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[ Silence ]
>> Koby Langley: My name's Koby Langley, I'm the Senior Adviser
to the CEO of the Corporation of National Community Service.
First, before we get started,
I wanted to acknowledge two people,
an old friend and a new friend.
The old friend is somebody that many people are just now getting
to know but it's somebody that I've known for many,
many years as a leader and advocate
in the better military family space and he also happens
to be sponsoring this, helping us sponsor this
particular presentation.
So Todd Bowers, would you please stand up?
Thanks, Todd.
[ Applause ]
I'd also like to recognize a new friend, Trisha Thompson.
Trisha Thompson helped organize this entire pre-conference
and has done some extraordinary work in leaning forward
in bringing the idea of National Service and Volunteerism
to this problem that we face and also to recognize veterans
and military families as a solution.
So I'd like everybody, please give a round
of applause for Trisha.
Thank you, Trisha.
[ Applause ]
So I'm here to talk to you all about an idea and I'm also here
to talk to you about a call to action.
The idea is that even in the darkest hour,
there are points of light.
These points of light can actually call us
to recognize a peerless spirit that inspires all of us
to extraordinary patriotic acts,
acts of selfless service and sacrifice.
These acts of service and sacrifice inspire others,
like our friends and our family members,
it's seeded in the spirit of service,
it inspires our neighbors and others that don't know us.
When our service ends, yours does not in places
like the streets of Joplin, Missouri.
Your service can actually continue through AmeriCorps,
doing things like building homes for homeless veterans,
responding to disasters, like Katrina.
Alan Petz is a hands-on network volunteer.
Alan was also an Air Force Veteran.
He responded to the Katrina disaster and was recognized
by President Bush for his selfless acts, service
and continued to volunteer for many years thereafter.
In Joplin, Missouri, over 16,000 AmeriCorps members --
excuse me -- over 75,000 volunteers were motivated
by AmeriCorps members and they provided
over 17 million dollars worth of support
to the City of Joplin, Missouri.
There's an idea that the leadership learned in the sands
of Afghanistan and the hills, and the hills of Afghanistan
and the sands of Iraq can be recognized and delivered here
at home, in places like Seattle,
Washington with AmeriCorps members like Tim Lovitt.
Tim was an Iraq War Veteran who came home and struggled
with his own hidden wounds of war, decided to volunteer
as an AmeriCorps member and set up the first ever Veteran's Corp
in our nation's history.
That Veteran's Corp served over 2,000 Veterans in the State
of Washington, connecting them with important resources
on campuses nationwide.
There's an idea that service can continue in places like here,
where we have foster grandparents who are mentoring
and tutoring the children of the deployed.
There's an idea that the resiliency learned
from loss can result in extraordinary vision,
vision from individuals like Bobbie Davis,
whom volunteered as, as a AmeriCorps member,
as well as volunteered with the American Legion Auxiliary.
Bobbie lost her husband in the war in Iraq and she's
since dedicated her life to supporting other Veterans
and Military family members through AmeriCorps
and through AmeriCorps -- American Legion Auxiliary.
This type of vision can also result in what happened here
in this photograph less than three months ago,
which is the fielding of a Veteran's Corp
to provide substance abuse counseling support
to National Guardsmen and Reservists in our nation.
Over 100, the first were actually sworn
in less than a month ago.
There's this idea that the lessons that we learned
as service members in the areas
of teamwork can lead to teamwork here.
These are fire trails, pick your national forestry land.
We have teams of AmeriCorps members, hundreds of teams
of AmeriCorps members that are serving there every day.
These are Veterans, people like Mike Bermer,
who is also an Iraq Veteran.
Mike returned home and spent the next three years trying
to find a job.
Eventually, his wife sat him down and said, Mike,
what you really need is you need a new mission.
You need something that will motivate you.
So Mike decided to volunteer and become an AmeriCorps member.
He spent approximately a year on the fire trails in places
like Durango, Colorado and he led another team
of AmeriCorps members and all of them wound
up getting jobs afterwards.
The idea of mission first, people always.
There is an idea that was born in 1960
that national service can equal service to nation.
And today, there's a reality that individuals,
like Chris Marvin, who, himself, is, who, himself, is a veteran
and who has served extraordinarily --
extraordinary -- extraordinarily well for his country.
Most people don't know is
that although Chris Marvin is well known to many people
in this room, that Chris was shot down during his deployment
and he's had multiple facial construction surgeries
and was on the edge of death.
Chris has returned, returned through his service of nation
to explain to all of us that as you serve in uniform,
you can also serve in national service.
There's an idea that if we all join forces together
that if everybody in this room takes a look at the person
to the left and to the right and says, can I serve with you,
that yes, we can all serve together.
There's an idea that even the darkest hour,
there are a million points of light.
You can be one of those points of light.
So to our Veterans, I would like to say,
your service can continue.
Your service can continue at AmeriCorps.gov, where united,
we're serving Veterans and Military families every day,
where over 16,000 Veterans have already served
as AmeriCorps members, where, where 26,000 Veterans
that are serving as AmeriCorps members and senior corp members
around the country today and where we've touched
over 500,000 lives last year alone.
Join us at nationalservice.gov.
Thank you.
[ Applause ]