Making Political Contacts/Colleagues/Forever Friendships

This is a key area of importance in your endeavor to start up a nonprofit organization, maintain political contacts, and to ensure that you and your organization are well covered with elected official relationships

This is a multi-layered process that has to be carefully planned, plotted and based on (1) Politics constantly change, (2) Elected officials constantly change and (3) The political landscape constantly changes. The only thing that doesn’t change is change itself.

The three levels of political support are of course federal, state, and local elected officials. This is a skill that you cannot learn in school. This is a skill that you can develop and must develop over time. It is important that you surround yourself with people from both sides of the aisle and everyone in between. At the time of writing this book the political landscape that exists in 2022 is a roller coaster on its finest day. It is an impossibility to focus on one particular issue such as homelessness because homelessness comes in and out of the news cycle almost daily. I can honestly say that since 1974, not much has changed on the issue of homelessness and how we treat people that live on the streets. They can pin all the fancy names they want such as house challenged, food deserts and other newfangled clichés that they come up with, but the fact remains that homelessness and poverty are issues that will not go away tomorrow. It must be addressed in a master plan type of way.

Make sure that you explore the issue of political contacts to the fullest extent and that you’re able to ally yourself with winners and people that are there for the right reasons. Always make sure that you keep your organization in first place and that you take the high road and do not take any political sides. Your journey to happiness on this issue will be much smoother.

Good luck with this one.

With U.S.

Congressman Dr. Joe Heck after my testimony at the U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Financial Services, "Housing for Heroes: Examining How Federal Programs Can Better Serve Veterans."

Congressman Heck invited me to testify. This was an honor to be of service.

2021 State of Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford, me, Shannon Kelly, Owner/Partner, Share Village Las Vegas, Robyn Gerber-Garcia, Executive Director, “ Worth Fighting For” and Judge Cynthia S. Leung, Department 1, Las Vegas Municipal Court.

Dean Heller and Share Village Las Vegas Co-Founder, Shannon Kelly.

Michelle Fiore and Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn G. Goodman.

2019 US Veterans meeting led by United States Senator and candidate for President of the United States, Elizabeth Warren at Bonanza Hugh School, Las Vegas, Nevada.

With Las Vegas City Councilman Ricki Barlow and Eric Strain, AIA at our Strong Cities, Strong Communities (SC2) celebration

2015 With former State of Nevada Assemblywoman and United States Congressional candidate Lucy Flores at our Strain/Stalk Strong Cities, Strong Communities (SC2) Celebration.

72 Hours In Washington, D.C.

One of the proudest moments of my life, pictured here with First Lady, Michelle Obama.

The date was January 12, 2016, when Ms. Cynthia Dias, United States Navy Veteran and I were invited to The White House.

Ms. Dias was honored to sit with The First Lady at President Obama's Final State of the Union Address.

It was a 72-hour whirlwind of representing our US Veterans and our City of Las Vegas, NV.

What came out of this was briefing meetings with The White House staff, The HUD Secretary, The VA Secretary, US Congresswoman Dina Titus, US Senator Dean Heller and US Congressman Joe Heck's staff directly helping us with our new Veterans Village #2 residence in Downtown Las Vegas.

That is how the world changes.

Special thanks to Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn G. Goodman for initiating these meetings.

I am blessed.

I would like to take a moment and thank Ms. Cynthia Dias, UNITED STATES NAVY Veteran and resident at Veterans Village Las Vegas for the courage, determination and her willingness to be an advocate with me for US Veterans and Veterans Village Las Vegas during our trip to meet in Washington, D.C.. Thank you, Ms. Dias, you are an amazing American!

2018 This was at my meetings at The White House with Ms. Sarah E. Makin-Acciani, Deputy Assistant to the President and Director of Public Liaison and Intergovernmental Affairs, Vice President Mike Pence. Ms. Makin-Acciani is a Patriot, friend to our US Veterans and friend to Veterans Village Las Vegas.

Special thanks to United States Congresswoman Dina Titus and staff members and United States Veterans Terry Care and Daniel Carranza for your continued assistance at SHARE Village Las Vegas.

2017

& Senior HUD management @ HUD Headquarters in Washington, DC. Veterans Village Las Vegas continues our quest to make sure our US Veterans are treated with respect and dignity.

2016 Veterans Village Founder Arnold Stalk at U.S. Senator Dean Heller's office with Skarlett Doyle and Cynthia Dias. Great meeting advocating for all U.S. veterans.

By: Su Phelps & Megan Way | Photos by Su Phelps

Democratic presidential candidate and Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard visited Veterans Village on May 11th for a tour of Veterans Village and a veterans townhall to meet the local public, listen to their stories and answer their questions.

