If you haven't realized by now, SUPPORT the TROOPS = SUPPORTING BUSH'S WARS.
It doesn't mean taking care of soldiers or making sure they are fully equipped or any of that other garbage.
Otherwise, why is this even allowed to happen?
NO ONE should be HOMELESS in America!!!!
"Homeless veterans left in lurch by plans to raze shelter: Lease expired; development of site is planned" by Steve Vogel, Washington Post | February 13, 2008
WASHINGTON - A dilapidated shelter for homeless veterans is set to be leveled to make way for development on the sprawling grounds of the Armed Forces Retirement Home in Washington, leaving a nonprofit veterans group scrambling to find a new place for 50 men and women to live by the end of next month.
US Vets employees, which operates the shelter, was notified by retirement home officials shortly before Christmas that they would have to vacate the building by the end of this month, when their lease expires. Late last week, the home granted a one-month extension, but said no further reprieves will be given.
"We're not evicting them. Their lease is up," said Christine Black, a communications consultant for the home. "They have known this all along."
But shelter officials said they expected the retirement home to find another place for the homeless veterans on its large campus. "At no time over the course of 4 1/2 years did we anticipate being displaced," said Stephanie Buckley, regional director of the US Veterans Initiative, the nonprofit group that runs US Vets as a collaboration with Cloudbreak Development, a special-needs housing developer based in California. "We never thought we'd be faced with that."
US Vets has been working arduously to find a new location elsewhere in the city, thus far without success, Buckley said.
Black said the group has ignored past deadlines to move, and she pointed to a critical audit that she said "raised a real red flag" about the veterans group and its connections with the for-profit Cloudbreak.
Caught in the middle of the dispute are 50 veterans living at Ignatia House, all of them with honorable discharges and many with substance abuse problems, Buckley said.
Some said they never felt quite welcome on the edge of the retirement home.
"They never wanted us, anyway," said Maurice Tucker, 53, an Air Force veteran who said he has been living at Ignatia for two years as he recovers from drug and health problems. "We never felt welcome here. They don't fix the boilers. We've kind of been freezing here."
Under a plan awaiting final approval, the 50-year-old building would be demolished in preparation for developing a 77-acre parcel of land at the home with a mix of condominiums, apartments, medical office space, and a boutique hotel. The income generated from the project would pay for improved medical and living facilities for the 1,100 veterans who reside at the historic 155-year-old retirement home, officials said.
Yeah, the developers will all get nice and fat, which is the point.
It certainly can't be taking care of veterans, otherwise their wouldn't be a "boutique hotel" planned, would there?
The home receives no direct money from the federal government and instead relies on a trust fund drawn from service members' paychecks to operate. Faced with bankruptcy in recent years, the home developed a master plan allowing the development of large parcels of the 272-acre property.
$800 BILLION for these fucking wars without end, and yet they can't find a few billion for these guys?!
Service members paying for the place through their own checks?
That plan will come before the National Capital Planning Commission this spring. If approved, demolition on a 77-acre parcel on the south side could begin this summer.
The plan includes a requirement to build a 100-bed shelter for homeless veterans. US Vets is seeking to be part of the redevelopment and had expected to be able to move from Ignatia into that or another facility on the property. "Every time we thought a deal was imminent, something came up," Buckley said.
Ignatia House, once a nunnery for sisters caring for veterans and later a guesthouse, was rented to US Vets at a discounted rate on an "as is" basis, which meant that the home was not responsible for maintaining the building. US Vets did not want to spend money on improvements in a building meant as a temporary home.
The building has sunk into disrepair, with an elevator out of commission for weeks, darkened hallways, and little heat.
"Ignatia House was always intended as a step into entering into a long-term lease" at one of the other properties on the campus, said Thomas Cantwell Jr., a founder and former executive director of the US Veterans Initiative.
Cantwell also heads the for-profit Cantwell-Anderson and its subsidiary Cloudbreak, which holds the lease on Ignatia House. An audit last year by the Corporation for National and Community Service, which oversees AmeriCorps and other networks of nonprofit service organizations, said the veterans group has had a number of "less-than-arm's-length transactions" with Cantwell-Anderson. The audit also questioned whether $500,000 in grant money was spent and accounted for properly in 2006.
Black said the retirement home is aware of the audit. "It raises concerns that they're not following the rules," she said. "We don't think it's good responsibility when they ignore deadlines."
Cantwell said steps are being taken to address the concerns raised by the audit. "It certainly has nothing to do with the situation in the District of Columbia," he said.
Yeah, nothing like profiting of the troops' misery!
US Vets describes itself as the largest nonprofit organization in the country dedicated to helping homeless and at-risk veterans.
Cantwell said it was "unconscionable" that the retirement home could not find room for 50 homeless veterans. "It seems fundamentally wrong. Veterans are veterans."
Black said no other sites are available on the campus and suggested it was unfair for US Vets to paint the home as the villain. "It's very frustrating to have them point the finger of blame at the Armed Forces Retirement Home."
Then how about at Bush?
It's his fucking lying wars that have created this mess!
For veterans at Ignatia House, the dispute leaves them facing an uncertain future after March 31.
"Once you fall through the cracks, it's hard to get back up," said Grover Miller, 65, a Navy veteran who said he lost job as a cabdriver after he was arrested for driving while intoxicated.
Love Smith, 64, an Air Force veteran, is resigned to leaving.
"To me, it was better than sleeping in the park," he said."
I don't want to hear any more criticism of people who don't support Bush's wars as being against the troops!
When TF is America going to wake up?
If you won't revolt for the troops, then who will you revolt for?
