The Chattanooga Housing Authority and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs will provide housing and social services for homeless veterans by the end of this month.

“There’s a need for housing and a lot more services,” said Vietnam veteran Johnny Horne of Chattanooga. “A lot of veterans are in no condition to take care of themselves.”

Some local veterans live in cardboard boxes under bridges, said Mr. Horne, a former local AMVETS post commander. Some veterans are unaware of their rights and need services beyond housing to keep them off the streets, he said.

CHA is among six housing agencies in Tennessee that will receive 195 housing vouchers for veterans.

Another 560 vouchers have been distributed to three housing agencies in Georgia, including agencies in Atlanta, Dublin and Augusta.

CHA has 35 vouchers that will be available to homeless vets by mid-November, said Tammie Lyons, CHA’s Housing Choice Voucher program director.

CHA Executive Director Betsy McCright said local veterans have an increasing need for assistance.

“There are recent veterans coming out of the war. There are also elderly and disabled veterans on fixed incomes,” she said. “We hope this will help them get affordable housing.”

To keep their CHA housing, veterans must be willing to participate in other social service programs such as job skills preparation if they don’t have a job or substance abuse programs if they have a drug addiction, Ms. Lyons said.

Mr. Horne said he’s concerned that veterans may forfeit housing because they don’t want to receive other services.

“If you go off and fight a war, are you going to want to sit in a class when you get back?” he asked.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has provided $150 million for 20,000 housing vouchers and services for veterans over the past two years, according to a HUD news release.

The vouchers are provided through the HUD’s Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing program, which provides rental assistance for homeless vets.

The overall goal is to eliminate homelessness among veterans within the next five years, said Violet Cox-Wingo, chief of social work services with the VA Tennessee Valley Health Care System in Nashville.

The VA is assigning a social worker to Chattanooga who will coordinate social services to help veterans, Mrs. Cox-Wingo said.

The social worker, not the veteran, must determine that the veteran no longer needs the services, she said.