WASHINGTON – When Glenn Garland was growing up, his older friends were returning from the Vietnam War with physical and emotional scars.
Now, as a new generation of American veterans is returning home from battlefields in the Middle East, Garland, wants to help ensure those veterans get help to deal with their physical and psychological wounds.
Paul Rieckhoff (middle), the founder of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, discusses the Veteran Support Fund on Wednesday. (Kevin Wang/Medill News Service)
Wednesday, Garland, now the president of Texas-based energy optimization company CLEAResult, his wife and two other families introduced a fundraising challenge that they hope will be a “game changer.” The three families helped launch the Veteran Support Fund, which aims to collect at least $30 million for five of the nation’s veteran support organizations.
The other two founders of the fund include Philip Green, president of Washington health care consulting firm PDG Consulting, and Jim Stimmel, executive vice president of CLEAResult. They, together with Garland, injected more than $1 million in initial fund and they are challenging all Americans to pitch in with their donations.
“In the last 10 to 20 years, it was pretty easy for Americans to overlook the contributions made by those veterans,” Garland added. “Every successful person in this country has enjoyed their success because of the sacrifice of someone else.”
Paul Rieckhoff, founder of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America who advised Garland on setting up the fund, said it will establish a platform where Americans can donate to all “trusted and effective” veteran support organizations.
“It’s not a charity,” Rieckhoff said. “It’s a necessity.”
The three families who provided the initial fund share some common stories. None of their children have served in the military, a fact they called a “luxury.” They said after seeing many parents whose children had to serve because of economic reasons and had endured great sufferings, they decided to come together and rally for those who were less fortunate.
“If I woke up one day and I realized my kids were overseas, I wouldn’t be able to sleep. I would be in desperate fear and anxiety,” said Green, who started brainstorming about the fund last year. He approached Rieckhoff with the initial idea before the two crafted the plan.
The fund will accept donations of any amount. But the founding families said, they are targeting a certain audience. They hope to see more families who make more than $250,000 a year as well as those, like their own, who do not have children who have served in the military.
“There are many veteran support groups, but they all live hand-to-mouth,” said Rieckhoff, who is an Iraq Ware veteran. “Many people think veteran affairs are the problems for the military only. They are not.”
IAVA, along with four other beneficiaries of the fund, assist veterans and their families with a lot of high-tech medical services such as transformative surgeries and emergency aids. Rieckhoff said their commitment in technology made funding more pressing. The other four groups are Operation Mend, Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors, Operation Homefront and National Military Family Association.
IAVA recently received $250,000 from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to build a data visualization project, which Rieckhoff said would help shorten waiting periods for veterans who need medical services.
Rieckhoff said the project will allow veterans in the country to update their information such as location and health condition.
“The average waiting period for our veterans is half a year now, and some have to wait till 2015,” he said, “No businesses can even wait that long. It’s crazy.”