From helping veterans acquire compensation and health care benefits to replacing pins, badges, and patches lost from their uniforms, area veterans affairs offices make sure local veterans can access the resources they need.

Alpena County Veterans Officer Dan Perge said more than 2,000 veterans reside in Alpena County. Working with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Perge’s office helped deposit more than $14.2 million in veterans compensation directly into the pockets of veterans in Alpena County in 2022. In addition, local veterans received $13.5 million in health care benefits, Perge said.

Perge said that, although his office assists about 200 veterans a month, many veterans in Alpena County don’t know about the office in Alpena or are too prideful to ask for help.

He said his office and his staff — which includes William Stypick, assistant veterans service officer — act as middlemen between area veterans and the VA and help veterans wade through all the red tape involved in trying to claim benefits or other needs.

News Photo by Steve Schulwitz Alpena County Veterans Officer Dan Perge, left, offers help to Marine veteran Mike Stentoumis last week. Stentoumis had some questions about a government program that assists veterans and met with Perge to get his questions answered.

“It can be very difficult and the VA is very accommodating and allows people to sit at home and file a claim online, but is it an easy process? No,” Perge said. “There are a lot of ins and outs and information needed that some people, especially widowed spouses, may not know. We can help them clear many of the hurdles.”

Last week, the widow of Larry Mason, a Marine who died in 2009, stopped by the Alpena veterans office to seek information on how to file for a property tax exemption. Perge explained that a tax abatement form should be mailed directly to her because she had received the tax break before and explained the process she should use if the tax letter didn’t come in the mail.

The widow said her husband took care of all of the paperwork and filings to the VA for his benefits, but, when he passed, she didn’t know what to do to claim benefits or if she was entitled to any at all. She said she was already distraught from the passing of her husband and the uncertainty about finances and how to work with the VA added to her anxiety.

“When you don’t have the correct paperwork because he had it tucked away in one of his little hiding holes, I found it difficult to get everything I needed,” she said. “I didn’t have the dates of when he went into the service, the date when he got out, what his rank was, and it was very difficult.”

Perge said he assists many spouses of veterans and is beginning to see more younger veterans who fought in the most recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and in the Gulf War.

News Photo by Steve Schulwitz Alpena County Veterans Officer Dan Perge drops an American flag in a container full of other flags at the Alpena County Department of Veterans Affairs office. The flags will be properly disposed of. Flag disposal is only one of many services the office offers.

“We still don’t see as many as we do from the Vietnam era,” he said. “But we are seeing more from the current-era veterans.”

Despite the high number of veterans his office has helped, Perge said he believes there are still many veterans who don’t know about his office and what it is for. He said he is marketing the department in hopes more veterans in Alpena County will seek help if they need it.

“I’m shocked how many times I get calls and they tell me they didn’t know we were here,” he said. “We use the state’s county veterans grant to run ads, put up billboards, make TV commercials to get the word out. We are doing everything to get the word out there.”

News Photo by Steve Schulwitz A memorial dedicated to an Army veteran from Alpena hangs on the wall at the Alpena County Department of Veterans Affairs office. The memorial honoring Gene Fussey is one of several dozen paying tribute to veterans for their service.

News Photo by Steve Schulwitz The widow of Larry Mason, a Marine who died in 2009, dropped in at the Alpena County Department of Veterans Affairs office in Alpena last week seeking advice on how and when to file for a tax benefit. Veterans Officer Dan Perge quickly offered her direction.

News file photo