Veteran Details Struggle To Continue Local Veterans’ Activities
Sonora, CA — Vietnam Veteran Frank M. Smart is 84 years old and very worried about the future of local Veteran’s groups and activities. Smart has nearly 40 years of involvement with local Veteran’s groups. He currently estimates several hundred members belong to the groups, but many active members are as elderly as he is with the average age of Vietnam veterans being 75.
Smart states, “An existential crisis currently confronts Tuolumne County veterans’ organizations and could result in catastrophic consequences for future veterans’ activities.” He further details, “The crisis is simple, lack of membership and lack of participation.”
Smart proposes solutions in his new blog posted here. Those solutions include creating a new ‘The Modern-Era Veterans Initiative’ to bring younger veterans into the traditional veterans’ groups, and consolidating the Color Guards into one unified Guard. In his own words, “The solution: membership, participation, involvement, commitment, pride in service, and continuing service that began when we entered the military.”
Smart laments what he fears may happen, “Seeing [Veterans’ Organizations] fail now would be a great blow to the pride of many veterans, particularly myself.” He invites discussion about the situation, with his contact information in his blog posted here.
