Politics & Government
Calverton National Cemetery Hosts Ceremony on Saturday for Deceased Homeless Vets
Ceremony under a tent will feature tributes from Congressmen Bishop and Israel and County Executive Steve Levy for 20 homeless veterans.
The remains of 20 homeless military veterans – some of whom died as far back as 2006, but whose bodies had never been claimed – will be buried at Calverton National Cemetery Saturday morning in a ceremony under a tent scheduled to begin at 11 a.m.
Speakers will include Rep. Tim Bishop, D - Southampton, and Steve Israel, D - Huntington, Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy and Commissioner Terrance Holiday, a retired Air Force colonel who heads the Mayor’s Office of Veteran Affairs for New York.
“We are honored to participate in this ceremony and to recognize the sacrifices made by these military members on our behalf,” said Levy. “Dignity Memorial and veterans’ organizations that worked so diligently to provide this well deserved tribute are to be commended.”
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The veterans' final journey, organized by the City of New York, the Department of Veterans Affairs and various non-profit groups, will begin at 8:30 a.m. at a staging area at Francis Lewis High School in Fresh Meadows, Queens. Dignity Memorial is a network of funeral homes in 32 cities that provides military funerals for qualified veterans through its Homeless Veterans Burial Program.
From Queens, a funeral procession of 20 hearses, each donated by funeral homes and livery companies, will travel the Long Island Expressway and then William Floyd Parkway, arriving at Calverton at around 10 a.m., according to Laura Macho, a spokesperson for the Frank E. Campbell Funeral Home, which is helping to coordinate the event.
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Weather permitting, the procession will be led by members of the Nam Knights Motorcycle Club and the Patriot Guard Riders Motorcycle Club, groups dedicated to respecting those who have served for the United States.
On the final leg of the trip – the four-mile stretch of Rte. 25 East leading to the cemetery’s entrance – the procession will pass under ten arches flying American flags, formed by 20 bucket trucks from local fire departments. Similar arches will be set up on various overpasses along the Long Island Expressway.
According to Macho, the bodies of the 20 veterans – whom she described as indigent and homeless men from Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn and the Bronx, with no close family when their died – had been stored in various mortuaries in New York operated by the city’s medical examiners office. Most passed away in 2010.
