thedrifter
09-17-07, 10:47 AM
Wounded sgt. closer to getting customized home
By Garry Mitchell - The Associated Press
Posted : Sunday Sep 16, 2007 10:16:12 EDT
MOBILE, Ala. — While wounded Marine Sgt. Greg Edwards struggles to walk on artificial legs — a reality in a life rebuilt after Iraq — he won’t have to worry much longer about where his family will live.
The Taunton, Mass.-based Homes for Our Troops will build its first specially adapted house in Alabama for Edwards, his wife, Christina, and their two young daughters, said Kirt Rebello, a spokesman for the nonprofit organization.
Once a general contractor is found, Rebello hopes the house can be built in six months. Property in Mobile County is being purchased this month for the Edwards’ three-bedroom, two-bath home.
In a telephone interview Thursday from his temporary home in Wheaton, Md., near his doctors, Edwards, who lost both legs in an Iraq explosion last fall, said he’s looking forward to the new home. But he admits being “real nervous” about settling down after almost eight years on the move with the Marines Corps.
Edwards, who enlisted at 17 and turns 25 on Sept. 20, said he hopes to enroll at the University of South Alabama here and study business or criminal justice.
Rebello said Homes for Our Troops has 20 homes under way, including the Edwards home. He said 15 other homes have been completed for wounded veterans nationwide.
Rebello said the organization continues to grow, but unfortunately cannot help all the thousands of wounded soldiers returning from war in Iraq.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has a grant program and loan guarantees that help wounded veterans with a home. The veteran could be reimbursed up to $50,000 to renovate a home to accommodate a veteran’s injuries.
Besides structural changes to a home, putting in ramps and wider doors, for example, the VA provides adaptive equipment for vehicles to veterans with service-connected disabilities.
Tom Wilborn, a spokesman for the Disabled American Veterans in Washington, D.C., said he doesn’t know of another nonprofit group that builds specially adapted homes for wounded veterans. He said some smaller scale projects may be undertaken in individual communities.
DAV joined with TV’s Extreme Makeover Home Edition to help one soldier in Tennessee, he said.
“We don’t fix them up in a house. We make sure all their rights and benefits are taken care of,” Wilborn said of the DAV.
In rebuilding his life, Edwards has endured 38 surgeries. The Marine was conducting house searches in Ramadi, Iraq, when a hidden explosive detonated Oct. 21. Besides the loss of both legs, the blast shattered his left hand.
Edwards doesn’t consider himself a war hero.
“A few people tell me that. I was just a guy doing a job and things went bad one day,” he said.
It was his third tour in Iraq. Edwards participated in the initial invasion and saw the statue of Saddam Hussein fall. On his second tour, he was nearly electrocuted and spent time at Walter Reed Army Medical Center recovering.
Edwards was back in Mobile for an Aug. 3 fundraiser baseball game, throwing out the first ball at Hank Aaron Stadium.
But he recently developed an infection that forced his return to Walter Reed in Washington, D.C., said Larry Gill of Semmes, who also was seriously injured in Iraq and now leads the campaign to raise money for the Edwards home project.
Contributions for Edwards have reached $50,000, with more fundraising events planned.
Don Ford of Mobile, a spokesman for the Blue Knights, a motorcycle group that usually raises money for the sheriff’s Boys Ranch, said the riders have joined the Edwards homebuilding drive.
“We’ve raised flooring, roofing, furniture. We have commitments for heavy equipment to clear his land,” Ford said.
Donations provide 50-60 percent of the construction cost on the Edwards home, and Homes for Our Troops, which has corporate sponsors and individual donors, helps supply the remainder.
Rebello said Homes for Our Troops was started in February 2004 by longtime contractor John Gonsalves. He was inspired to act by a news report of an attack in Iraq. A bomb blast survivor was talking about pulling a friend out of a vehicle who had lost his legs in the blast.
Gonsalves assumed there must be a group somewhere building specially adapted homes for wounded veterans. When he found none, he launched Homes for Our Troops.
