Shelter provides services, place to stay for homeless veterans in central Arizona

PHOENIX (KSAZ) - As Veterans Day weekend wraps up, it's important to remember that our nation's heroes should be honored and taken care of every day of the year.

The Central Arizona Shelter Services in Phoenix is an emergency shelter that provides services for nearly 600 people daily, 365 days a year. Many of these people are veterans

"Of that, we have about 100 per night on average in the shelter. They range anywhere from, I believe the youngest we had was 22, and the oldest veteran I've had in the shelter with us that we've helped was 82 years old," said Gwendolyn Reilly, the veteran program manager.

They help veterans like Kenneth Trux.

"In the service, you fit in. You had a certain thing to do, that was your job. Come out of the service, it's like you don't know what you are doing cause you don't know how you fit in," Trux said.

Trux served in the Army from 1984 to 1988. He was deployed to Korea.

When he returned, he tried running his own business, but adjusting was tough.

"All of a sudden, everything just fell through and I'm back here," Trux said.

By here, he means homeless, and sometimes helpless. And that's where programs like CASS come in.

"We have partners that we work with. St. Joseph, The Worker, Goodwill, other employers that come and they do job fairs and we send them there," Reilly said.

CASS offers a warm bed and a hot meal, but the services here offer a glimpse of promise as well.

"For one, you have a mailing address and you have all the resources in one spot instead of traveling all over the city to try to get to certain programs," Trux said.

"What the public can understand is that every day, we need to pay attention to the veterans who served our country, especially the homeless veterans that's an increasing population," said Lisa Glow, who is with CASS.