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March 7, 2017
Lafourche Parish is opening up office space to help local veterans attain the services they’ve earned.
Yesterday the parish opened up the Lafourche Veterans Office at the government complex in Mathews. Lafourche Deputy Director of Communications Caroline Eschette said the office space has been available for use for years, so the only new expense to the parish will be the addition of a fax line.
According to Eschette, while the office was open, it has been unstaffed for about two years, based on what she was told. Eschette said the state recently requested the location be reopened to service the public, and Parish President Jimmy Cantrelle accommodated the request. Kelli Woods will serve as the veterans assistance counselor on behalf of the Louisiana Department of Veterans Affairs at the location.
The office will be open from 9 a.m. – 3:30 p.m. every Tuesday. Eschette said the single-day operation was the state’s decision since it provides staffing, but adding hours to the office could be reconsidered depending on how the demand for services turns out.
In a press release announcing the opening, Cantrelle said Woods’s presence offers a personal touch to aiding veterans in their applications for benefits.
“I’m happy to announce this new central location to better serve our Veterans. Having a local representative to talk with in person makes it so much easier to get help, especially with benefits and care,” said Cantrelle.
The new office is a welcome sight for those working with veterans each day. Linton Doucet, a Korean War veteran and board president of the Veteran’s Memorial Park in Galliano, said he recently read about the veterans’ office opening. He said he wanted to get more information on the new location, noting suspicion rooted in veterans’ past headaches from applying for benefits.
“When you talk about veterans receiving some kind of help, money-wise or any kind of help, you want to see what it’s all about. Because it’s almost a no-no. I’ve always said that they give you the run-around,” Doucet said.
Doucet said the memorial park offers its own special services for veterans from the southern part of Lafourche. The park offers free rides with off-duty ambulance drivers to hospitals, clinics and doctor appointments for any veteran from the parish’s 10th Ward. The ambulances will take them to anywhere as far as Houston, Tex., on one side and Jackson, Miss., on the other. Doucet estimated the area currently has about 80 veterans and the park spends about $70,000 per year for the transportation services.
According to Doucet, one of the most frequent stops for the free rides has been Houma, which has been offering special get-togethers for those with post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.
“A veteran, when you come out, you’re never the same. I’ve seen these people, some of them, what they went through, they’re still trying to find their way home,” Doucet said.
Doucet hopes Woods can help those who’ve served the United States in attaining the services they deserve. He recalled his own troubles in applying for compensation about a decade ago. Doucet said he documented the ratio between his income and monthly bills, but the government continued to turn down his requests, instead only encouraging him to re-apply if they had an issue with his response. He said it was at that point that he gave up on applying for the benefits he earned by serving his country.
“It’s not a slap in the face, but you think with what you went through to keep this country free and have everybody have some kind of freedom where you can go ahead and apply for this, apply for that, it’s there, you know?” Doucet said. “You don’t want a free ride, but if they offer you something, they ought to come through and give it to you, not make you wait for this, wait for that.” ∙
