In an op-ed for Realty Times, Dylan Tête, 2021 Stand-To Veteran Leadership Program Scholar and Founder and Executive Director of Bastion Community of Resilience, explains how his organization is filling the gap in the continuum of care for our Nation's veterans and their families.
The United States needs more intentional communities for our veterans and their families. In an op-ed for Realty Times, Dylan Tête, 2021 Stand-To Veteran Leadership Program Scholar and Founder and Executive Director of Bastion Community of Resilience, argues that his organization can serve as a blueprint. He calls for investors and government and corporate leaders to step up with support to address a critical challenge: “How will we provide care for the 450,000 veterans living with a brain injury?”
Tête shares the story of Tyler – U.S. Army veteran and Bastion resident – and his road to healing through intentional neighboring:
Tyler was a 27-year-old highspeed paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division deployed to a remote base in Afghanistan when he felt a tingling sensation in the left side of his body one day in 2014.
“Drive on, Airborne,” he told himself. But he was having a stroke. Days would pass before a medevac could lift him to Baghdad, then Germany, and finally to the United States. But the damage was done. Tyler had a permanent brain injury.
He was living out of his truck in 2020 when Bastion – the New Orleans nonprofit I started nearly a decade ago to support injured warriors returning from Iraq and Afghanistan – got a call to “please help us find a home for Tyler.” We did.
Bastion is a unique neighborhood designed and built from the ground up to fill a gap in the continuum of care for veterans with life-altering injuries and their families. Our five-acre campus contains 58 apartment homes, with open greenspace and a community center. At Bastion, Tyler doesn’t just have a home. He has an intentional community, which provides the support he needs to thrive.
Continue reading at Realty Times.
