Rally4Vets Selects Road-Keeper as The Top Dog Championship’s Official Video and Data Loggers

March 23, 2023

Rally4Vets, the nationwide motorsports program highlighting veteran issues, has announced that it is delighted to partner with Race-Keeper as the official in-car video and data logger for all its future events.

The Road-Keeper HD is billed as the ultimate video and data logging system for road cars, race cars, off-road racers, race boats, helicopters, airplanes, and other vehicles. The system allows drivers to record dual-stream 1080p Full HD video and audio and offers 10Hz GPS and accelerometer data logging. The mapping, lap, and split timing, and driver comparison offered by the system are within reach of everyone on the track or the road. Created by Trivinci Systems LLC, the Road-Keeper HD is designed to be fully compatible with the company’s Race-Keeper Comparo, an industry-standard video data analysis application.

Rally4Vets founder Robert Hess praises the unique amalgamation of high-quality hardware and robust software tools offered by Trivinci by saying, “We are delighted to partner with Race-Keeper. Motorsport is a fun and exciting sport and one of our goals is to provide our sponsors and supporters with the experience of driving a racecar. The Road-Keeper system lets us easily provide each driver with a video recording of the on-track experience. Our participants love it.” Readers can find out more about the Road-Keeper HD system by visiting www.road-keeper.com.

The Rally4Vets program is one of the many initiatives undertaken by the Disabled Veteran Empowerment Network (DVEN), an organization that raises awareness about the challenges that veterans face in the United States.  As an Army veteran and PTSD survivor himself, Robert Hess combined his passion for motorsports with his first-hand experience of life as a retired serviceman to create Rally4Vets and amplify DVEN’s message.

One of DVEN’s key missions is reducing the annual veteran suicide death toll.  Over 6,000 veterans and active-duty personnel take their own lives every year. This equates to almost one life lost every hour.  The counter on the organization’s homepage is a stark reminder of the scale of the problem it is dealing with.

“Veteran suicide claims the lives of 18 veterans and active-duty personnel every day,” Robert says.  “Connecting these veterans and their family members with resources to prevent these deaths is one of our key missions.” Readers can find out more about the work DVEN has undertaken by visiting www.dven.org.

Rally4Vets holds several motorsports events throughout the year to support providing free service dogs to veterans dealing with PTSD.  Its programs include TrackCross – autocross on a racetrack, road rallies, and car meetups. The organization’s impactful work and Robert’s dedication to the cause have attracted the interest of several sponsors such as Radial Tire Company from Silver Spring, MD, and Navy Federal Credit Union.

Since 2021, Rally4Vets has also hosted the annual Top Dog Championship at Summit Point Raceway in Jefferson County, West Virginia.  The event, open to drivers at all skill levels, is an opportunity for motorsports enthusiasts, such as veterans, active-duty personnel, family members, and anyone who takes pride in the nation’s defense forces, to come together in a friendly, low-risk environment to compete for bragging rights.

Robert welcomes motorsports enthusiasts who admire Rally4Vets’ mission to attend its next major event later this year by saying, “Spectators can attend the 2023 Top Dog Championship at Summit Point on October 1, 2023, for free.  We encourage everyone to come out and cheer on their favorite service team. The Army team claimed the Top Dog Trophy in 2021 and 2022.”

Rally4Vets events provide the motorsports community with several ways to support America’s disabled veteran community.  As of the time of writing, readers can make donations towards DVEN’s 2023 fundraiser.  With a goal of $20,000, DVEN aims to fund one year of the Veterans Moving Forward two-year service dog training program which will provide a fully trained service dog for a disabled veteran.

Readers can find out more about Rally4Vets and Robert Hess by visiting www.rally4vets.com.

SOURCE: Press Advantage [Link]

 

 

Veteran Poll Workers Needed — DVEN Offers Help

August 08, 2022

The Disabled Veteran Empowerment Network (DVEN), an El Segundo, CA-based organization whose goal is to help disabled veterans, is pleased to announce that they have joined the Vet the Vote coalition to engage America’s 17 million veterans in providing poll workers for the country’s election system. The coalition aims to address the lack of poll workers while also giving veterans, especially some disabled veterans, a way to help their communities again. Learn about DVEN and how they have joined the vet coalition online at https://dven.org/dven-joins-vet-the-vote-coalition/.

“The national shortage of poll workers has reached a critical level — the traditional cohort of poll workers has an average age of 60, and the COVID-19 pandemic significantly suppressed their outstanding volunteerism,” says DVEN. “America needs to recruit more than 1 million volunteers annually to administer election polling sites, and election boards across the country have struggled to recruit enough poll workers to efficiently and effectively run elections. America’s 17M+ veterans and their family members are ideally positioned to help fill this critical shortage. Vet the Vote’s ever-growing coalition already includes 30+ incredible organizations, including VSOs, MSOs, the National Football League (NFL), and the US Chamber of Commerce.”

