Lloyd Knight

Yeah.

So for South Carolina Department of Veterans Affairs, still a relatively young state agency.

So it wasn't till about maybe six years ago, a little bit over six years ago, that at the time I think Governor Haley said, "Hey, we need to have a full cabinet position for the Department of Veterans Affairs." And then under Governor McMaster, that became a reality.

Um, so we have been very fortunate that because we are such a young agency and we had great secretaries, first secretary, Secretary Grimsley, to our current secretary McCaffrey, um, we've been very fortunate to have their support, the general assembly support, and the veteran community support for the work that we're doing.

And so our work, what we really wanna do as a state agency is we wanna make sure that we advocate for the benefits that veterans are entitled to and have earned, and also make sure that we can m- get them all the services that they need to help them become thriving members in their community.

And then the very last cohort he briefed his personal leadership project, which is, which is very special, something that Georgia tried to do a handful of years and, and it lost momentum after or during COVID.

But can you talk a little bit about your project and we had a great conversation before we went live here on, on, on some of the successes that you're having with it.

So for Veterans Treatment Courts South Carolina, I became familiar with that from a grant that we received from the Bureau of Justice of Assistance to implement and enhance Veteran Treatment Courts in South Carolina.

I threw those beers away that day.

And they said, we can put you into a place called the Veterans Empowerment Organization.

And that's where I ended up eventually meeting you.

But I was there for three months, going to AA meetings seven days a week, going to a meeting way up in Sandy Springs, trying to get out of the rut of being on that campus every single day.

And I knew that if I just continued to respond, that things would continue to get better.

And they did.

So fast forward a month or two, the executive director had come down to the basketball court one day and asked me to come upstairs and share my story with the board of directors to let them know where I came from and how things are going at the Veterans Empowerment Organization.

and what they're doing right, what they're doing wrong.

And I became an intern and I took a bunch of free classes.

And at the end of that year, I got on Lloyd Knight.

Amazing.

I've got to double down and make this happen.