Legionnaires urged to engage with Post-9/11 groups

Legionnaires urged to engage with Post-9/11 groups

Per a resolution passed during the National Executive Committee’s Spring Meetings, Legion posts and departments are being called upon to embrace and collaborate with Post-9/11 generation-centric veterans groups, such as Team Rubicon, The Mission Continues and Team Red, White & Blue.

Resolution 20, introduced by the Legion’s 100th Anniversary Observance Committee, encourages posts and departments to build and maintain mutually beneficial relationships with the local branches of these Post-9/11 veterans organizations and other similarly situated organizations.

“(These) are three effective and innovative Post-9/11 veterans groups that share values similar to those of The American Legion and can play an important part in defining a second-century vision for the organization,” Resolution 20 reads.

Past such collaborations between Legionnaires and members of these groups have provided crucial assistance to communities in need. In 2013, Legionnaires and posts in Colorado collaborated with Team Rubicon members to provide relief to flood victims who were displaced as a result of mass flooding that damaged more than 16,000 households in Colorado. Legionnaires and Team Rubicon also worked together to provide disaster aid to the Northeastern Seaboard in the wake of Superstorm Sandy in 2012 and for tornado victims in Oklahoma in 2013.

Legionnaires are encouraged to reach out to Team Red, White & Blue and participate in, or help host, the physical and social activities and volunteer opportunities that Team RW&B coordinates in communities. Legionnaires should also consider participating in community service projects coordinated by The Mission Continues, which seeks to help veterans reintegrate into civilian life through placing them in “platoons” that volunteer and provide community outreach. The platoons welcome participation from veterans of all ages and eras. Legionnaires are encouraged to locate a platoon in their area and ‘serve’ with it.

Donations made during the Spring Meetings helped National Commander Michael D. Helm reach his fundraising goal of $4 million. At the 2014 National Convention, Helm issued a challenge to the Legion Family to raise a combined $4 million this year for the Legion’s various charities. Closing in on the goal heading into May, donations made during the Spring Meetings pushed the campaign over the top. The Sons helped hit the goal with a donation of more than $128,000 to the Child Welfare Foundation. Donations will also go to fund Operation Comfort Warriors, the National Emergency Fund, the Legacy Scholarship Fund, Endowment Fund and Soldier’s Wish, as well as the Auxiliary’s Emergency Fund, Spirit of Youth Scholarship Fund, Children of Warriors National Presidents’ Scholarship and the Auxiliary’s Foundation.

“I think setting the goal and opening all the charities to the entire American Legion Family put everybody in that spirit-of-giving mode and maybe (created) a little bit of competition between each other,” Helm said. “Not only was it coming together as a family to raise money for American Legion charities, but also an individual, personal competition between departments or posts, Auxiliary units, (SAL) squadrons and (Legion Rider) chapters.”