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Date: 5/2/2023
LUDLOW — On April 29, the town of Ludlow and its Veterans Services Department commemorated its new Veterans Center at 487 Holyoke St. with a ribbon cutting ceremony and open house. Town Administrator Marc Strange, state Rep. Aaron Saunders and state Sen. Jake Oliveira were in attendance as well as veterans and their families.
Director of Veterans Services Eric Segundo said, “This Veterans Center idea has been in the works for a couple of years now. It came forward with the coronavirus pandemic and we identified services that were lacking.”
He continued, “We needed to have a center where we can do all the activities and services for our veterans who didn’t have access to the Internet, telehealth access, food insecurity, socialization with other veterans and that’s when this came about.”
The new Veterans Center will have a permanent food pantry with refrigeration and a conference room that can hold up to 90 people. The center will be introducing evening hours to the center and hosting veterans coffee hours and lunches. The center will also have a dedicated space for veterans to use the computer to either telehealth with their doctors, schedule appointments, job searching or resume building with the printer and fax machine for access for that as well.
Part of the new center’s dedication included the official naming of the center’s conference room in memory of Sgt. Joshua D. Desforges, a United States Marine, who was killed in 2010, while serving in Afghanistan and the only Ludlow service member killed in action from the wars in Afghanistan.
Segundo stated, “We must never forget those lost in war, in order to continue to remember them and remember their service, we must continue to say their name so we will never forget. By having his name on this conference room wall as everyone comes in here, they will remember Josh Desforges and his memory will never fade.”
He went on to say, “We’re looking to have this center be a one stop shop for veterans to come in and do anything veteran related and be here located in their own community.”
Right now, the hours for the Veterans Center are Monday, Wednesday and Thursday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Friday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m.