SIKESTON -- A local resident is holding a garage sale this weekend for veterans in need. Sikeston resident, David Smallwood, is planning a yard sale at his home where the proceeds will go to a veterans transition house in Cape Girardeau.
A 100-year old house was donated to Southeast Missouri State University Student Veterans Organization by a local businessman, according to SVO President Matthew Golden.
"This is a very worthwhile project as it allows veterans and dependents a place to temporarily live while seeking permanent housing," said Smallwood, who served in the Army during the Gulf War.
Because the home is in "dire need" of repairs, Smallwood is parting ways with some of his favorite collectible items, such as his Hot Wheels collection, baseball cards and autograph baseballs from Hall of Fame players. Along with the collectibles, Smallwood said individuals have donated clothing and furniture for the cause.
"(The house) had a host of things wrong with it," said Jeremy McBroom, SEMO director of the Office of Military and Veteran Services. "It had been vandalized, plumbing and electric wiring was ripped out for copper and the furnace was damaged."
With collaborative "student driven" effort of the SVO and United Ways Days of Caring, volunteers gutted the interior until all that is left were wall studs and floor joists, said McBroom.
"(SVO) is building it from the ground up," McBroom said. "They had partnered with other agencies and the (university construction and design students) to get drawings made for the interior blueprint."
Without any grants or federal aid, the project is "slow-going" because, as of now, funds only come from donations and fundraising. "Money has been the song and dance," Golden said. "We raffled a rifle and shotgun last year and planning on doing some other raffles this year."
Golden said SVO is trying to implement a "poker run," an organized event where participants (usually using motorcycles or other means of transportation) draws a card at several checkpoints. The objective is to have the best poker hand at the end of the run.
"The intent is to help veterans transition into civilian life or get their feet on the ground," McBroom said. "What we noticed at the University were homeless veterans in and around Cape Girardeau. We have several young vets brought to us that didn't know what was going on with school as far as their benefits... They were kind of lost."
Golden attributes this feeling of being lost to the challenges veterans face when transitioning to civilian life after their deployment. For Smallwood, it was not having the structure that the military provided and the camaraderie, or "brotherhood" that was prevalent.
"My hardest part of transition was communicating with people," said Danny Kimball, a Sikeston veteran who served in a Marine Expeditionary Unit during the War on Terror campaign right after the 9/11 attacks.
"It is difficult," Kimball said. "I think transitioning back, you go from having a bunch of guys who know exactly what experiences you've dealt with and who've walked down the same path. You come back to the civilian world and nobody has your experiences, nobody understands what you've been through and you don't have those people to unload on or just being around."
Kimball added, "I had some experiences I was still dealing with Afghanistan... The transition to being a civilian was hard for me. I didn't feel satisfied with it -- I felt frustrated with it all the time, so I decided going back into military was my best course of action, which led me to signing for another enlistment. I had a 15-month deployment to Iraq as an infantryman, and when I came back to the States, I had less than a month to get prepared to come back home and enter the civilian workforce."
Kimball also mentioned some of the struggle veterans face is due to finances. "You're a young guy living in barracks. Your bills are paid for except cell phone and car note, and now you have every bill you can imagine. You develop bad spending habits and are unprepared to run a house. Those are life skills that you haven't developed yet."
There are about half a million veterans in Missouri, according to the US Department of Veterans Affairs. About 6,200 of them live Cape Girardeau County and roughly 11 percent of the adult homeless population is made up of veterans.
There's also been a rise in homelessness among younger veterans as well. According to National Coalition for Homeless Veterans statistics, there were approximately 12,700 homeless vets who served in military campaigns since 2001.
"We had one veteran living out of his van," McBroom recalled. "He was a student working two jobs and showering at the (recreational) center. He had a family in North Carolina but didn't have money for a mortgage or place to stay here."
Although the number of young homeless veterans is on the rise, they only constitute about nine percent of the overall homeless veteran population.
"We want to help veterans no matter what," said McBroom. "We're able to get them lined up with homeless shelters and other veteran organizations."
Without the interior blueprints, Golden said the SVO can't get an accurate estimate of the construction costs but it is in progress. He mentioned it's a three-level house with four bedrooms and about four bathrooms. As far as capacity goes, they're "still trying to figure that part out," he said.
"My hope is, I want the other veterans to see this," said Smallwood. "If we all chip in, we can get this finished much faster." Smallwood said he plans to give 20 percent of the garage sale earnings to SVO and the other 80 percent will be split between Latino relief organizations in Texas and to the Wounded Warrior Projects.
The garage sale starts Friday at 5 p.m. and will continue through Sunday from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. located at 109 David Drive in Sikeston. Residents interested in donating goods for the sale can call David Smallwood at (573) 979-3417. For those interested in more information about the veterans transition house or want to make donations can call the SEMO Office of Military and Veteran Services at (573) 651-2263.