Empowering Military Families: Overcoming Challenges with Operation Homefront

What unique challenges do military families face, and how can we support them in times of need? Join us for an enlightening conversation with Vivian Dietrich, the Senior Regional Director for Region 4 of Operation Homefront, who brings 17 years of experience to the table. Gain insight into the critical financial assistance programs aimed at alleviating unexpected burdens like car repairs and housing costs, and discover the vital role that financial management guidance plays in fostering strong, stable, and secure military families. Vivian and I talk about the pressing issue of affordable housing near military installations.

Transitioning from military to civilian life presents its own set of challenges, and Operation Homefront's Transitional Homes for Veterans program is here to bridge that gap. Vivian takes us through the comprehensive support system offered, including low-rent housing and financial education, designed to empower veterans toward self-sufficiency. Listeners are encouraged to plan ahead and start thinking about life after military service well before separation. Don't miss out on how volunteers and donors are crucial in making these programs successful, benefiting not just the veterans' families but the entire community. Tune in to learn how you can make a difference and stay connected for upcoming episodes with even more impactful insights.

Chapters

• 0:00 Supporting Military Families With Operation Homefront
• 15:17 Supporting Military Families Through Operation Homefront
• 25:21 Honoring Military Families With Operation Homefront

Transcript

Larry Zilliox: 0:14

Good morning. I'm your host, larry Zilliox, Director of Culinary Services, here at the Warrior Retreat at Bull Run, and this week our guest is Vivian Dietrich. She is the Senior Regional Director for Region 4 of Operation Homefront and before we get going, I've got to believe that Region 4 is the best of all the regions, and she's here to tell us why and more about what Operation Homefront does. I know they do great things. We've been at tabling events. Most recently we were both at the holiday party at Walter Reed in December, so I'm very familiar with Operation Homefront and I'm very excited to have her join me. So, vivian, welcome to the podcast.

Vivian Dietrich: 1:03

Larry, thank you so much for inviting me. My favorite subject Operation Homefront and how to help military families. I'm also excited to be able to partner with someone who has extreme devotion to our service members, and I'm just privileged to be here today.

Larry Zilliox: 1:23

So tell us how long have you been involved with Operation Homefront?

Vivian Dietrich: 1:26

Well, just the other day somebody on the inbox dropped me an email that said congratulations on 17 years with Operation Homefront. And for a moment I don't know whether I was celebrating or going gosh, has it been that long, but it's been a blink for me. A wonderful organization, and I just think the time that I've been here sort of speaks for itself to find a place that you're giving back and helping military families. Just, the years go so quickly and there's still so much left to be done.

Larry Zilliox: 2:05

For sure, this is Region 4, which is Northern Virginia. How big is the region? Is it also DC, maryland, or what is this region?

Vivian Dietrich: 2:14

Operation Homefront is a national organization. We have six regions across the United States. We serve all 50 states, so I've got eight of those states the DMV, west Virginia, both of the Carolinas and Tennessee and Kentucky, so pretty much the mid-Atlantic region.

Larry Zilliox: 2:35

Your programs. What would you say is the top program that Operation Homefront has, or is the one that services the most active duty and veteran population?

Vivian Dietrich: 2:47

Well, we have a variety of programs, and they're divided into relief, and they're divided relief and recurring programs. Our real core program, though, is our critical financial support, and this is an opportunity that we feel we have to support military families that are facing financial stress.

Larry Zilliox: 3:14

What does that look like? I know that housing is a huge issue and lack thereof. What other assistance do you give them? When it comes to financial assistance, is it for car payments or repairs or anything like that?

Vivian Dietrich: 3:30

Our financial assistance program is helping military families that are facing financial stress. Perhaps the family car broke down? The car needed repairing. So what do you do? You skip your house payment, you don't pay the utility bill? Well, then you begin to fall behind. So this is our core value it helps these families when there's that shortfall, and it most often will be around a mortgage payment, rent, utilities, home and car repairs, maybe overdue bills, and sometimes it's even something as simple as groceries, which isn't simple when you don't have money and you have family. Being able to call and get support for groceries is a big deal, especially during this high inflation period of time. We're finding that these families, the need is increasing, especially in the world of needing food during this time.

