MOORHEAD — For Joseph Akerman, a job well done means a client does not come back.

Akerman works as an employment specialist for the Minnesota Assistance Council for Veterans, or MACV, a nonprofit organization working to end veteran homelessness in Minnesota.

He recounted a time a veteran’s wife came back to thank him for helping her husband secure benefits from the Department of Veterans Affairs. While happy to hear a success story, Akerman’s goal is to help veterans get the support they need to get on their feet.

“Just based on the work I do, I hope I don’t hear from you again,” Akerman said.

Akerman and colleague Thomas Avegnon, housing stabilization case manager, work from Moorhead but assist homeless veterans in more than a dozen counties in the region. With offices around Minnesota, MACV is a piece of the puzzle in a network of organizations combating veteran homelessness in the state.

In the last decade, significant progress has been made toward ending veteran homelessness in Minnesota.

In 2010, a point-in-time count identified 644 homeless veterans, said Brad Lindsay, commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs. In a 2023 count, that number dropped to 336.

Minnesota has 10 regional continuums of care, which are planning bodies that coordinate housing and funding for people experiencing homelessness. So far, eight of the 10 have declared an end to veteran homelessness. The remaining two are Hennepin County and Ramsey County.

‘Pulling everybody together’

Lindsay credits the progress to efforts that started around 2014. That year, the Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs debuted its veteran homelessness registry, a by-name list of homeless veterans in Minnesota. Around the same time, it also began leading a coordinated effort to combat veteran homelessness in Minnesota.

“One of the big roles we took as an agency was the responsibility of pulling everybody together — the federal VA, us, all those stakeholders, all those homeless providers — and coordinating it,” Lindsay said.

With the help of the registry, organizations connect with each other to discuss the needs of individual veterans.

“Then one of those organizations, in most cases, or a couple of organizations, if needed, would then kind of be assigned to take that person and start working on getting them a housing plan,” Lindsay said.

June 2024 was the first time Minnesota’s homeless veterans registry dropped below 200 people.

Barriers to housing veterans have also been identified in the last decade, like affordable and available housing, Lindsay said. In response, the Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs developed the Veteran Temporary Emergency Housing Assistance Program, which provides funding to put veterans in a hotel or other temporary housing while starting to work on a more permanent housing plan.

The Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs also provides landlords with financial incentives to house veterans and has awarded grants to other organizations, like MACV, to create housing specifically for veterans, Lindsay said.

Organizations working to end homelessness strive to reach the standard of “functional zero” for homelessness. The concept takes into account that people will still face homelessness, but with community systems making instances of homelessness rare and brief.

Statewide declaration goal in 2025

Hennepin County has met the benchmarks for functional zero for veteran homelessness and has submitted a request to the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness to make an official declaration. Ramsey County is working toward that process, as well.

Lindsay said the Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs hopes to move toward requesting a statewide declaration in late 2025, which would make Minnesota the fourth state in the country to end veteran homelessness.

The West Central Minnesota Continuum of Care declared an end to veteran homelessness in the region in 2017.

Today, Akerman and Avegnon are part of the system preventing veterans from becoming homeless and helping homeless veterans find swift assistance.

A big part of their jobs is outreach in west-central Minnesota. When they make contact with a veteran who is homeless or facing housing instability, Avegnon works to help them stabilize that housing. Akerman focuses on the employment aspect of housing, helping people build stable careers.

The pair also connects veterans with other organizations, like the Clay County Veterans Service Office, local shelters and organizations providing mental health and addiction counseling.

MACV only serves veterans in Minnesota, but in a region bordering North Dakota, Akerman and Avegnon sometimes connect with veterans across state lines. In that case, Akerman said, they direct veterans to the North Dakota organizations that can manage their cases long-term.

“We like to have them working with whichever agency can hang on to them the longest,” Akerman said.

At present, Moorhead has around six homeless veterans, said Akerman, but the number is a moving target. Homeless veterans tend to move around often, but the homeless veteran registry and collaboration help Akerman and Avegnon keep track of the veterans they are working with.

