Veterans Services Center

About the Program

Category: Personnel Management, Employment and Training (Best in Category)

Year: 2009

Today’s employment market is seeing the growing emergence of a new type of job seeker: recently separated military personnel (active duty, guard, and reservists). These brand-new veterans returning home after serving in the Middle East, as well as the trans generational veteran population face a broad array of challenges including readjusting to civilian life, deciphering newly acquired veteran benefits, assessing their readiness to join the civilian workforce, and either returning to an already established career or striking out on a new career path related to their military experience. In response, the Maricopa County Workforce Development Division opened a Veterans’ Services Center as part of their new state-of-the-art West Valley Career Center in September of 2007. The overall objective of the VSC is to enhance integrated employment, training, and placement services to veterans and their spouses. The unique project design integrates and enriches the valley’s existing veterans’ services, incorporate online resources and e-tools, and provide additional support services in the areas of mental health, housing, and transitional needs. The Veterans Services Center is the first step in a progressive, long-term approach to increase, integrate, and improve services to this underserved population. The second phase of this effort is to replicate the model in Maricopa County’s East Valley career center. Throughout the process, Maricopa County has collaborated with the City of Phoenix to provide a regional perspective to veterans’ services in the metropolitan Phoenix area.