DR. JILL BIDEN SPEAKS ON MILITARY FAMILY SUPPORT

FROM:  AMERICAN FORCES PRESS SERVICE
Dr. Jill Biden, wife of Vice President Joe Biden, speaks about the value of military family support during a roundtable discussion at the Pentagon, April 10, 2012. The roundtable included Deanie Dempsey, wife of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, and honored the winners of the Joining Forces Community Challenge, which is an effort to recognize and celebrate the extraordinary military family support efforts of citizens and organizations across the country. DOD photo by Elaine Sanchez

Dr. Biden, Mrs. Dempsey Salute 'Challenge' Winners
By Elaine Sanchez
WASHINGTON, April 11, 2012 - Leading up to a White House celebration today, two of the nation's top wives personally thanked a group of individuals and organization leaders for their efforts to improve military families' lives at the Pentagon yesterday.
 Dr. Jill Biden, wife of Vice President Joe Biden, and Deanie Dempsey, wife of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, honored the winners of the Joining Forces Community Challenge during a roundtable discussion.

The Community Challenge, part of the Joining Forces campaign, is intended to recognize and celebrate the extraordinary military family support efforts of citizens and organizations across the country. First Lady Michelle Obama and Biden launched Joining Forces one year ago today to rally Americans around troops, veterans and their families, and announced the Challenge in July to capture the innovative ways people have chosen to support and honor them.

"What you're doing is so amazing," Biden told the group, which had just wrapped up a Pentagon tour. "This is a dream come true that you're out there helping military families."
USO President Sloan D. Gibson, who served as roundtable moderator, invited representatives from each of the six groups to explain their organizations' accomplishments and what spurred them to action. The winners range from a community that ensures families of deployed Guard members have a vast array of support, to a group that offers outdoor retreats to military spouses, to an organization of mental health professionals that volunteers their time, free of charge, to military families.

Whatever the service or support they provide, all embody the spirit of the Joining Forces campaign, Biden said, as they step up to serve and honor troops and their families. "Joining Forces is all about calling on people all across the country to lend a hand," she said.

Biden and Dempsey both passed on their personal gratitude for the groups' efforts. The Bidens' son, Beau Biden, is a captain in the Army National Guard who served a one-year deployment in Iraq, and Dempsey is a military wife and a military mom. Her husband commissioned all three of their children, she said, and their daughter is married to a captain in the Special Forces.

"What you do for all military families, you also do for the Dempsey family," the chairman's wife said. "From a personal standpoint, thank you from the bottom of my heart."
The Joining Forces Community Challenge winners are:

-- Armed Forces Service Center, St. Paul, Minn. The service center is a 24/7 "all free" lounge staffed by volunteers at the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport for active-duty military personnel, their families, activated reservists and National Guardsmen and other members of the uniformed services.

-- Defending the Blue Line, Hastings, Minn. This organization works to ensure that children of military members have access to participate in hockey through free equipment, hockey camps, special events and financial assistance toward association and other hockey-related costs.

-- Give an Hour, Bethesda, Md. Founded by Washington, D.C.-based psychologist Barbara Van Dahlen, this organization is dedicated to meeting the mental health needs of military personnel, their families, and the communities affected by the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. In addition to counseling, providers also consult to schools, first responders, employers, and community organizations. Give an Hour has provided nearly 50,000 hours of free service, valued at roughly $5 million.

-- Project Sanctuary, Parker, Colo. This organization brings military families together in the Rocky Mountains after deployments to help them reconnect through recreational activities and therapy. Follow-up support beyond the retreat is also provided, and includes support to families with housing, job placement and veterans' assistance.

-- City of Richfield, Utah. The city has supported its local Army National Guard unit through four deployments since Sept. 11, 2001. Additionally, Richfield provides several programs and services for military families, including a city utility abatement program and distribution of the city's newspaper to deployed soldiers so they can stay in touch with the community.

-- Our Family for Families First Foundation, East Greenwich, R.I. This foundation, chosen by the public as the Challenge's "People's Choice Winner," supports military families pursuing higher education by supporting military children through scholarships and military spouses through grants and assistance identifying educational opportunities.

Other than the People's Choice award, the Challenge winners were selected with input from a panel of judges that included news correspondent and author Tom Brokaw; J.R. Martinez, an Iraq war veteran, motivational speaker and "Dancing With the Stars" winner; San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro; Deanie Dempsey; and Gibson.
At the roundtable, Gibson ticked off the reasons he believes these groups deserve this national honor. They're having a positive impact on military families' lives, are building stronger bonds between military families and their communities, and are inspiring others to bring the same "passion and obvious care and concern" to military family support, he said.

All 20 Challenge finalists will be honored at today's White House event, which also marks the one-year anniversary of Joining Forces.

FIRST LADY TALKS MILITARY FAMILY SUPPORT ON "LATE NIGHT"

The following excerpt is from A U.S. State Department American Forces Press Service e-mail:

First Lady Talks Military Family Support on 'Letterman'

By Elaine Sanchez
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, March 20, 2012 - First Lady Michelle Obama encouraged Americans to rally in support of military families during an appearance on the "Late Show with David Letterman" last night.

The first lady shared a few laughs with Letterman, but then grew serious when the topic turned to her Joining Forces campaign. Obama and Dr. Jill Biden, the vice president's wife, launched this initiative last year to boost support to troops, veterans and their families.

Service members and their families have served and sacrificed for more than a decade, the first lady noted, yet most Americans are unaware of the extent of their challenges. "We take it for granted because we have 1 percent of this nation serving and protecting the rights of the other 99 percent of us," she said.

Growing up in south Chicago and with limited exposure to the military, the first lady said, she wasn't aware of these challenges either until recently. "It wasn't until I started campaigning and traveling around to military bases where I got to meet these very resilient, proud, disciplined, smart individuals," she said. "I thought, 'Most Americans have no clue about the level of sacrifice they're making so we can live in freedom.'"

The Joining Forces campaign is intended to ensure every service member, veteran and family member understands "they live in a grateful nation," she said.

Obama cited the progress she's seen in military family support since Joining Forces launched last spring, particularly in the area of employment. Organizations have been hosting veteran job fairs across the nation, and President Barack Obama has launched programs and incentives to encourage private-sector employers to hire veterans.

Due to these efforts and others, she said, the unemployment rate among veterans is decreasing at a faster pace than the broader unemployment rate. As of last week, the unemployment rate for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans was down from last year's high of 12.5 percent to 7.6 percent, below the national rate of 8.3 percent.

While this progress is a "great thing," the first lady said, she also called attention to military spouses' employment challenges. In this decade of war, military spouses have moved forward despite the challenges of frequent moves and deployments -- all while caring for children and a household.

But when it comes to moving forward in their own careers, she said, military spouses often run up against a brick wall as they're forced to kick-start their careers at each new location.

"These men and women are just as trained, they are just as prepared, they are just as competent" as their civilian-life counterparts, Obama said. "They're some of the best this country has to offer."

The first lady encouraged people to find military families in their midst and then "do whatever they do best," whether it's offering to mow a lawn or babysit for a family with a deployed loved one, or providing pro bono accounting or attorney services.

Obama also noted the importance of caring for children from military families. It's hard to imagine what they're going through, she said, as they move from base to base every couple of years. She recalled meeting children attending their 12th school in nearly the same number of years.

Still, they're keeping their grades up and are "still managing to keep it all together," she said. "Just imagine what these kids need."

Military families need to be on the forefront of Americans' minds, she told the audience. And, through Joining Forces, "we'll do everything we can to rally support for them so that they never feel that they're alone in this."