The official blog of American Veteran Magazine, the national quarterly publication of AMVETS.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

LZ:DC: Sons of AMVETS Take to Capitol Hill

This morning, AMVETS' week of advocacy in Washington, "LZ:DC," will commence when the Sons of AMVETS land on Capitol Hill, meeting with legislators, advocating for American service members, veterans and their families.

Armed with AMVETS Legislative Priorities for 2011, the Pennsylvania Sons of AMVETS will be the first to hit the halls of Congress, meeting with Rep. Chaka Fattah, D-Pa., at 10 a.m.

The Pennsylvania Sons have more than a dozen meetings scheduled this week with the Pennsylvania Congressional delegation and a special award presentation to Rep. Jason Altmire, D-Pa., taking place tomorrow afternoon.

Sons of AMVETS National Commander Robert Hammett, a life member of the Indiana Sons, is already on the ground in Washington and plans join the Pennsylvania contingency for their early meetings.

Each year, the Sons of AMVETS come to Washington in force to advocate for veterans and their loved ones. The Capitol Hill visits coincide with the testimony of the AMVETS National Commander before a special joint hearing of the House and Senate committees on Veterans Affairs, where AMVETS officially presents its legislative priorities for the coming year.

AMVETS National Commander Jerry Hotop will present AMVETS' legislative agenda tomorrow at 9:30 a.m. in the Senate Derksen Ground Room 50. For details about the hearing, Click Here.

Last year, the Sons of AMVETS conducted more than 120 meetings with legislators, and Hammett said this year they plan to surpass that mark.

For this year's visits, the Sons also recruited support from AMVETS and the AMVETS Ladies Auxiliary to cover more ground on the hill.

Every year, members of AMVETS, the AMVETS Ladies Auxiliary, the Sons of AMVETS and AMVETS Riders converge on the nation’s capitol for four days of advocacy on behalf of American military families, memorial events to honor the fallen, organizational business, and the annual AMVETS Silver Helmet Awards, honoring champions of veterans’ service from across the country. This year, AMVETS has given this week a name that captures the urgency and scale of the mission: LZ:DC.

“LZ” is the common military acronym for a helicopter “landing zone”—a place where forces can be quickly inserted into the forward-most areas of the battle space. This week, AMVETS' LZ is Capitol Hill.

American Veteran will follow LZ:DC and the Sons of AMVETS Capitol Hill advocacy closely, bringing you updates from each day's events. Each Sons of AMVETS Department participating in LZ:DC will also be sending in photos and highlights as they happen, which we will include on the blog and on the AMVETS National Web site.

To learn more about LZ:DC, Click Here.

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3 comments:

  1. I have been trying to navigate through these organization as a female veteran who is homeless and pregnant at this time; searching for some kind of help, all I get is well we can't help you because you don't have some kind of substance abuse and since you are pregnant you don't qualify for the rest of the program we offer or we don't have that much program for women vets but if you were a male we would of been able to help. I hear of so call help for women veteran where is that who are they and what happen to women vets who are pregnant who don't fall in these obscene rules that makes it impossible to get help to those of us that don't fit the norm. I have been trying since I gotten pregnant now I am 9 months pregnant and all I still get is unfortunately we can cant help with your current situation,or there are no program out there for people like you in this situation. It looks like to me what these program are made for is not help those of us who just need a little help to get on our feet, to wait for you to loose all hope, self respect, pride, self-worth before they say well OK now we can help you since you no longer feel like a human being.

    West Palm Beach, Florida.

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