New Bill for Homeless Vets

Last week the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee approved a bill that could provide job opportunities and housing for homeless Veterans, especially women and Veterans with families.


Including two amendments by Sen. Jon Tester, these services would be offered to struggling Veterans across rural America.

S. 1237 would increase the Veterans Affairs grant program that pays up to 65 percent of construction costs associated with modernizing, expanding or building Veterans housing. It would also establish a new grant program to assist homeless women Veterans and homeless Veterans with children in rejoining the labor force.


Tester’s unanimously approved amendments, appropriate at least 5 percent of the bill’s funds for programs in frontier and rural communities, It would also create an automatic enrollment system for National Guardsmen and Reservists. 5 percent is the National Coalition for Homeless Veterans’s estimate of the number of homeless Veterans in rural communities.