Groundbreaking Ceremony Held For New Veterans Home In Sallisaw

A groundbreaking ceremony was held Friday for a new veterans home in Sallisaw.

The center will sit on 90 acres on Highway 59 and will be a long-term care facility for Veterans in Oklahoma.

“We have 300,000 veterans in Oklahoma and all of those people put their hand up and said ‘send me I’ll go’ and this way we can give back to them in a time in their life when they need it," said Joel Kintsel, executive director for the Oklahoma Department of Veteran Affairs.

Kintsel said this center has been in the works for a couple of years. Sallisaw was selected as the home in 2018 and he said he's thankful for the community support. 

“Well I’m not entirely surprised because we knew there was very deep support in the community of Sallisaw for this as well as within the Cherokee nation, so I’m not surprised that there’s a large turnout," he said.

Retired General Ben Robinson said this is an exciting day and he's happy for all veterans. 

“It means that while all of America should hate war, we should love our warriors," Robinson said. 

Robinson said a place like this will mean the world to those who served. The facility is expected to be complete two years from today. 

“There’s a lot of pressure on the concept of America being an exceptional nation,” Robinson said. “These are the exceptional people that made America an exceptional nation.”