American Legion and DAV working to help Veterans in the area
The Local American legion post in Cameron MO is working to help veterans apply for, and receive, their benefits. There are a number of challenges that veterans have to overcome not the least of which is filling out the forms to apply for benefits. A second challenge for many is finding an actual person to talk too rather than trying to negotiate various websites on the internet or working thru a computer answering system on the telephone. Our goal is to try to bring the people who have the answers to the veterans rather than putting the burden on veterans to travel long distances to get help. Another focus of our efforts is to provide assistance when the problem comes up. Often, the benefits might be available, but not for several weeks, months, or longer. When someone is in crisis, they need help now, not next week or month.
There are a quite a number of groups trying to help veterans deal with everything from “returning to civilian life” to “assisted living facilities” to prevention of Veteran Suicides. Much of it is truly wonderful and needed. Unfortunately, there are also some scams that take advantage of good people. It can all be quite confusing and difficult to know who to trust. Post #33 of the American Legion is hoping that we can consolidate some of those efforts and provide a ready resource to help those who have trouble getting their benefits.
It doesn’t take much to get a request for benefits denied and the process of appealing that can be even more complicated than the original effort.
To help with this process, The Legion has arranged with the Disabled American Veterans of Missouri to schedule the Mobile Service Office van to come to Cameron on Thursday Sept 14th from 10 AM until 5 PM. It will be parked at the Cameron Market parking lot and help will be available for veterans and their dependents to come in and find answers to the benefits available.
Lots of changes have taken place in the Veterans Administration over the past couple of years. The Mobile Service Office will have the latest information about those changes. For more information, contact Alan Reed, (816) 288-1992 or Pat O’Connor (816) 575-2568.