On the night of Dec. 21, a small crowd of veterans and community members met at sundown to again participate in the 5th annual Candlelight Vigil commemorating the over 49,000 homeless veterans who will be living on the streets of America on the longest night of the year. They met at the Cherokee County Veterans Park and stood in front of the nation’s homeless veteran statue that depicts two veterans, one male and one female, who were homeless for many years.
The female statue represents a female Marine who was living out of her car for most of her 21-year struggle with homelessness. The male statue represents an Army Apache crew chief who was homeless living on the streets of the South for over six years. As with more than 40% of all homeless veterans, the female Marine struggled with thoughts of suicide. With help from Post 45 Service officer Jim Lindenmayer and the Marine Corps League, she was able to overcome her homeless bout and was able to get rated at 100% service connection by VA. She is now living her life back in the civilian world.
The Army male veteran was not as lucky. After getting stabilized by the Cherokee County Homeless Program, which is currently part of Post 45, he was sent to a long-term veteran shelter in Atlanta, where he was murdered; his case remains unsolved. As a result of this incident, we no longer will send any veteran down to Atlanta as it has proven to be unsafe. We are in the process of building a Transitional Veteran Housing facility here in Cherokee County where we can help homeless veterans longer, as we only provide temporary shelter currently, stated Lindenmayer, who is also executive director of the program.
Wreaths were placed at each of the statues, and prayers for the homeless were read as part of the vigil. The temperature would drop to 26 degrees this night in North Georgia, and our thoughts and prayers for those who served yet find themselves homeless were top of mind.