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Veterans cemetery fundraisers make deadline to trigger fed money By PHILLIP MOLNAR Fort Ord veterans cemetery organizers managed to raise $2.6 million in roughly two months to make Tuesday's deadline to access a $6.7 million federal grant for construction of the first phase of the Central Coast Veterans Cemetery. State Assembly speaker John A. Perez turned out to be the recently much discussed mystery donor, giving $1 million from the Assembly's budget to the cemetery's endowment fund. He had offered to give the money back in July as an "insurance policy" to fall back on (http://tinyurl.com/po2eokn). "I'm ecstatic," Janet Parks, the past president of the veterans cemetery foundation, said. "We worked so hard to get the cemetery." State Sen. Bill Monning, D-Carmel, said in a news release veterans and their families have benefited from Perez's generosity. "I want to thank the Speaker for his support to build this cemetery," Monning said in a news release, "and for his commitment to prioritize veterans' issues." The state Department of Veterans Affairs sent a letter of acknowledgement to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to confirm the state's intent to participate in the 2014 grant process, Monning said. U.S. Rep. Sam Farr, D-Carmel, said it was veterans who labored to make the dream a reality. "That hard work has paid off with today's news," he said in a news release. Carmel Mayor Jason Burnett said he was glad to make the deadline but fundraising will not stop, especially because they have $300,000 in loans to pay back. "We were given a short deadline to pull this together and people stepped forward," he said. "... We are going to continue to need local support." The cemetery must still go through an environmental impact review and there is no timeline for when construction will start. Phillip Molnar can be reached at 646-4487 or pmolnar@montereyherald.com. |
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