Vivian Dietrich: 4:35

Some of these contributing factors and it's impacting a lot of different people, not only the military, but it's partially they're young, they have not the skill sets that they need to manage their income and to manage their expenses, and we're here to help build this strong, stable and secure military family. That's what we want to do. So when they face a hardship, if there's a bump in the road financially, they can reach to Operation Homefront and we can assist. Sometimes these situations can even occur if there's a deployment. We're a military family. My husband is retired now but he went back with DOD and we've experienced some of those situations yourself. You deploy, many times there isn't someone to care for the children, so the spouse will have to leave their job and come home or they need to hire sitters. Loss of income. All of these things play into factors that occur in a military family that they can't avoid. But they need a place to turn. So our critical financial assistance program, which they can go to our website, operationhomefrontorg and read about how to apply for that type of assistance.

Larry Zilliox: 6:01

I know housing is a huge, huge issue. In fact. Listeners, next Monday morning's episode will be one that I recorded recently with Alyssa Sissa. She's the Director of Defense Capabilities and Management at the General Accounting Office of Defense Capabilities and Management at the General Accounting Office and they just released a report on what DOD should do to address the critical supply shortage of affordable housing around installations.

Larry Zilliox: 6:29

And reading through this report and you just hear story after story of military families that are struggling because they're getting a base housing allowance but it doesn't cover in their community what the cost is of renting and they're either sending a family home to live with relatives and the service member goes into the dormitory or they're just struggling and not, you know, just really having a hard time. And does Operation Homefront have any programs that help them with budgeting or to teach them about managing money? Or, you know, because they're in an environment where, by and large, just about everything is provided for them, you know you have a legal problem, you go down illegal things like that. Is there any training involved or is it just a grant sort of program?

Vivian Dietrich: 7:29

When you apply. We like to really understand everything about the family. We do a deep dive into their financials. We try to find out how they're living, what their need is and if they may call and just ask for, can you pay my utility bill? Well, we want to understand the entire financial picture. It's important for us to understand that picture so that we know how best to help them the first time around that someone applies, if they're applying for financial assistance. Once we check the eligibility, go through their financial situation. We're looking to make someone resilient. We're trying to stabilize them. We will make a decision as to what debts need to be paid and we'll pay the debts to the vendor. We do not give the cash to the family. What we do is we pay the vendor and then we set them up so that they can move forward, because many times it's just a bump in the road.

Vivian Dietrich: 8:36

A car set them behind. It's just a bump in the road Car set them behind. They had maybe someone became ill and there was an expense there. So once we've alleviated that, we tell them okay, if there's nothing else at this point, you know we wish them well and they can come back should they run into a problem again. If they come back a second time and we see there's a pattern beginning, okay, we begin to look at okay, this family is most likely going to need some critical financial schooling at this point. So when they return, that's part of the criteria.

Vivian Dietrich: 9:19

There is that we do want to get them sound on how to manage their funding. They're young, they don't really know it's not taught in the schools as much, it's not out there. It's so easy to get that credit card at $10 a month and the next thing, you know it's $250 a month in a high balance. So we do have counselors that can work with them and referrals that we can give them where they have to go to schooling, to HACCP, and then come back and we can help them again. Then come back and we can help them again In all of our housing programs. That's something that we encourage as well is building their financial literacy. You just give someone a house, it's not going to work. It's not going to work because they've got to know how to maintain it. We have a variety of housing programs that you may have noticed on our websites, and if I could walk through them for a second, I can kind of explain to you how that works.

Larry Zilliox: 10:24

Let me ask you one question before we move on to that. Do you find that when service members or veterans come to you and say, okay, I have this problem, that very often it's never just one problem? It's probably a series of things like maybe they have an issue paying a bill, but they're also struggling to find care for an autistic child, or you know PCS. Every time a service member PCS, there's always additional costs that aren't covered by the military. You know you have to. You have to buy new things because you couldn't ship food, all sorts of things like that. Do you find that it's never really one thing, but usually a couple?

Vivian Dietrich: 11:09

What I've found is it's really there's a pattern. The calls come very late in the day. It's usually they're going to turn the power off at five o'clock. Okay, so they're calling at 415. They're going to turn the power off. Can you help? Generally the wife, and it's always.

