The Defense Department is in the process of reshaping our post Iraq military forces.   Though taxpayers don’t feel it, Congress IS cracking down on military contracts and contractors.  Iraq assignments have concluded and after ten long years, the U.S. is transitioning out of its  “war stance.”   Officers are not being promoted.  Forces are being reduced.  A Navy recruiter on the West Coast reports that no new enlistees are being accepted if there is even the slightest question of fitness for service.  No physical limitations, no criminal records, no educational gaps.

At the same time the industry of war churns to a halt, soldiers who have sacrificed for

our country are coming home.

Where will our veterans find jobs?

This month, U.S. Government records show that 14 million Americans are already out of work.  Up to 25 million if you count those who have taken part-time employment in lieu of full-time jobs.  What will we have to offer the brave soldiers who have served and protected us?

The Obama administration is facing a wall of needy Americans, who don’t want unemployment, who aren’t accustomed to hand-outs, who WANT A JOB.  The future of Barack Obama’s presidency may be defined by whether  or not he can put our veterans to work.

Here’s a personal account of what its like to come home, disabled and inexperienced, and to need a job as told to the Orange County Register in California, where tens of thousands of Marines are connected to Camp Pendleton:

When Erick Castro returned to Santa Ana in 2004, he faced the hard reality of what coming home means for veterans these days. He may have served his country and even been recognized with honors, but that doesn’t count for a lot when it comes to getting a job.

“Not a lot of people are looking to hire a guy with one leg and hardly any experience,” he said.

It is a major issue for veterans – able-bodied and disabled – as the U.S. winds down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

What are they going to do when they get home, often with little education, six years behind their peers in experience and with skills that don’t always translate into the civilian world?

“I can say I was able to hit a target with an M16 from 400 yards away,” said Jacob Gomez, of Placentia, who was a boatswain’s mate second class in the Navy. “Are you going to put that on your resume?”

GETTING OUT

 

Where do they go from here?

Transitioning from the military to civilian life has always been a challenge but it is even more difficult now as the economic downturn drags on.

The first post-9/11 veterans returning in 2004, 2005 and 2006 had the advantage of coming home to a booming job market. Unemployment dipped below 5 percent nationwide and fell as low as 3.7 percent in California. Jobs were plentiful, especially in construction and manufacturing, which didn’t require education or training.

But the trickle of veterans who were returning home in the mid-2000s is turning into a flood, with 30,000 to 35,000 getting out of the service in California this year.

They face a 12 percent state unemployment rate and are competing with nearly 2.2 million other unemployed Californians for jobs. Meanwhile, the government, aerospace and defense contract jobs that used to be so abundant and welcoming of veterans are disappearing due to budget cuts.

Nationally, the unemployment rate among Gulf War II-era veterans was 14 percent in July versus 9.1 percent for the population as a whole, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

It is particularly tough among the youngest veterans ages 18 to 24, most of whom only have a high school diploma and never worked in the civilian world before enlisting. Unemployment has remained stubbornly high for this group, with a quarter of these young veterans out of work.

Peter Gravett, secretary of the California Department of Veterans Affairs, said returning veterans are focusing on education because they don’t want to just settle for any work. They have higher goals.

“After you’ve been to war a couple of times and seen all the disasters that you’ve seen, you don’t want to come home and flip hamburgers,” said Gravett, a retired major general who served in the Army and California National Guard.

TICKET TO A NEW LIFE

Just  after World War II, the GI Bill is helping thousands of post-9/11 veterans go to school. New, more-generous benefits that now cover most tuition, books and housing costs are making it much easier for them to get an education.

Well-deserved Homecoming

Castro, who was 24 when he was discharged in 2004, realized finding work would be a challenge.

“I had no college degree. I had no civilian experience. Who was going to give me a job?”

Castro enrolled at Santa Ana College, and then transferred to Arizona State University, where he got his bachelor’s degree in math in 2009.

He came back to Orange County, but it was the height of the recession and unemployment was 8.9 percent.

“I was submitting my resume left and right and was not even getting a callback,” he said.

He also faced a problem many veterans confront – an unspoken uneasiness about their possible combat-related mental and emotional problems.

Castro just scoffs at that, saying he lost his leg, not his mind.

“I’ve been through a lot in my life,” he said. “Does it sound like I’m damaged?”

A friend who is a veteran offered to hire and train Castro as a controller for his small telecommunications firm. It was only a short-term position and the pay wasn’t great, but Castro jumped at the chance to get some experience.

STATE OF CONFUSION

he military developed a mandatory Transition Assistance Program that includes such things as resume writing and interviewing, to help prepare military personnel for civilian life. There also are numerous state and federal efforts targeted at veterans.

But the programs suffer from a lack of coordination. The word simply isn’t getting out to the veterans who need the help.

“You have to be really motivated to find information,” said Claire Horseman of Fullerton, who was medically discharged from the Coast Guard in 2007.

Last year, a group of Orange County Employment Development Department employees who work with veterans saw the problem with a general lack of information about the services available. Knowing that the situation will only get worse as the wave of post-9/11 veterans grows, the EDD workers embarked on a study to figure out how to better focus their efforts.

They are now implementing some of their findings to ensure that the one-stop centers truly are one stop in addressing veterans’ needs. Now every veteran who goes to a one-stop center is directed to a veterans representative. The representative will work with the veteran to determine what the veteran wants to do and what skills, education or training is needed to reach that goal.

The help can range from a job interview workshop to career counseling to providing information on applying for GI Bill benefits. The EDD representatives also can direct veterans to housing, healthcare and social services if they have issues in those areas.

State officials also recognized the lack of coordination. Gov. Jerry Brown signed an executive order last month to create an interagency council on veterans.

The council will bring together all the state agencies that deal with veterans’ issues ranging from CalVets and the Labor and Workforce Development Agency to the Health and Human Services Agency and Housing and Community Development. The idea is to reduce duplication and better coordinate all veterans efforts.

ON THE JOB

Having finished his work with his friend, Erick Castro didn’t have time to wait for the government’s help. He created his own job, a state-licensed construction contracting firm owned and run by disabled veterans. The firm, All Veterans Corp., mentors, trains and hires veterans to do contracting work.

They started out with government contracts with the VA and Marines, but Castro said his workers are fully trained to do any general engineering or electrical work.

Meanwhile, he continues with his education and is halfway through his MBA.

Castro is convinced the education and training veterans are now getting, combined with the leadership skills and work ethic they learned in the military, will pay off.

“We’ve sacrificed so much for our country,” Castro said. “All we’re asking is the opportunity to be of service to our country again.”

Contact the writer: 714-796-3646 or mmilbourn@ocregister.com

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Filed under: Economy, Featured, Inside The KC, Politics, Uncategorized by Sonja Eddings Brown, Oct 31, 2011