After Founder of Veterans Village, Dr. Arnold Stalk gave Tulsi the grand tour, the room flooded with people and became standing room only with everyone waiting to listen to Tulsi. Mike Kelly, Chair of Nevada Democratic Veterans and Military Family Caucus (NDVMFC) first welcomed the congresswoman for taking the time for the townhall. Whilst recognizing the majority of veterans in the room he told Tulsi, “We have higher expectations because you’re one of us, you share our hopes, our dreams, our anxieties and the fears that we have. You’ve been there, you’ve been in the sock just like many of us have.”

Tulsi started by talking about her own service and the values that doing service brings. “We [in the military] come from all parts of this country. Every race, ethnicity, orientation, religion, all walks of life coming together, and we wear that same uniform and that same flag on our shoulder. Each of us made that commitment to put service above self, willing to put our life on the line on service to our country; It is that focus on that mission of service, those values of service above self, that I seek to bring to the White House.”

One of the first people to speak was from Caesar Lopez, who asked Tulsi to sponsor a bill for him, “I been deported for six years, I don’t have any ID, the government took everything from me; Since I don’t have any protection at all I’m asking if you could sponsor a bill for me.” He then tells everyone the day he got deported, “I always considered myself American, I grew up In America. When I’ve been called wetback and I’ve been called everything, it never bothered me. What bothered me was on January 16, 2013, when the judge told me I was a threat to the nation, that I was a criminal and that I was a terrorist and that is why he was removing me from the country; For them to tell me I’m not an American and that I’m a terrorist and then expel me from my country, it’s the worst thing anyone ever did to me.” Tulsi responded saying she knew the Governor of New Mexico, “I know the governor of New Mexico, we’ve served together in congress, and I look forward to meeting her and to work with her to do all we can to help you.”

Su Phelps, President of Society of Military Widows Chapter 34, asked Tulsi about her stance on the Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP) and Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) offset. “I understand that our President just voted down for us, but I do believe our SBP is from our husband and purchased for their wives. The DIC is for the widows, who deserve that benefit from their husband, but at this moment all the widows who have DIC and or SBP but couldn’t receive the benefits because they offset that. How would you stand for that?”

Tulsi’s responded, “I would not stand for that. The laying down of one’s life in service to our country is a sacrifice made by that individual, their family and loved ones. When we see what happened now, where once again there’s not enough money to make it so those gold star families and those gold star widows to get the benefits they earned through that sacrifice and service from their loved one.”

To end the event Dr. Arnold Stalk and Mrs. Stalk present a U.S.A. flag to Tulsi as a gift.

By Megan Way | Photos by Su Phelps

Veterans Village welcomes all 2020 presidential candidates to take a tour of the Veterans Village facility and to participate in a Town Hall organized by Mike Kelly, President of Nevada Democratic Veterans and Military Families Caucus to speak to veterans and local media. On Friday, July 12th, the Nevada Democratic Veterans and Military Families Caucus presented New York Senator Bernie Sanders Town Hall to veterans from Veterans Village and members of the media. Among the attendees was Assemblywoman Brittany Miller.

One of the first questions was from Su Phelps, “Senator Sanders, I’m the President of Society of Military Widows Chapter 34; I’d like to talk about one thing that’s been overlooked since 1972, it’s benefits for widows. There’s a bill called S622 and Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) offset. It’s a right our husband earned for us, and the Survivor Benefit Plan (SBP) is the insurance that our husband purchased for us; so, as a widow if we qualify for both of them, why do we have to be deducted DIC from the SBP.”

Bernie Sanders: “Su raises a very important question I should’ve talked about earlier and that is, when we talk about veterans' issues, you’re not just talking about the veteran, you’re talking about the entire family; When we are talking about veterans needs, Su was right in saying, we got to be looking at family needs for the veterans”

From a veteran in the audience, “My question to you is what needs to happen at the end of the month debate, what needs to happen to bring veterans issues to the forefront. What can you do, because I’m conscious of your record; but when you got millions of people watching the debates, that’s not the time to use the veterans name to get a cheap pop from the audience. I think it’s a time to bring forward the many issues on homelessness, education, medical for veterans exclusively.”

Bernie Sanders: “The debates are a kind of a crazy format, where you got 45 seconds to answer, but I think the more important point to find is the issues we’re talking about today, have got to be addressed, dealt with and discussed not only in a democratic debate, but on the floor of the congress.”

Dr. Arnold Stalk, Founder of Veterans Villages thanked the Senator, “You’ve invigorated this group Senator let me tell you; what I wanna say is what I say everywhere I go, there is a solution to this problem. It’s complex, but there is a solution, with us it’s five steps, it’s emergency housing, transitional housing, permanent and rental housing and assisted living; there’s no reason, no reason in the world our veterans should be suffering like this and a forum like this is priceless to us; Thank you”