‘I didn’t give up’: Marine veteran goes from living in abandoned school to downtown apartment

A report from the city of Detroit says more than 1,700 people sleep on the streets any given night. A number of them served our country as part of the military. VOA Michigan is pushing back against the affordable housing crisis in our Make Camo Your Cause series. Fox 2's Brandon Hudson learns how an old Catholic school is giving homeless veterans hope. A joke? Of course, yeah, let's hear it. Let's hear it, dude. How much of that sense of humor has gotten you through some of these tough situations? All my life, yeah. How long were you in the Marine Corps? Just over two years. How long were you without housing? One year to the day. What was that situation like for you? Very eye-opening. I lived on the streets of Detroit through a winter. Thank you, Dr. Um... It had its ups and downs. Met a lot of wonderful people in the same position. You said you lived in a school. Yes, it was an abandoned school. Benjamin Franklin near Motor City Casino. How did you get connected with the VOA? Out of the blue, Representative Jeff contacted me and I was very skeptical about it. Let me know how you met John. I met John through one of the church kitchens, soup kitchens. I said, I'm just looking to help you. If I can help you in any way, I said, I'm here. He was like, I was like, do you got any documents? He said, no. I said, you got your DD-214? He's like, I haven't seen that in 30 years. He said, I've been asking for it. I said, well, I'll tell you what. I said, do you have an email address? He said, yes, I do. I said, be here next week, same time, same channel. I said, if you don't have it then, I said, you can tell me, get lost. So I met him next week, he sat there, he had a cup of coffee waiting for me, he's like, how'd you do that? Thank you very much. And I said, can I sit down and talk now? He says, I'm all open for it. Did you ever think that when you were staying at that abandoned school that you'd ever be able to sit down and say, I have a place of my own now in downtown Detroit? Well, I didn't give up. I always look for options. There's options out there for the homeless. This is a wonderful option here. I recommend it to any veteran. And I keep trying to find a veteran out there, a lost lamb as I call it, to bring them into this fold.