Dequarious, a U.S. Navy Veteran originally from Atalanta, GA has been in Oregon since 2019. He joined the Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program (HVRP) in April after he and his wife lost their employment in March.
With three children to support, they were going through tough times. They were behind on rent and prepared for eviction when he was referred to HVRP by the Employment Department. A few weeks after enrolling in our program, his family’s car blew a tire and after an inspection, he learned that all the tires were bad.
To help him, our HVRP’s Employment Specialist Jennifer started calling other community partners to try to find someone who could help get some tires for this Veteran and his family. ❤️
With luck, Roy McClain, Case Manager for our Critical Time Intervention (CTI) program and the Interim Program Manager for our VETcare Prevents program, made contact with Arlene on behalf of the Mid-Willamette Valley Homeless Alliance Continuum of Care(CoC). Arlene knew someone who was looking to donate a vehicle to a Veteran in need!
We were eventually put in touch with Liz Garrow of Polk County. Liz’s husband had recently passed away and as a long-time advocate for local Veterans, she wanted to make a difference in a Veteran’s life. Earlier this month, HVRP Outreach Specialist, Chanel Harris, took Dequarious to meet Liz and was given an amazing gift of a 1999 Mercedes-Benz!
Liz is a blessing as she not only donated a vehicle, but she also donated a walker, wheelchair, and an electric scooter with a lift to VETcare! We thank her so much! She has made a huge impact on this Veteran and his family during these tough times.
In Dequarious’ own words: “I was introduced to Jennifer at HVRP VETCare and she was able to help me and my family in ways I wasn’t expecting. She has been active with me in finding employment and whatever help I needed, but what takes the cake was when someone contacted her about donating a car and she thought about me and my family. It meant so much to me and my family and the VetCare team has gone above and beyond my expectations. It was great when HVRP Outreach Specialist Chanel Harris took me to meet the person who donated the car and to meet Liz Garrow. Now things are looking better because of HVRP VetCare and I cannot thank those guys and girls that work extremely hard every day to help whoever they can.”
To our amazing staff who worked together to find a solution and to Liz for her generosity, thank you for helping us get one of our Veterans back on the road! ❤️
If you’d like to make a donation to help impact the Veterans that we serve like Dequarious, please contact us at (503) 364-1728 or vetcareprevents@westcare.com.
