The new, 12-passenger, $45,000 van will allow the East Main Street post to maintain a 60-year-old tradition of providing local veterans with door-to-door service for out-of-town medical appointments — and it also allows Clark County to comply with a longtime state law.
The law requires counties to provide free transportation for veterans to the nearest Veterans Affairs medical facility, according to Cathy Ater, executive director of the Clark County Veterans Office.
“Every county does it differently,” Ater said. “We’ve found it’s easier to contract with the VFW.”
The county pays Post 1031 $4,000 a month to operate the van, Ater said, saving the county from having to purchase a vehicle, maintain it and employ a driver.
Like the post’s last six vans, the new one — of which Post 1031 raised half the money for, financing the rest — will be on the road five days a week.
The post is accepting donations to pay for the van, Heck said. Checks should be made to VFW Post 1031 and denote ambulance fund in the memo.
Last year alone, he said, the post transported 1,240 Clark County veterans to the Dayton VA, for a total of 25,217 miles.
“I’ve never dropped anybody off who didn’t thank me,” said Chuck Adams, a Vietnam veteran who drives the van two days a week.
He picks up veterans at their homes and then waits at the hospital until everyone is done.
“The eye clinic is always slow,” he added.
The veterans who use the free service are of both genders, all ages and all income levels, Adams said.
“It’s an honor to take care of these guys,” he said.
Inside the van, the conversation ranges “from soup to nuts,” Adams said, but often drifts back to the service.
“Every one of us,” he said, “had the worst drill instructor there ever was.”
For Post 1031, this is merely the continuation of a tradition that began in 1952, when the post bought its own ambulance.
When asked why the post continues to shuttle veterans around, Heck pointed to the lettering on the side of the new van: “We honor the dead by serving the living,” it reads.
“That kind of sums it up,” he said.
Adams, a Marine who went to Vietnam in 1969, admittedly enjoys talking up World War II veterans, and has transported members of most every branch.
“I can’t recall taking any sailors down,” Adams said. “Maybe they’re in better health. I know they had better food. I can guarantee you that.”
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