DVEN believes strongly in the role veterans can play in helping to run safe and secure polling sites and election boards all over the United States. Veterans and the families that support them have proven their commitment to their country and to serving it on countless occasions, and they are some of the best people to participate in the Vet the Vote program. DVEN encourages all veterans and their families to visit the Vet the Vote website and consider how they can support the initiative. The website can be found at https://vetthe.vote/.

DVEN hopes that the program will help alleviate the shortage of poll workers and that their efforts will get veterans in a position to help the communities that they have dedicated their lives to serving. DVEN works closely with a number of organizations whose job it is to look out for the concerns of veterans all over the United States. One of their most important partners is the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), an organization that serves over 27 million veterans who have served their country in some way. Through their nationwide system of hospitals, clinics and other more, the VA offers American veterans access to a number of resources and services to make their lives a little bit easier. The Disabled Veterans Empowerment Network works to promote the interests of disabled veterans and does so by working closely with the Department of Veterans Affairs to come up with solutions to many of the issues faced by veterans.

Another one of the organizations supported by DVEN is We The Veterans, a nonpartisan, non-profit organization created by veterans and military family members whose goal is to empower veterans and their families across the country to build a better union. We The Veterans says, “We represent the quiet majority of the veteran community who put country over party and are committed to building a more perfect union. We believe in the power of positive patriotism and civil discourse among citizens and leaders. While Americans may be divided on many issues, respect for those who have served is a near-universal sentiment. That status in society is a privilege to uphold and a responsibility to lead. After years of war, we envision a new, but equally important role for veterans and military families: strengthening our democracy and ensuring misinformation and polarization don’t continue to tear at the fabric of our union.”

Visit https://www.wetheveterans.us/ for more information on the organization and the kind of work they are doing in order to build a better country. There are also links to many of the other organizations DVEN works with that can be found on their website (along with links to various resources that may be of use to veterans). They would like to encourage veterans to get involved in some of the initiatives that are popping up across the United States as many of them present an opportunity to help build a better country.

SOURCE: Press Advantage [Link]

DVEN CEO Robert Hess Selected to Review Mission Daybreak Proposals

By Press Advantage, Published 

El Segundo, CA-based DVEN is pleased to announce that their CEO, Robert Hess, was recently selected to help the Veterans’ Administration come up with innovative solutions that aim to reduce veteran suicides.

DVEN Founder and CEO Robert Hess, himself an Army veteran and PTSD survivor, has been selected to be a proposal reviewer for Mission Daybreak innovation submissions. The US Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has launched a significant effort to reduce veteran suicides. Mission Daybreak is a $20 million grand challenge to develop innovative solutions that meet the diverse needs of Veterans. The grand challenge, designed and produced by Luminary Labs through a contract with Capital Consulting Corporation, is part of the VA’s 10-year strategy to prevent Veteran suicide through a comprehensive, public health approach.”

Veterans often find themselves needing professional mental health care and therapy upon returning home.  If they fail to get this help, they are more likely than non-veterans to commit suicide.  People like Robert Hess (who is himself a veteran), along with organizations like the Veterans Administration, strive to provide these vulnerable individuals with the resources they need. Their objective is to prevent the conditions that lead to so many veteran suicides every year.

Hess served in Vietnam and Europe as well as at the Pentagon and the Department of State.   has long been a staunch advocate for disabled veteran awareness and suicide prevention.  “Suicide is a serious public health problem that affects communities everywhere,” says DVEN.  “In 2019, more than 45,000 American adults died from suicide, including 6,261 US Veterans. Veterans make up just 7% of the US population but account for almost 14% of annual suicides.

DVEN believes that proposed solutions should seek to reduce the frequency of suicides by addressing one or more challenges in certain focus areas.  Phase 1 of Mission Daybreak will award $8.5 million in prizes, with 30 finalists each receiving over $200,000 before advancing to phase two where they will gain exclusive access to various services.

Ten more teams will receive an award of $100,000.  Phase 2 will be an eight-week accelerator that will provide resources that will help participants prepare for their final submissions. It will award a total of $11.5 million in prizes.  Read more about Mission Daybreak online at https://www.missiondaybreak.net/.

Mission Daybreak began on May 25th in 2022, calling on innovators from various fields to come up with suicide prevention solutions that meet the needs of veterans from all walks of life. This initiative builds on the Veterans Association’s long history of advancing health innovation to create a support system for innovators and their solutions.  The challenge offers a large sum of money to innovators in addition to various resources like data, research, mentorship, educational webinars, and partnership opportunities.  The VA is the largest integrated healthcare system in the country, so it is able to leverage expertise from private-sector, nonprofit, and government collaborators to help support Mission Daybreak’s mission.