Vivian Dietrich: 11:31

I mean, obviously you knew you were getting the disconnect notices, but you can see the pressure and the stress that they're under. They don't know where to turn, so it's usually at a very last minute. I have nowhere else to turn. They're Googling or they're searching or they've heard of us and they'll call and it's just a desperate call that we get. Most of the time, if you ask them, they'll say, oh, that's all I owe. But when you talk with the families they'll begin to relax and they'll share. Well, I thought if I told you I also was going to have the water cut off in two weeks I might not be able to get the power turned on. So they're in such a story about support and where they can go and where they can find it, and they're just desperate for you to help them with the one crisis.

Vivian Dietrich: 12:26

But we have highly trained counselors that work with the financial assistance and they are always kind. They're great listeners. It's not easy for families to talk about their financial situation. It can even be embarrassing for them. But our counselors are gentle and they work through and in no time they're just opening up and they're sharing their story. They're sharing about their financial needs and they just run through a list and we'll ask them is there anything else? Because we're going to find it. We go, we want to see the bank statements, we want to look at the eligibility requirements, we want to know that they're in the military. You know it's certain steps that they go through, but the professionalism of the Operation Homefront Critical Financial Assistance counselors is amazing and they connect very closely with those families. They sort of own that family and feel like, hey, I've got to find everything that we can do to help this family and to get them in a better situation. So we're a simple bump in the road.

Larry Zilliox: 13:46

Doesn't become a long-term crisis members call and think that all they need is just covering of one financial debt, when, if the counselor has the entire picture, they can make them aware of resources they had no idea were available and ways to get additional support. I mean that's just amazing. So, yeah, let's talk a little bit about the housing programs that you have, because I mean, this is a nationwide problem, not just effects only, you know, military, but there's a critical shortage of affordable housing nationwide. You can't find a place to live in this country making minimum wage by yourself. You have to live with other people to be able to afford it. So our service members and veterans are not exempt from that. There are a lot of service members who retire and find out that their retirement pay is not enough and they start working again, or spouses get jobs and it can be a real struggle. But there's also a serious problem of homeless veterans and I think your housing programs are really exceptional. If you could, yeah, tell us a little bit about the housing programs.

Vivian Dietrich: 15:16

Well, to your point. Last year's Blue Star Family surveys actually showed that 44% of the retired veterans and 46% of the non-retired had less than one year to even think about what were they going to do when they got out of the military. They just were not paired. And many of them come out and they don't even have a job to step into, let alone where am I going to live, where are the children going to go to school? So Operation Homefront has housing programs called Transitional Homes for Veterans, called Transitional Homes for Veterans, and knowing that this is a challenge for veterans that are stepping out of the military, we have established some homes around the country that enables transitioning veterans that are from three years of discharge, right in that window where they're going to be successful or they're not. With that transition they can apply for one of our programs based on having served honorably. It's temporary, it's rent-free, they also have financial education. Again, just to give them a home will not make them successful. It has to have all of the components. We call it a program that they graduate from and we support these families and help them work towards self-sufficiency as they come into the civilian world. So once we select a family from one of those homes. We assign them a caseworker. They also are assigned a financial counselor and they will work with them to create a personalized financial, educational, employment and personal goals. We want to set them up for success. These families will gain knowledge about how to manage their funds, how to buy a house, how to improve their credit scores, pay off debt, what to do when there's an emergency and how to engage in the community. The homes that we have that are transitional homes are in communities that are affordable for their income bracket so hopefully, when the program ends that they buy a home in that community, come to our programs that were $15,000, $20,000 in debt, left debt-free with $15,000 to $20,000 in their savings, because we hold them accountable for how they're managing their dollars while they're in these programs and setting them up for success.

Vivian Dietrich: 18:14

Even though it's rent free, we do require the payments to pay a monthly fee. It's usually a portion of the real estate tax. It's not a handout. It's like you're actually earning this and you're paying a small fee. It may be a few hundred dollars and then they can reside in the homes.

Vivian Dietrich: 18:36

There's a two-year or a three-year program, but many of these families that come into these programs. They're changed. They're changed. They're children. We have them set up in schools. They're active with other kids in the community. The family has connected through different community groups and activities and they have a home that they're proud of. They're also taught while they're in these homes. You know you're going to have to repair a home. You can't just go get a place and not take care of it. Then you're going to run into emergency issues again. So it's really a wrap around the family to help them get to a place that they're stable and can stand on their own. That's a transitional home for these military families that are coming out. But some of these homes and you can go to our websites here in Alabama, florida, georgia, illinois, louisiana, north Carolina, south Carolina, texas. We currently are taking applications in Florida, georgia, louisiana, south Carolina and Texas. Obviously, these areas are more affordable. To your point that you made earlier, where do you find affordable housing?

