AM Buffalo was live today at WNY Heroes Inc.'s new facility. Tonight is the grand opening of this wonderful new hub for veterans but this morning we are giving you a first look inside. The new facility is not just a place to get all the formal services veterans need. It is a place to come together to just be together. To talk. To support each other.
Emily Lampa spoke with Lynn Magistrale, program director of WNY Heroes. Lynn says, “We are going to have an open house tonight at 1001 East Delavan and we are going to have some wine tastings, some beer tastings, some food of course, and just network, a great time to for to say, we’re here, come take a look, hear about our programs and other facilities will be here as well sharing what they do in the community for veterans as well.”
One program they offer at WNY Heroes is Pawsitive for Heroes. Lynn says, “Pawsitive for Heroes was started by Chris Kreiger and he knew there was a need once it was working for him. He knew it couldn’t just be him that needed a service animal to help him through day-to-day and so we knew we had to have this program and it grew so much we now have our own training facility.”
This facility offers counseling, prescription pick-up, and just recently WNY Heroes received funding to help pay for prescriptions! Lynn says, “We now will have our counselors right on staff, we will have social workers, we already have the case work here in place so now we can grow off of that. We will have nurse practitioners here to see the veterans. So, a lot of times veterans will fall in this little gray area where they aren’t able to utilize the VA or they aren’t able to utilize the other amazing services in the community and there is that little spot in the middle that they don’t get covered for, we are now able to do that with the support of our community.”
Also on site is the New York State Department of Veteran Services. They will see veterans if they need any service connections
WNY Heroes is a non-profit. Lynn says, “Without your support we can’t do this. Without our gala, without our fundraising, we absolutely could not do this. We are a nonprofit and we are here to help veterans and we will do whatever it takes, whether it is working for free, whether it is begging for volunteers, whatever it takes we are going to make it absolutely happen.”
For more information go to WNYHeroes.org or give them a call at 716-630-5020.
