CENTRAL FLORIDA — There are fewer veterans living on central Florida streets.
The Central Florida Commission on Homelessness announced that central Florida has reduced veteran homelessness by nearly 88 percent since the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs began to implement its Housing First strategy four years ago.
Under the Obama Administration, the Department of Veteran's Affairs has been putting veterans into permanent homes without strings attached, without treatments required, since 2011.
The goal now is to house the rest of the homeless veterans who might not be eligible for the VA's money because they were dishonorably discharged.
Mayor Buddy Dyer and Mayor Teresa Jacobs attended a breakfast where the announcement was made.
"We need focus from the mayor's office to the local VA to your agency to focus on waking up with a healthy panic of what are we going to do today to end veteran homelessness," said Anthony Love of the VA.
The VA has quadrupled its budget from $300 million to $1.2 billion to work to end veteran homelessness.
"We have to be urgent as if someone's life depended on it because it does," said Love.
Orange, Osceola and Seminole counties have housed 867 veterans who were living on the streets or in the woods since 2011.
"We have to be cognizant when you see tragedy in a war zone; life is not black and white anymore. It can be many shades of gray. So, it's not our job as a community to argue over statuses, it's our job to get every veteran a home," said Andrae Bailey of the Central Florida Commission on Homelessness.
The Commission on Homelessness believes that the VA's approach of providing housing first, and then providing voluntary treatment is a model for solving homelessness among civilians.
In April of last year, Dyer pledged to house 300 chronically homeless people in three years.
"Things are not moving always as quickly as you'd hope, but when the plan is in place and the resources are in place, the steps going forward are going to come together," Bailey said.
WFTV
