Greater Boston Veterans Collaborative

Sean Horgan

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Veterans Collaborative⁠

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In July 2014, I was one of dozens of area veterans and veterans service providers gathered in Boston where Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America released the disturbing results of their 2014 Member Survey. “The crisis of suicide” was identified as the top concern of the roughly 2,000 members who completed the survey.

“Today the stories confided through this survey have motivated our urgent call for a nationwide effort to combat suicide. Forty percent of our members have known at least one Iraq or Afghanistan veteran who has died by suicide, and 31 percent have thought about taking their own life since joining the military.” –– Paul Reickhoff, IAVA Founder

I worked with a group of other local leaders from various organizations and the City of Boston’s Office of Veteran Services to convene a summit bringing together service providers from organizations across various sectors. This ambitious group set goals to assess the field, identify strengths/gaps in services, encourage greater collaboration, and build a coalition of organizations working proactively together to improve on and leverage available services and support to reach those who are seeking it.

In advance of the kickoff, we developed a survey for participants to identify common ground and interests across organizations, and to identify the primary focus areas, skills, and needs of each organization. We developed a list of local stakeholders, looking at service providers, veterans organizations, universities, agencies, and others to plan for the first summit in January 2015.

A series of timely white papers outlining the critical importance of coordinated efforts in the veterans space informed our approach and process. During the summit, it became clear more opportunities to connect around a range of issues were desperately needed to identify challenges, brainstorm together, and learn about each other’s work and how to make direct referrals to the various programs.

After a couple of summits, the Greater Boston Veterans Collaborative (GBVC) emerged to meet the ongoing need to create inclusive spaces, increase face-to-face engagement between service providers, and map the landscape.

Below is a photo from the early days where I’m probably describing the approximate size of the chicken parm sub I’d like for lunch ;-)

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