ROANOKE, Va. – Making a difference, one veteran at a time.
“I can’t improve their lives by much but I can at least improve it for today,” FRAME co-founder Rochelle Sibitzky said.
Sibitzky is one of the founders of Family Readiness and Military Ease, or FRAME. She wants to make sure veterans in Southwest Virginia aren’t overlooked.
“We definitely need to make sure that this country and this community takes care of our local veterans,” she said.
FRAME spent the day Saturday giving veterans, as well as people experiencing homelessness, a proper Thanksgiving meal.
Kitchen head Tammy Waters said anyone could come get a meal, winter clothes, and even a haircut.
“Not too many people care enough to do anything and just the fact that they’ve got somebody feeding them, clothes, toiletries, and this time of year it’s getting cold,” Waters said. “They’ve got clothes, shoes, blankets, anything you can imagine — and a lot of people around here really need that.”
Waters tells 10 News the event has grown tremendously in the eight years since it started.
“It started with five or six bags of clothes and a couple of crockpots of food to 15 tables of clothes, 20 crockpots of food, and it’s just an amazing thing to be a part of and witness,” Waters said.
According to Sibitzky, there is a large homeless veteran population in Roanoke.
“Everybody knows somebody that has served in the military, so it’s great that this community wants to help — even if they’re out here on the street — that the community still wants to help them,” Sibitzky said.
She said anything can make a difference, especially a meal and a haircut.
“At the end of the day we know we did what we could to send them on their way for the day in a better mood,” Sibitzky said.