So, this is probably going to be a long one and I’m probably going to cuss a few times so if you get offended, probably stop reading now. Mayor Hicks asked me Monday, if I would attend a meeting on Tuesday for the veterans in our community at NMSU Grants campus and I said sure. This meeting was with legislative members from NM both having NM representatives and NM senators. Harry Garcia and Lee Alcon are two of the 18 committee members. They get together in different communities, and they are supposed to be listing to the concerns of our veterans and trying to come up with some solutions to help with their needs.
I walked in there and looked around and saw 95 percent of the veterans not wearing a mask, I said cool, I’m not wearing one then.
I have been hearing myspace that the meeting was canceled because of the mayor, but as you can see in the video, he left way before they canceled the meeting.
Going to mental health rehab was good for me in many ways, one of them was I got to meet many vets that suffer from mental health issues. I never realized that on the outside, it seems fine, but the inside of a vet, it’s eating them alive.
My roommate for 27 days was a bad ass Marine from Deming NM. He did 7 tours. On the outside, a bad ass, muscular Native man, my age; in the inside, almost every night crying in the bathroom because of nightmares. It really opened my eyes what the men and women in our military have to go through to keep us safe.
I was under the impression that this meeting was supposed to be hearing concerns from our vets in our community and see where the legislative can put their money and resources.
I really wanted to see where I can help my vets in my community. So now I’m confused, you see they canceled the meeting because the vets in the audience and myself would not wear a mask. I just got confirmation that after they kicked us out, they restarted the meeting without the audience.
You kick out the ones that the meeting is about then restart it without them.
I had to say it again My eyes are more open now and I hope meetings will get to take place in the future so we can get our vets the help they deserve.
We will be forever thanking you for your service.
This opinion was taken from Erik Garcia’s Facebook page. The Cibola Citizen will follow up with this story in next week’s edition.