VETERANS AFFAIRS
Press Release - 4/26/2007
By
May 3, 2007, 15:25 PST

Veterans’ liaison moving to city offices

By Chris Mayhew

Community Recorder Staff Writer

ALEXANDRIA – Veterans seeking help obtaining government benefits have a new place to meet with their volunteer liaison: Alexandria’s city offices.

Ron Allari, of Alexandria, a volunteer Veterans Service Officer for the area, has met regularly for years at Campbell County Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 3205 in Alexandria.

Allari and Post Commander Mark See asked council to use space in the city building, Thursday, April 5.

Veterans have expressed privacy concerns about meeting in a room next to a bar at the V.F.W. to discuss benefits, Allari said.

“They tell me ‘I don’t like coming to a noisy and smoky bar at the V.F.W. Post,’” Allari said.

Allari said he meets 30 to 40 veterans a month. He carries federal government benefit manuals hundreds of pages long to help veterans properly fill out paperwork for benefits, and answer almost any question they may have.

“I’d just like to find someplace where I could sit down with a table and a chair to sit down with a veteran in confidence,” Allari said. “Ideally, I’d like to get someplace with high speed Internet access.”

Mayor Dan McGinley said there were a couple of places in the city building Allari could use.

If handicap accessibility was ever an issue, Allari could sometimes meet in a private room in the police station on the ground floor of the city building, said Alexandria Police Chief Mike Ward.

cmayhew@communitypress.com

578-1051