Paul Szmal: FLX Morning continues. It is 8.15. Temperatures actually dipped. Under cloudy skies, we're at 37. Time to visit with our friends from the American Red Cross. And to do that, Michael Tedesco is here. Good morning, Michael. How are you?
Michael Tedesco: I'm great, Paul. Thanks. Good morning to you as well. And we've just come on Veterans Day, being on Tuesday. And actually, the roots of the American Red Cross itself trace back to wartime, back to the Civil War.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, that's absolutely true. Many may know Clara Barton as the founder of the American Red Cross. And actually, she established the first chapter right here in Dansville in western New York. But yeah, her vision was formed while she was serving members of both sides of the Civil War conflict. So those are definitely part of our roots. And each year, the American Red Cross assists more than 220,000 military and veterans families with a network of volunteers that stretch not only across the country, but globally.
Michael Tedesco: Yeah, that's right. Anytime that the U.S. military has a forward deployment or operations overseas, we go right alongside them to provide services to active service members. And we have programs and services on site at more than 120 military medical facilities and over 160 veteran care facilities worldwide. So yeah, it truly is a global presence.
Paul Szmal: And there's also something called the Hero Care Network.
Michael Tedesco: Yeah, that's really a network that provides a continuum of care for both active military and our veterans. So we offer things like workshops for the newly enlisted to try to give them a sense of what military life is going to be and what kind of support services are available to them. Times of deployment can be particularly stressful. So we have programs for family members of deployed personnel to help them get through it. But it really is a program that's available all the time to active retired military members and their families.
And communication is a key part of that too. So we're an organization that has a congressional charter with the U.S. to provide emergency communication services between families and military personnel. So if someone is overseas and there's a tragic event at home, maybe a death or an accident, we are the ones who communicate to that deployed individual and work with their commanding officers depending on the severity of the case to make arrangements for them to get home.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, that is an important service. And again, that is a congressionally chartered. It's the only program that is congressionally chartered.
Michael Tedesco: That's correct.
Paul Szmal: We're talking with Michael Tedesco from the American Red Cross. We're talking about veteran services that are offered not only to active military members, but Michael, a lot of these services will stretch and adjust themselves for life after military service.
Michael Tedesco: Yeah. We look at it as providing support and services from the first day of enlistment to life after service. And I've had an opportunity to meet some people who are great volunteers for the SAF program. And they will say it's from the time of enlistment to the time of death, really. And we have volunteers who serve in the local VA hospitals providing some diversions like special days or celebratory days where they may bring in 10-bit donuts or a lot of people laugh, but things like spam, because that's kind of a shared experience that veterans may have. They have memories of eating spam while deployed or overseas, and it's really well received.
And probably the most touching thing I've learned about these services from one of our volunteers is there's a program called No Veteran Dies Alone. So in the cases where we have elderly veterans or very ill veterans in a VA hospital who, for whatever reason, may not have family or loved ones around them, we have a volunteer who will sit with them up until the time of their death. I remember him during a talk saying, we don't leave soldiers behind on a battlefield. We're not going to leave them behind here. So the dedication of our volunteers is just unbelievable.
Paul Szmal: And I've got to imagine that that's hard.
Michael Tedesco: Yeah. And when you talk to the volunteers who are carrying out these services, many of them are veterans themselves. So they've got that bond and that camaraderie. And the things that they do for others is, everyone knows the Red Cross for blood donations, for responding to large-scale disasters. I don't think a lot of people are aware of the immense services we provide to members of our military and their families.
Paul Szmal: And it's great that veterans find their way into the American Red Cross to volunteer for these different programs because, as you said, there is that camaraderie, there's that commonality there. They have a unique understanding of a lot of the issues that veterans might face.
Michael Tedesco: Yeah, absolutely. It's all born from shared experiences, right? And our veterans are used to a life of service. And that's what Red Cross volunteers are all about. Not only in the service to the Armed Forces Program that we're talking about this morning, but our other volunteers as well. Because we do have veterans who are members of our disaster teams who may leave their home in the middle of the night to go comfort a family that's just experienced a huge home fire that's left them devastated. So yeah, our volunteers, those who are veterans, they blend in pretty seamlessly because they're used to serving and being very selfless.
Paul Szmal: I want to mention how people, veterans, can access the HeroCare network. It's important to say thank you to our veterans, not just on Veterans Day, but every day for their service. But in order to access that HeroCare network, how would they go about doing that?
Michael Tedesco: Well, they can go through our website, RedCross.org backslash SAF. Or they can, there's a HeroCare app out there that they can get by texting Get HeroCare. That's G-E-T-H-E-R-O-C-A-R-E to the number 90999. Or they can call the HeroCare specialist at 877-272-7337.
Paul Szmal: And let me just give that phone number again so people have a chance to write it down.
Michael Tedesco: Sure. 877-272-7337.
Paul Szmal: All right. Michael, as always, we appreciate it. Thank you very much. And again, not only thank you to the veterans for their service and dedication to our country, but also thank you to the Red Cross for continuing to support them, not only during their active military careers, but beyond the active military career. It's a privilege and it's something I wish more people knew about so that our veterans who may be facing some challenges knew where to turn if they need help.
Michael Tedesco: Absolutely. And again, RedCross.org is a great place to start finding that information. Michael, thank you as always. We'll chat with you again in a month's time.
Paul Szmal: Oh, thank you, Paul. And have a great Thanksgiving. Yes, you too, as well. It is 825 on FLX morning.
