OGDEN -- Veterans in Weber County, led by Congressional Medal of Honor winner George Wahlen, are trying to get the state's second veterans nursing home.
Wahlen, of Roy, and other members of the Utah Military and Veteran Affairs Committee, are drumming up support at city council meetings."Pocatello has three nursing homes for veterans, and we have more veterans than Idaho has," said Wahlen, a veteran of the Korean and Vietnam wars while serving in the U.S. Navy, Marines and the Army. He earned the Medal of Honor as a Navy medic at Iwo Jima.
Utah likely has 150,000 veterans, and probably 300 around the state are in private nursing homes, using Medicaid funding that could be saved, veterans say.
Also, veteran organization members are more likely to volunteer at Veterans Administration facilities.
Wahlen and the veteran affairs committee, a statewide consortium of veterans groups, spent more than five years lobbying around the state to get Utah's first VA nursing home established in Salt Lake City.
The 80-bed facility opened in April and is already full.
Wahlen hopes things will go a little faster this time around.
"We're contacting local officials and once we document the local support, that makes it easier to approach the Legislature," Wahlen said. The veterans need a legislator to sponsor a bill.
The state must pay a third of the anticipated $6 million cost before the Veteran's Administration will commit to the project, he said.
Former Sen. Craig Peterson, R-Salt Lake City, sponsored the appropriation bill for the Salt Lake project. "We're sorry he retired," Wahlen said.
Wahlen and other veteran affairs committee members have visited the Layton and North Ogden city councils, and plan to speak with the Brigham City and South Ogden councils.
They're hoping a city might have a site available to donate for a nursing home.