Veterans Business Network collecting donations, reaching veterans in need

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Military veterans are stubborn. They’re trained to be. In active duty, they were trained to see the mission in front of them, to carry out that mission and have pride in the work they did. When they step away or retire from the military—and especially if they have seen combat—they sometimes lose that sense of mission and their way. It’s then that their lives can shatter, and they’re too stubborn to ask for help.

This according to Derek Lloyd, an Army Airborne veteran and General Manager of Duke Concrete in Queensbury, and Juan Gonzalez, the CFO of Hunt Companies of Argyle and a retired Senior Chief Petty Officer of the Navy.

This stubbornness can be deadly, Lloyd said, adding that as trained killers veterans do not attempt suicide at a rate three times the national average, they simply do it.

“We’re more ‘successful.’ We’re kind of trained to know how to be deadly,” he said.

He and Gonzalez are part of the Adirondack Regional Chamber of Commerce’s Veteran’s Business Network, a network that helps veterans through advocacy, education, connection and collaboration. The help can also be communication, letting a veteran know there are other veterans going through the same thing. 

It can be helping a veteran realize that their training, especially in leadership or even that stubbornness, can become a transferable skill that works in any job. 

If a veteran is trying to become a certified, Veteran Owned Small Business in New York, communication, collaboration and education are at play, said Gonzalez, the chair of the VBN. The process requires many steps and a lot of paperwork, and the VBN is there to “create opportunities.” 

The goal of “connection” is never too far out of range, either. 

This month the ARCC and the VBN are focused on food and necessities donations to help homeless and food-insecure veterans and their families. The donations will go to Adirondack Vets House, Inc. and the Veterans & Community Housing Coalition.

However, the donations have the added benefit; they create a reason to connect, to help, and to let veterans know it is OK to need some help.

“It’s hard to ask for help,” Gonzalez said. “It’s hard to have a career where you’re in...fight or flight” mode and then turn it off. The stress of reacclimation is hard on the veteran and the family.

It’s nothing new, both Gonzalez and Lloyd admitted. The need persists because war and combat are not normal, and the basic need to reorient the mind of a veteran is ongoing.

Lloyd said he had a strong network of family and friends that helped him nine years ago after a career of jumping out of planes. 

He said that combat veterans can be trained to see problems as something that must be destroyed or killed. 

“That’s a way to solve a problem,” in the military, he said, destroy it. If life for a veteran is not going well, veterans can see themselves as that problem. 

So veterans like him reach out, he said. 

Gonzalez said much the same, and that the VBN is trying to tell people it is OK to need help and ask for it.

“It’s getting cold outside quickly,” he said in the parking lot of Queensbury Hotel as he collected donations. “And we’re here to help.”

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If you want to donate: contact the ARCC, and make donations at their headquarters. Call the office at 518-798-1761 to schedule a drop-off, or email Carol Ann Conover, caconover@adirondackchamber.org. 

What to donate to the Adirondack Vets House, Inc.:

  • Laundry Detergent 
  • Coffee (dark roast dark coffee)
  • Canned soup (everything but Tomato we have plenty of that type)
  • Snacks; the residents love treats. Cookies, donuts, cakes, etc.  
  • Paper products, toilet paper, paper towels, no tissues or toiletries, we have plenty! 
  • Gift cards for gas and coffee from Stewarts, grocery stores (for meats and milk), Walmart (for our bedding needs, pillows, sheets and blankets full size bedding), Lowe’s for supplies and Home Depot
  • Please, no furniture or clothing at this time.
  • Monetary Donations are always welcomed! All monetary donations go to the Veterans operational costs not to support services which means salaries and such! We take pride in making that possible!

The Guardian House for female vets also welcomes other necessity and “feel-good” item donations including:

  • Travel sized OTC medicines.
  • Hair & beauty accessories (brushes, combs, nail polish, make-up, mani-pedi kits, loofahs, etc.).
  • Sanitary items.
  • Comfy socks/slippers, pantyhose/leggings and other comfort items. 

For a complete list of what and how to donate and a list of items that cannot be accepted for donation, please visit the VCHC website.