On Sunday, August 3rd 2008, Veterans, Families, children and friends enjoyed the Grand Opening of the new Florida Veterans Multi-Purpose Center.

The Center will offer mental health and Equine Assisted Therapy to veterans facing pre and post deployment in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Center also offers free weekend retreats for returning service men/women and couples.

For more information on this and any other programs offered, please call us: 866-598-8387

Washington, DC --- The United States House of Representatives passed Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen’s veterans center bill to rename the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Miami, Florida, as the "Bruce W. Carter Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center".

First Class Carter served as a radio operator with Hotel Company, 2nd Battalion, 3rd Marines, 3rd Marine Division. On August 7, 1969, in combat north of the Vandegrift Base in the Quang Tri Province in Vietnam, Private First Class Carter threw himself on an enemy grenade, giving his life in service to our country...

Despite the grim job forecast, the nation's largest employer -- Uncle Sam, is on a hiring spree, looking to bring on hundreds of thousands of the nation's best and brightest, according to the Partnership for Public Service.

Two key factors are driving the federal government's hiring projections, according to the organization's research:

-- The brain drain. Nearly one-third of the federal workforce, 530,000 employees, is expected to retire or leave in the next 5 years.

-- The need to keep American's safe. 193,000 mission-critical jobs must be filled by September 2009, including scientists, medical personnel, lawyers, accountants, IT experts and a variety of security positions, including: border patrol agents, customs officers, immigration agents, food inspectors, criminal investigators and airport screeners.

In a Zogby poll released today and commissioned by the nonprofit, nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service nearly two-thirds of young people reported that they have considered working for the federal government.

As American service members continue to fight and die in Iraq and Afghanistan, many men and women in uniform come home profoundly changed. Some discover they suffer from post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Others struggle with depression, anger and/or substance abuse and find it difficult to readjust to civilian life.

A few can’t deal with the pain they feel. They commit suicide. There have been four suicides among South Dakota National Guard members in the past four years. Two Guard members killed themselves last year in the state but had never been deployment overseas. Another took his life during a deployment to Iraq in 2004. A fourth killed himself in early 2006, more than 11 months after returning from a deployment to Iraq.

The number of dead soldiers in Iraq continues to climb. Others lose their limbs when yet another IED blast blows up their transport vehicles as they move in and out of war-torn Baghdad.

The potential after-effects that soldiers may suffer from this war, however, has become one big ticking time-bomb that could explode the military's already fragile morale - if nothing is ever done about it.

And post-traumatic stress disorder has the potential to tear apart families already burdened by the roller-coaster ride of National Guard soldiers being called in-and-out of duty that they thought would simply help pay their college tuition.