Vet-to-Vet Support Command is on a mission to help veterans

For years after suffering a traumatic brain injury while on active duty, Howard Hutchison struggled with the effects of his injury and tried to give his life more meaning.

He finally found it when he walked through the doors of Patty Gnefkow’s office in 2014 as her first volunteer for a new Compeer program she was starting to help support area veterans with PTSD, anxiety, depression and head trauma.

“Our enthusiasm for veterans just clicked,” said Hutchison, who goes by Hutch. “And we just started to light the world on fire.”

At the time, Gnefkow was a director at the Mental Health Association of South Central Kansas and Hutchison had been chair of the Veterans Advocacy Council for Behavioral Health, an independent group collaborating with the Robert J. Dole VA Medical Center in Wichita.

After two years, the pair decided the need was so great that they should create an organization solely focused on helping veterans. Together they formed a nonprofit called Vet-to-Vet Support Command in January 2016.

As part of its mission, Vet-to-Vet connects veterans with community resources and services, holds support group meetings at more than nine locations, including at senior living facilities, on the Wichita State University campus and even homeless shelters, and organizes social outings to movies, museums and other events to help veterans avoid isolation.

As the sponsoring agency of a group called the Veterans Providers’ Coalition of Sedgwick County, they organize monthly meetings that bring together as many as 60 community agencies and veterans organizations. Vet-to-Vet also helps put on an annual veterans expo. Last year more than 1,000 people attended the four-hour expo. This year’s expo is scheduled for Aug. 1 at the Mid-America All-Indian Center.

Vet-to-Vet also gets involved with planning Wichita’s annual Veterans Day parade and new Navy Week activities. It recently launched a new workplace veterans meeting program and a vet-to-vet women’s group.

Sometimes the two do even more, like when Gnefkow went to the hospital to sit at a veteran’s bedside with his daughter. Hutchison is more than willing to give his number to veterans so they always have someone to call.

Hutchison said he knows how difficult things can get for veterans, particularly those with injuries and trauma that can cause other problems in civilian life. For decades after a heavy oil drum crashed down on him during a maintenance inspection of a Minuteman Missile silo in 1979, he felt its crushing effects.

“I’ve been homeless, transitional, had suicide attempts, been hospitalized,” he said. “I’ve been in dark periods.” He was placed under guardianship twice.

Veterans have always been important to Gnefkow, who has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and nonprofit leadership. Her father and husband served in the military.

“I am so lucky to follow what I know is right,” she said.

This story was originally published February 16, 2020 at 12:00 AM.