Flora Templeton Stuart Injury Lawyers is teaming up with Operation Stand Down Kentucky to bring Veterans supplies! We have 100 backpacks we need to fill with hygiene products, clothing essentials, canned foods, magazines, and books! Donations accepted at our office at 607 E. 10th Ave. Learn more at http://www.osdky.org
Operation Stand Down Kentucky is a Professional Veteran Fiduciary/Representative Payee Program that focuses on paying a veteran’s debts and monthly fixed expenses. A veteran can either be appointed by the VA/Federal Government or voluntarily admit themselves into the program as we describe as a willing participant.
Operation Stand Down Kentucky aims to help veterans
By Don Sergent of Bowling Green Daily News
For the third straight year, local military veterans needing assistance with food and other essentials can find help through the Operation Stand Down Kentucky group.
The organization’s Backpacks for Veterans in Need project started earlier this month and will continue through Dec. 9. The backpacks will be filled with food items and such essentials as shoes, socks, underwear, toothpaste and various hygiene items.
Diana Hankla, a volunteer for Operation Stand Down Kentucky, said the group has had 125 backpacks donated and now needs to collect items to fill them.
Hankla said Greenwood Ford is a permanent drop-off location. Other businesses and organizations helping collect items are Family Works Therapy, Cone Funeral Home and the Flora Templeton Stuart law firm. Local restaurants such as Roosters, Buffalo Wild Wings, Cambridge Market and Blaze Pizza have also helped through donating a portion of sales to the backpack effort.
Organizations such as the American Legion Post 23, the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 1298 and the Veterans Administration Clinic are also helping with the effort, Hankla said.
“The main thing we try to do is follow Abraham Lincoln’s creed that says, ‘To care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan,’ ’’ said Hankla, a Bowling Green resident who has written children’s books and donated some of the proceeds to organizations that support military veterans.
The Backpacks for Veterans program is valuable in getting needed items to veterans, but Operation Stand Down member Justin Howard explained that the program can do more.
“We’re trying to get necessities to people who need it,” said Howard, a Marine Corps veteran who lives in Scottsville. “But it’s also a great way to connect to people and learn what they’re going through. What I get excited about is the chance to talk to them. I’m trying to help them fix the situation that led to them needing the backpack to begin with.”
Howard said Operation Stand Down helps veterans with financial matters so they can be more independent.
For more information about Operation Stand Down Kentucky and its Backpacks for Veterans program, call 888-574-1736 or visit this website: http://www.osdky.org/.
Article can be found here.
