Posted on 07/03/2010 11:20:39 AM PDT by SandRat
SIERRA VISTA — Living next door to Fort Huachuca, there aren’t many communities like ours that offer such a large variety of programs to support veterans, the military and their families. From providing food vouchers to helping with post traumatic stress or combating homelessness among the state’s veterans, there is no lack of organizations to aid current and former service members.
However, this means that there seems to be a perpetual thin spread of money to go around to these programs.
For this reason, Boots For Our Troops, a nonprofit organization that helps raise money on behalf of veterans’ organizations, will be holding a benefit event at Demun’s Food and Spirits at 6 p.m. tonight in Huachuca City.
Highlights will include music by Pat Daddy and the Twelve Bar Blues Band, tents set up to donate money and a 50/50 raffle, said Mike Maloon, the vice chairman of the board of directors.
He hopes the event will pull in quite a crowd, but says regardless of size, he will be giving away $2,500 in funding to be split amongst Hero Hearts, the Veterans Outpost in Tombstone, Army Community Services at Fort Huachuca, the Elks Lodge Veterans Services Program in Sierra Vista and the American Legion Post 52 in Sierra Vista.
Since Boots For Our Troops was started in 2008, it has given out more than $63,000 in grants to Arizona programs helping veterans and the military. Every dollar generated, other than the small amount to go toward printing and government fees, goes back into community and state programs to support the troops, said Rich Bank, the chairman of the board of directors.
The goal, Maloon said, is to help out when the government can’t afford to support these programs. “A lot of local organizations have limited fundraising opportunities, and we thought we could expand their capabilities,” he said. “They have many beautiful programs but they’re always underfunded.”
Through fundraising and working with community businesses, Boots For Our Troops has given more than $10,000 in Cochise County, Bank said. He added that businesses often will seek out Boots For Our Troops in the hopes of being able to help with fundraising. “It’s all about the convenience of the public to donate to help support the troops,” he said.
The name Boots For Our Troops alludes to the nonprofit’s symbol, he added. When an individual or family gives a donation to Boots For Our Troops, they’re given a paper boot on which to write their name and donation amount.
Just a few weeks ago, Boots For Our Troops gave out $6,000, leaving the account with only $500, Bank said.
“It’s not our ambition to keep the money sitting around in our bank account,” he said. “We tell people we’re not professional fundraisers, but we sure are persistent.”
Let me get this straight... millions and billions of dollars are being stolen, wasted, tossed out of windows, paid to bribe our enemies, used to prop up drug-runners, and are just generally misspent in Afghanistan and Iraq, and our veterans and their families need vouchers for food???
What the hell is going on here?
That’s the case
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