A final home for homeless vets

Thursday, Nov. 17, 2005 | 8:32 a.m.

They served their country in uniform, and now an estimated 2,400 of them in the Las Vegas Valley are homeless.

While others tend to their pressing needs in this life, former Nevada Assemblyman Lou Toomin, an Air Force veteran, wants to make sure that when they die, local homeless veterans will not end up in indigent graves, forgotten by the nation they once defended.

Over the years Toomin has helped move the remains of veterans from unmarked graves to the Southern Nevada Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Boulder City, where they received free burial and full military honors.

To draw attention to the issue, Toomin plans to hold a Dec. 2 ceremony at Las Vegas-owned Woodlawn Cemetery, where Clark County buries indigent people.

At the ceremony, a 4-foot by 5-foot red granite monument will be dedicated. It reads in part: "To those homeless veterans who have been forgotten and buried without recognition or honor."

That, of course, is a short-term solution to the problem. The long-term answer is to get homeless vets preregistered at the veterans cemetery, Toomin says.

To do that, they need proper identification and their military discharge papers -- an obstacle for many.

"The problem with many homeless veterans is that they have lost documentation and cannot prove who they are," Toomin said. "When they die, there often is no one to speak for them -- no friend or family to do the paperwork."

Southern Nevada Veterans Cemetery Director Jack Porrino said many choose not to preregister, forcing his staff to make veteran verifications prior to burial.

"We verify about 40 percent and that number is growing," Porrino said, noting that about 12,000 veterans are preregistered. "We work closely with Clark County Social Services to prevent veterans from falling through the cracks."

If Social Services cannot determine that an unclaimed body is that of a veteran entitled to a free burial at the veterans cemetery, the body is buried in an unmarked grave at a cost of about $1,400 to taxpayers.

Michael Whatley of Bunker Mortuary, which oversees Woodlawn's operation for Las Vegas, said because people tend to avoid talking about death, it is difficult to convince them to prearrange for it.

Still, every effort should be made to give veterans honors to which they are entitled, he said.

"This monument is symbolic that we do not want to leave anyone behind, but you know we have -- we cannot possibly account for everybody," Whatley said.

Porrino said veterans who have lost their discharge papers can go to the Nevada Office of Veterans Services, 950 W. Owens Ave., Room 111, and fill out a form to obtain out-of-state paperwork verifying that they were honorably discharged.

Such paperwork is sufficient for preregistration at the veterans' cemetery, which now has more than 18,000 grave sites, Porrino says.,

Veterans who want the one-page preregistration form mailed to them can call the cemetery at 486-5920. Completed forms must be taken to the cemetery at 1900 Buchannan Blvd., Boulder City, where copies are made for the cemetery's records.

"I just want to make sure that those who are entitled to burial with military honors get it," Toomin said. "Having a monument at the site where we know there are veterans buried as indigents will bring awareness to situations that affect homeless veterans."

Ed Koch can be reached at 259-4090 or at koch@lasvegassun.com.