The Santa Clarita Valley Veterans Collaborative, a local group looking to network veterans with resources, volunteers and outreach, is inviting a renowned expert to speak about veteran issues.

Dr. Carl Castro is credited as a driving force behind the SCV Veterans Collaborative, which is a partnership between USC, College of the Canyons and a number of community service groups dedicated to helping that population.

The talk is geared toward those in outreach in the veteran community, and USC has the largest such program in the country. Anyone working in veteran advocacy is invited to listen to Castro’s presentation.

“(Castro) provides the interns from USC to COC for veteran therapy and counseling,” said Elliott Wolfe, one of the organizers and founders of the collaborative. As the head of the School of Social Work Center for Innovation and Research, he oversees about 500-600 graduate students every year “trained as experts in veteran issues and prepared to venture out into the world to assist where needed.”

Related story:  SCV Veterans Collaborative To Offer Veteran Resources Network

More than 10,000 Santa Clarita Valley residents are veterans who’ve served in the various branches of the armed forces.

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Some of them are looking for information on health care resources. Others are seeking the help of counselors to deal with the trauma they’ve faced.

And many of them are homeless.

Elliott and Judy Wolfe, in collaboration with Murray Wood, Jerry Buckley, and others at the College of the Canyons, formed a group to make sure they know help is out there, a Veterans Collaborative, working with more than 60 other community partners, including KHTS AM-1220.

The Collaborative intends to create an online resource page of useful and reliable programs local veterans can use without having to head over the hill, as well as a way to reach out to those who wish to learn more about what’s out there for veterans.

“Judy and I both feel that it’s the time in our lives, well, we’re not getting any younger,” the retired founder of successful private investigation firm said. “We figured it was time to start doing some philanthropic work.”

To that end, the group is also seeking grant writers who can help the Collaborative go after existing funds and scholarships for veterans here in the Santa Clarita Valley.

The Wolfes, who’ve been involved heavily in veteran philanthropy, supporting projects such as the Gary Sinise Foundation, realized while they were working in partnership with USC, that there was a great local need, as well.

The Wolfes, both USC alumni, spurred USC’s Social Work program with creating the Collaborative in partnership with COC to address that locally.

College of the Canyons, for example, has approximately 1,100 veterans among its student population, and many of them experience a spectrum of challenges unique to starting civilian life over as an adult, said Renard Thomas, director of the Veterans Resource Center at College of the Canyons.

COC, which is represented by Murray Wood (among numerous other COC faculty and staff who are supporting the effort) is hosting the meetings to develop the collaborative, which are scheduled to take place monthly, and might soon need a larger venue than even the expansive University Center conference room offers. There were 50 community representatives at the first meeting in August, and more than 60 at September’s.

The goal behind the program is to create a reliable referral network for Santa Clarita Valley veterans, many of whom are being required to travel to the city of Los Angeles to get their resources they’ve been guaranteed, Thomas said. And even when the students has the resources to make it to L.A., some are met with broken promises or, in some cases, lost in a struggling system.

The group reported statistics based on their research that provides insight on the veteran:

1 percent of the U.S. population is in the military service

11 percent of the U.S. population served during World War II

50 percent of all college students were veterans after World War II

There was 0 percent unemployment after World War II

In total, 8 percent of the U.S. population has served in the Military sometime during their life

Perhaps, most concerning, half of all homeless veterans in the country are in Los Angeles (which officials attribute to the climate)

The COC veteran population is just one of the many segments of a very diverse group, returning veterans, who have a myriad of needs, Thomas said, and while the college is excellent at making sure the students have access to their educational or training resources for career development, the re-adjustment for veterans, and the need, goes beyond that, he said. And that’s the whole idea of the partnership.

“Our mission here at COC is to help veterans who are interested in receiving training, retraining or education… And so we help those veterans get those benefits,” Thomas said. “We are really good at the educational and work training piece, but we need to resource with networks outside our institution in order to help veterans with issues, obstacles that they’re facing other than education. So if you have PTSD, TBI, you’re homeless or you’re just experiencing some transition anxiety, we’re going to partner with you with someone who can offer those services to help you with that.”

The group plans for the website to be operational within a week or two, but Wolfe said any veterans who would like to sign up for information, a business owner who would like to support the group or offer an additional resource, can contact Elliott Wolfe at ipry4u@gmail.com.