner on Saks’ behalf.
To Toni Reinis, executive director of New Directions, a
program for homeless veterans in Los Angeles, the
presence of vets on the streets is a national disgrace.
The program is a cause for hope. In 2003, 170 of its
graduates found jobs. Some went to work in New
Directions’ businesses: a construction company, a
catering company, a handy worker program, a cafe on the
VA grounds in Westwood.
New Directions does not wait for homeless men and women
to knock on the doors of the facility in Westwood. It
sends graduates of the program, like Peter Starks and
Calvin Bennett, out searching on skid row, at MacArthur
Park and on county beaches - often starting at 6:30
a.m.
One recent morning on skid row, among the cardboard
houses, tents and tarps, they began the day’s search:
Good morning, brother, how you doin’? You a vet?
Anybody a vet?
One former Marine named Darryl sat on a crate, his
belongings in a shopping cart. Another walked down the
street wearing a "Proud to Be an American" jacket and
missing a thumb.
A man who said he was a veteran and called himself Rock
sat on a piece of cardboard eating spaghetti.
"I fought for the flag," he said. "But the flag never
fought for me." Rock wanted nothing to do with Starks
or Bennett, echoing a common distrust of government,
particularly the VA.
In this work, experience is the currency that buys
legitimacy. Many other veterans and non-veterans
listened to Starks, the ex-Marine who was wounded twice
in Vietnam and took his first hit of marijuana while
hiding in a bomb crater. When he returned home, he used
drugs, trusted no one and never talked about the war.
Starks spent 30 years addicted, pushing shopping carts,
sleeping on the streets. Three years ago, a veteran who
had graduated from New Directions spotted him and
encouraged him to complete the program.
"Willie B. came and got me from the dope spot," he
said.
On this Thursday morning Starks searched the street for
Mark, a 51-year-old former Navy man and heroin addict
who had spent a month sleeping under freeways, and
years and years in prison. The day before, after
listening to Starks, Mark had said he would leave this
life behind.
"I hope to God that this guy sticks to it," Starks
said, as he drove through skid row. He cruised past a
crowd huddled around a dying campfire on the sidewalk.
Finally, he spotted Mark. "There he is!" In what seemed
like one fluid motion, Starks was out the car, on the
sidewalk, ready to scoop Mark up.
But Mark, a duffel bag on his shoulder, a tentative
look on his face, was not ready to go.
I need to shoot up first, he told Starks. I need to
find the dope man. Can you come back in 15 minutes?
Starks has seen windows of opportunity slam shut in an
instant. Men get on the New Directions van headed to
their new lives - and get off before it leaves skid
row. They say they will call and don’t. Standing next
to the car, Starks did not chide Mark or preach. I’m
not going nowhere, Starks said to Mark. I’ll wait right
here.
In a few seconds, hardly enough time to find the dope
man, Mark was back. Heroin, at least today, had lost
its hold.
"I’ve had enough," he said, heading for the car. "Let’s
do it. Let’s go. I’m through…. I’m tired."
"You’re making the right decision," Starks said as they
drove away.
At New Directions, 700 to 800 veterans finish the detox
program each year. Then they return to the order that
marked military service: up at a certain hour, dressed
a certain way, bed made just so, meals together.
The men spend a year working on changing themselves:
education, job training, counseling, medical care,
anger management, reuniting with family.
In exchange, they agree to follow the rules, like the
soldiers they once were. Mark did not balk or complain.
All he wanted, he said, was what his habit had stolen
from him.
"I just want a little dignity," he said. "I want to
look at my mother and my daughters and say I’m doing it
straight."
In the lobby waiting to begin the process, Mark seemed
pensive but unwavering. Take care of this brother,
Starks said to the staffer who came to greet him. Then
he turned to hug Mark.
"It’s gon’ be all right," Starks said.
Then he walked outside and raised his fist in victory.
Before the end of the month, Mark had left the Westwood
campus and the opportunity that New Directions had
offered. It is not known if he returned to the streets.
Since his departure, many veterans like him have
completed the program. They now confront a vexing
imbalance: Many will earn about $8 an hour in a town
where the average rent for a two-bedroom apartment is
$1,346, in a county where the median price for a house
is $387,000.
Having conquered the demons of their past, they face a
new battle.