Ellie
By Garry Mitchell - The Associated Press
Posted : Sunday Sep 16, 2007 10:16:12 EDT
MOBILE, Ala. — While wounded Marine Sgt. Greg Edwards struggles to walk on artificial legs — a reality in a life rebuilt after Iraq — he won’t have to worry much longer about where his family will live.
The Taunton, Mass.-based Homes for Our Troops will build its first specially adapted house in Alabama for Edwards, his wife, Christina, and their two young daughters, said Kirt Rebello, a spokesman for the nonprofit organization.
Once a general contractor is found, Rebello hopes the house can be built in six months. Property in Mobile County is being purchased this month for the Edwards’ three-bedroom, two-bath home.
In a telephone interview Thursday from his temporary home in Wheaton, Md., near his doctors, Edwards, who lost both legs in an Iraq explosion last fall, said he’s looking forward to the new home. But he admits being “real nervous” about settling down after almost eight years on the move with the Marines Corps.
Edwards, who enlisted at 17 and turns 25 on Sept. 20, said he hopes to enroll at the University of South Alabama here and study business or criminal justice.
Rebello said Homes for Our Troops has 20 homes under way, including the Edwards home. He said 15 other homes have been completed for wounded veterans nationwide.
Rebello said the organization continues to grow, but unfortunately cannot help all the thousands of wounded soldiers returning from war in Iraq.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has a grant program and loan guarantees that help wounded veterans with a home. The veteran could be reimbursed up to $50,000 to renovate a home to accommodate a veteran’s injuries.
Besides structural changes to a home, putting in ramps and wider doors, for example, the VA provides adaptive equipment for vehicles to veterans with service-connected disabilities.
Tom Wilborn, a spokesman for the Disabled American Veterans in Washington, D.C., said he doesn’t know of another nonprofit group that builds specially adapted homes for wounded veterans. He said some smaller scale projects may be undertaken in individual communities.
DAV joined with TV’s Extreme Makeover Home Edition to help one soldier in Tennessee, he said.
“We don’t fix them up in a house. We make sure all their rights and benefits are taken care of,” Wilborn said of the DAV.
In rebuilding his life, Edwards has endured 38 surgeries. The Marine was conducting house searches in Ramadi, Iraq, when a hidden explosive detonated Oct. 21. Besides the loss of both legs, the blast shattered his left hand.
Edwards doesn’t consider himself a war hero.
“A few people tell me that. I was just a guy doing a job and things went bad one day,” he said.
It was his third tour in Iraq. Edwards participated in the initial invasion and saw the statue of Saddam Hussein fall. On his second tour, he was nearly electrocuted and spent time at Walter Reed Army Medical Center recovering.
Edwards was back in Mobile for an Aug. 3 fundraiser baseball game, throwing out the first ball at Hank Aaron Stadium.
But he recently developed an infection that forced his return to Walter Reed in Washington, D.C., said Larry Gill of Semmes, who also was seriously injured in Iraq and now leads the campaign to raise money for the Edwards home project.
Contributions for Edwards have reached $50,000, with more fundraising events planned.
Don Ford of Mobile, a spokesman for the Blue Knights, a motorcycle group that usually raises money for the sheriff’s Boys Ranch, said the riders have joined the Edwards homebuilding drive.
“We’ve raised flooring, roofing, furniture. We have commitments for heavy equipment to clear his land,” Ford said.
Donations provide 50-60 percent of the construction cost on the Edwards home, and Homes for Our Troops, which has corporate sponsors and individual donors, helps supply the remainder.
Rebello said Homes for Our Troops was started in February 2004 by longtime contractor John Gonsalves. He was inspired to act by a news report of an attack in Iraq. A bomb blast survivor was talking about pulling a friend out of a vehicle who had lost his legs in the blast.
Gonsalves assumed there must be a group somewhere building specially adapted homes for wounded veterans. When he found none, he launched Homes for Our Troops.
Ellie