Veteran Organization Profile: Veterans For Peace
Keeping with our “Honor Your Hero” theme of the American Hero Award Contest, we are profiling Veteran organizations and their heroic work. If you’re interested in having your organization featured, please contact Katherine@vamortgagecenter.com
Veterans For Peace is a 22-year-old organization with 7,000 members. Veterans For Peace delivered 24,000 phone cards to patients in 149 VA hospitals last Christmas. This year the organization is planning a larger effort, raising $90,000 to do so. Veterans for Peace also helps 80,000 Iraqis get safe drinking water, supports orphanages in Vietnam and Afghanistan, and has an NGO seat in the United Nations. As part of the International Campaign to Ban Land Mines, Veterans for Peace shares a part of the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize.
The Northern New York chapter of Veterans for Peace helped pass the New York State depleted uranium (the “new Agent Orange”) GI/vet coverage law, which has served as a legal precedent for other states. The chapter also informed the VA headquarters of 4,000 nationwide free support groups that provide help for individuals suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The chapter has also begun assisting the Gandhi Institute on how to help America heal after the conflict in Iraq, including ensuring that troops aren’t passively blamed by neglecting their needs.
We would like to offer our thanks to Roland Van Deusen, US Navy 1967-8, Naval Reserve 1962-72, a Vietnam era Veteran who provided us with information about the achievements of Veterans for Peace, nationwide and in New York. To learn more about the Northern NY Chapter (Chapter 121) please visit www.vfp-northcountry.org or contact info@vfp-northcountry.org. To learn more about Veterans for Peace nationwide, please visit http://www.veteransforpeace.org.
Jon Holt
February 7th, 2008 at 10:09 amThanks for the information. Go Navy!!
Jed Stevens
April 10th, 2008 at 8:29 pmGreat post, are you kidding? Go Army.
Roland Van Deusen
April 19th, 2008 at 8:38 amUPDATE on Veterans For Peace – we hit over 54,000 free phone cards to VA hospital patients over the past year, also aided Agent Orange victims, helped North Country chapter area vets get much-enhanced property tax exemptions, and are currently discussing with the Central NY Chapter of the NY Civil Liberties Union, how we can help hospitalized vets at the Syracuse VA Hospital register to vote, despite nationwide Veterans Administration policy of denying access to this for its patients.
A member of our national board has mde 12 trips to Vietnam to help build medical clinics, and the Asheville, NC Chapter has bought modern body armor on EBay to send to NC Guard unit sent to Iraq with WWII equipment, and organized a blood drive. We honor warriors, not war.
Roland Van Deusen
April 19th, 2008 at 1:37 pmCan anyone help with this project? GOOGLE “Voter registration in VA hospitals & you’ll be horrified. MSNBC, ARMY TIMES, VETERANS TODAY Magazine, and a Senatorial letter to VA, all confirm that VA is doing everything to deny their hospital patients access to voter registration!!
We need to get this info loud & clear out to the mass corporate media so thousands of veterans won’t be disenfranchised by not registering before October 10th. The VA might cave under massive pressure. I’m talking w/the Central NY chapter of the Civil Liberties Union, about getting arrested in the lobby of the Syracuse VA hospital for the “crime” of possessing w/intent to distribute, voter registration forms, pens & postage.
If the CNYCLU arranged sufficient media coverage and defended me, this might get settled in a court of law, forcing the VA’s hand. RSVP to this site w/improved ideas on this for me, spread the word any way you can.