Said Hess, “I created the Prostate Cancer Awareness Project 501 c3 non-profit charity in 2006 to help veterans with prostate cancer measure their risk and find their cancers while they still are treatable.  We expanded our mission to include support for all cancers in 2016, and the Prostate Cancer Awareness Project became The Cancer Journeys Foundation, also a 501 c3 non-profit charity, EIN 81-1880936.  In 2018, we came to understand how many veterans are dealing with cancer, and the huge number of cancer survivors who are dealing with PTSD like so many of our veterans.  In early 2019, we created the DVEN program to provide more focus on our disabled veteran population.  Thank you for visiting DVEN and for your support of our disabled veteran community.”

For more information on the organization and Robert Hess’ vision, visit https://dven.org/mission-vision/. The organization’s representatives can be reached by phone or email as well.

DVEN CEO Robert Hess
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For more information about DVEN, contact the company here:Robert Hess
3104305899
robert.hess@dven.org
DVEN
840 Apollo Street
Suite 100
El Segundo, CA 90245

DVEN Earns Leadership Award for 2022 from the Academy of the United States Veterans

May 06, 2022

Disabled Veteran Empowerment Network (DVEN) is proud to announce that they have been awarded the 2022 Leadership Award at the 7th Annual Vettys awards ceremony held by the Academy of United States Veterans (AUSV) on April 23, 2022, in Las Vegas, NV.  The Veterans Awards, or Vettys is an annual award presented by the Academy of United States Veterans (AUSV) to honor and give recognition towards members of the US veteran community for their outstanding work in supporting the American veteran community.  More about this can be gleaned from https://dven.org/dven-wins-leadership-award-for-veteran-suicide-prevention/.

Robert Hess, the founder of DVEN, says, “On behalf of our great staff and volunteers at DVEN, I was honored to be selected for the 2022 Leadership Award from among many outstanding non-profit organizations supporting veteran mental health. We are particularly proud of our Rally4Vets motorsports program that supports free service dogs for veterans dealing with PTSD. Our volunteer team deserves all of the credit. A huge ‘thank you’ to each and every one of them.”

DVEN CEO Robert Hess honored with Leadership Award from the Academy of US Veterans for DVEN

DVEN founder Robert Hess is an American Legion Life Member and also a member of the Legion’s Hollywood Post 43. The primary concern of DVEN is the large number of suicides in veterans.  The DVEN home page notes that as of the present time, there are 18 veteran suicides per day and there have been a total of 2,644 veteran suicides since January 1, 2022.

The problem is that post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental health disorder that affects many veterans who have experienced or witnessed a life-threatening event, such as a car accident, combat, sexual assault, or natural disaster.  Veterans usually suffer from feelings of being on edge, having upsetting memories, or having problems with sleep. And if these symptoms persist for over a few months, they could be suffering from PTSD.

With regards to the AUSV, more information can be gleaned from their website at https://www.ausvfoundation.org/home.  It is through their various social and philanthropic activities that AUSV seeks to inspire its members to adopt key values, such as empathy, leadership, and ambition, and to always go for excellence.  The people behind AUSV believe that collaborative communities can be used to offer genuine opportunities for society.  And by stimulating creativity within these cooperative communities, they hope to establish a new narrative for veterans and for all Americans.

The American Legion, which is one of the organizations supported by DVEN, wants to encourage veterans who believe they have symptoms of PTSD or depression to go to their local post and get in contact with other veterans.  The American Legion is also actively working to help prevent veteran suicides through their peer-to-peer support programs that are available in the over 12,000 American Legion posts all over the country.

Meanwhile, DVEN founder Robert Hess has chosen to support the Rally4Vets amateur racing program.  In this annual event, veterans, active duty servicemen and servicewomen, and veteran supporters compete in motorsports with the goal of providing support for disabled veterans suffering from PTSD.  All of the funds raised in this event are to be used for providing service dogs and suicide prevention programs for the benefit of disabled veterans with PTSD.  DVEN also has several other veteran programs and services, including those for women veterans, minority veterans, homeless veterans, mental health, PTSD, and adaptive sports and special events.

Launched in 2019, DVEN has established as its mission to identify those veteran organizations that are providing real support for veterans and to give them some monetary support. This is actually important because there have been a number of organizations that have been observed by the Federal Trade Commission and state governments to have other motives, instead of helping veterans. Their vision is to make the lives of veterans better by providing resources and information to help with their independence and safety to allow them to have the best quality of life possible, with the ultimate goal of achieving disabled veteran awareness and suicide prevention.

Those who would like to know more about DVEN and what they do can visit their website at www.dven.org, or contact them through the telephone or via email.

SOURCE: Press Advantage [Link]

About DVEN:

DVEN (Disabled Veteran Empowerment Network) is a program of the Cancer Journeys Foundation. The DVEN program was created in 2018, to support the thousands of veterans dealing with service-related cancers and PTSD.

Contact DVEN:

Robert Hess
DVEN
840 Apollo Street
Suite 100
El Segundo, CA 90245
3104305899