🎖️ Military & Veterans By Domenic Clementi, Military & Veterans Editor

The Virginia Department of Veterans Services

My Friends,

Thank you for taking the time to read this column. While I am certainly not young, I completed over thirty years of service in the U.S. Army not that long ago. Yet I feel like I still have a great deal to learn about being a veteran — very much to figure out about what benefits are available to me, and so much I am still figuring out about how the various complementary and overlapping benefits systems and networks operate. Here's how I hope to help you in this column. I will endeavor to provide a useful tip, observation, or a link to a website that may be of use to you.

This week: The Virginia Department of Veterans Services (DVS) 👉 dvs.virginia.gov

Please take a minute this week — over your coffee or beer — to click on the link above. Although I have lived here in Woodbridge for several years, both in and out of uniform, I neither knew nor bothered to find out if the State of Virginia had a department devoted to veterans and their issues. Well, yes, they do, and I think it's a pretty good one.

The Virginia DVS has 38 offices across the state and can help with:

— Advising Veterans on Disability Claims and Pensions — Support for Mental Health and Substance Abuse Disorders — Assistance to Military Spouses (Employment, Child Care, Professional Licenses and Certifications) — Education Benefits — Tax Exemptions

When you visit the website, you will find so many more areas where the DVS can assist you and your family.

If you are like me, you may want to speak to someone in person. The Manassas office is the nearest one to Woodbridge:

Virginia Department of Veterans Services — Manassas Office 9300 W. Courthouse Rd, Suite 305, Manassas, VA 20110 📞 703-479-7437 By appointment, Monday–Friday, 9–11 a.m. & 1–3 p.m. Limited walk-ins every Friday, 9–11 a.m.

I hope this information was of use to you. Have a great week — and be proud of your service.

Honoring service. Covering community. — Dom

Photo: Unsplash, Judy Beth Morris