Larry Zilliox: 19:51

Yeah Well, I would urge our listeners to check out the webpage, to go to operationhomefrontorg. Operationhomefrontorg Check out the webpage. There's plenty of resources. Look at these programs. It may not be right for you, you may have a house, you may be fine, but you may know a young service member who's separating and needs to be in this program, and they need to be in this program long before it's time for them to separate or retire Three years. Traditionally, we recommend that service members look at a TAPS program and begin to consider their future after military service at least two years before they've decided they want to separate. So this is a program that could help them, especially the wounded, ill or injured soldiers that just really do need to continue with treatment after they're medically discharged, and being placed into this type of program near a VA facility could be a godsend, really.

Larry Zilliox: 21:03

So, listeners, take a look at the webpage. You all know where the big red button is. It's up in the right-hand corner. Go ahead and bang on it and donate. Think about the different programs that they have and how effective they are with helping families. I know that you can donate, give whatever you can $5,000, $10,000, $15,000, whatever you can. It all goes to a very good cause. So don't overlook that, but check out every inch of the webpage and find resources either for yourself or those that you can recommend to your buddies and your fellow service members. You know, vivian, before we kind of wrap things up here, what's the one thing that you want, the most important thing that you want listeners to know about Operation Homefront?

Vivian Dietrich: 21:56

You know Operation Homefront there's so many. We're one of the largest nonprofits in the United States that support veterans. But Operation Homefront supports military family, not just the veteran. To have a healthy military family is good for us, it's good for our country, it's good for their family, and we can't do this without volunteers. We have over 4,000 plus volunteers helping us support our military families. We also can't do it without our donors.

Vivian Dietrich: 22:36

We have donors all around the programs that help military families get out and enjoy an event where we provide holiday meals. A meal seems very simple to many of us, but a holiday meal every holiday, whether it's the 4th of July, whether it's Thanksgiving and the December holidays it's Thanksgiving and the December holidays a holiday meal where everyone can come together with their family, whether the service members deployed and it's the family and the neighbors. It's a holiday meal that provides everything that they would need to be able to pull together, a traditional holiday meals of Thanksgiving, and we give them a gift card to be able to purchase the protein. And that doesn't change the fact that they're alone, but it does help them get through the holiday by having friends over and having a meal and not having it be a negative impact on their budget. So every single program we have is budget relieving and we need the support of the community to make this happen for us.

Larry Zilliox: 24:04

I can't tell you how important this program is. Listeners, this is one of the largest VSOs. Professionally run a steward of your donation, I guarantee it. Professionally run a steward of your donation, I guarantee it. You definitely want to check out their webpage, which again is operationhomefrontorg. Don't overlook all of the programs that they have, because just reading down here I saw just caught my eye that they have the Star Spangled Babies program, which provides financial support and critical baby supplies for newborns to service members. So I mean, who thinks?

Vivian Dietrich: 24:41

of that Lettering baby showers. We do baby showers and I'm telling you we have so much fun with these moms because they are most likely hundreds of miles away from families and friends and maybe even a spouse is deployed. But this is a baby shower they wouldn't ordinarily have and they are just showered with wonderful gifts and it's all done by volunteers helping us and grateful donors saying hey, we want to support our military families while they're here in our community, and these happen all across the United States.

Larry Zilliox: 25:18

Wow. Well, that's just great. So, vivian, thank you so much for joining us I really appreciate it and for letting everybody know how wonderful Operation Homefront is.

Vivian Dietrich: 25:31

It was my pleasure, it was a privilege to be here and share with you about Operation Homefront, our military family. They serve us every day when our country has a need. I think it's important that we're there when they have a need and that's what we can do together. Thank you for allowing me to be here today and share about Operation Homefront.

Larry Zilliox: 25:52

Well, absolutely, and, listeners, we'll have another episode next Monday morning at 0500. If you have any questions or suggestions, you can reach us at podcast at willingwarriorsorg. Until then, thanks for listening.