Southern Colorado community provides no-cost resources for veterans

PUEBLO, Colo. (KKTV) – Mt. Carmel Veterans Service Center hosts a monthly community resource fair in Pueblo known as “Helping Hands,” to provide essential resources and services to veterans at no-cost.

On Wednesday, organizations came together to help meet the needs of veterans in the community. One of the businesses at the event was Vets Auto Clinic, a veteran-owned, non-profit mobile mechanic service. With this service, the mechanics can meet a person wherever their car is located, take it back to where they work on the car and return it to the owner once it’s repaired.

One of the owners of Vets Auto Clinic, Benjamin Norris, says their non-profit helps those struggling financially.

“We did just start vets auto clinic, which is our nonprofit and that’s to help those who are in economical hardships and need their car.

“Most of the time they need it to go to work and it breaks down on them and they don’t have the money to pay for it so the nonprofit will cover that part of the repair.

“We also want to help those that have physical problems and they still they can drive, they can operate the vehicle, but they’re on a fixed income. You know they got to pay for their groceries sometimes they got to pay for their medicine and they don’t have money to keep their car running. So Vets auto clinic is going to be there for them.”

Another service available for veterans at “Helping Hands,” was an ultrasound and pregnancy testing mobile unit, provided by the local non-profit, A Caring Pregnancy Center (ACPC).

Lindy Hendrich, the Patient Services Director at A Caring Pregnancy Center, says it is vital to inform people who may be pregnant about the choices they have and this helps bring the community together.

“We can give them education you know on their options that they have for pregnancy.

“Maybe what (it) could look like for (them) if they were interested in getting connected with material services. We have a baby boutique so we can give them diapers, different types of material support stuff like that.

“The more like community outreaches that you have like this, the more a community can grow and just become knit together and understand ways that they can help each other. They may have a need, but they can also serve in a different way.”

Laurie Collins the Client Service Specialist at Mt. Carmel Veterans Service Center says they want to give back to veterans as best as they can.

“We like to be sure you know our entire community, the food insecurities are met.

“Anybody can come out. We also want to try to get in touch with all of our veterans who can come in and see us to come visit us to receive wraparound services.

“We just want them to know how special they are to us and so we want to provide these wraparound services to them to come out look at the resources we have and you know be able to help in anyway that we can.”

If you’re interested in learning more about Vets Auto Clinic click here. If you’re wanting to learn more about ACPC click here.

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