“It’s difficult, but because we work in coordination with other organizations, one of them will find them and hand them over to us, or we will find them and direct them somewhere,” Avegnon said.

Housing for All Veterans Act

Efforts are also being made at a national level to end veteran homelessness. In July, U.S. Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., introduced the Housing for All Veterans Act. According to a press release from Smith’s office, the bill would provide housing vouchers to all low-income veteran households, protect veteran families from discrimination based on using a voucher and help public housing authorities electronically verify veteran status and lease rental units.

On Thursday, Aug. 8, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced it would award $20 million in funding to public housing agencies to help cover administrative fees for the HUD-Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing program. The program helps veterans find and maintain housing.

The Clay County Housing and Redevelopment Authority was among public housing agencies awarded funding, receiving $12,770, according to HUD.

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Zebby Matthews turned in the best start of his young career, Cole Sands allowed just one hit in his two innings on the mound and Griffin Jax made quick work of the Cardinals in the eighth inning on Sunday. The Twins appeared well on their way to a series-ending victory after Royce Lewis delivered a pinch-hit double in the bottom of the eighth inning to give them the lead back.

And then, things started to unravel.

With one out in the ninth, Edouard Julien slid and knocked down a ground ball, but it went off his glove and into the outfield. The very next batter, Brendan Donovan, hit a grounder to Julien, whose throw to second instead sailed into the left field, putting runners on second and third. The Cardinals then made the Twins pay with Lars Nootbaar’s two-run single leading St. Louis to a 3-2 win in the series finale at Target Field.

“First time that I’ve ever (missed) on a double-play throw arm side,” Julien said. “I don’t know what happened. Maybe my feet weren’t turned enough, but I usually do that. I don’t know. It just happened in a bad moment, I guess.”

After the error, Jhoan Duran struck out Cardinals (65-65) left fielder Tommy Pham, putting the Twins within an out of sealing the victory. That was the closest they got.

Nootbar swung at the first pitch of his at-bat and sent a single to left to put the Twins (72-58) down for the first time all day.

“We gave it to Duran. He gets a bunch of ground balls. He really didn’t do anything to hurt his cause, but sometimes you get a bunch of ground balls and you can lose the game,” manager Rocco Baldelli said. “It’s a play that Eddy’s going to make almost every time.”

Duran (6-7) surrendered three hits and two runs, both were unearned.

An inning earlier, it looked as if Lewis was going to play hero, hammering a JoJo Romero changeup to the warning track in left-center field to bring in Willi Castro and give the Twins the lead back.

The game had been tied since the fifth inning when Matthews, in the best start of his young career, allowed a home run to Victor Scott II with two outs in the inning. Matthews was sharp in his outing, striking out seven batters, including two in each of his first three innings of work in his outing.

“I definitely was happy with the performance out there,” he said. “I left a slider up in the fifth inning that Scott was able to put a barrel on, but for the most part, I executed the pitchers I wanted to.”

He nearly matched Cardinals starter Erick Fedde, who quieted the Twins for the third time this season. Fedde allowed just a home run to Castro, the first batter he faced in the first inning, before settling in and not giving another run in his six innings of work.

“He’s a difficult task,” Baldelli said. “He’s proven that.”

But while the Twins weren’t really able to solve Fedde, they did have themselves in position late to win a game and, for the third time in a week, saw a potential victory turn into a tough loss.

“We probably could have found ways to score some runs today and separate a little bit and give ourselves a little bit a cushion,” Baldelli said. “When you’re trying to hold it together and keep them from scoring for many innings, sometimes just putting balls in play will lead to wins.”

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Right around this time last year, the Twins decided to move Louie Varland to the bullpen, allowing him first to get his feet wet in the role at Triple-A before deploying him as a weapon out of the major league bullpen.

Varland responded to the new challenge, giving up just two earned runs in 12 innings (1.50 ERA) to cap the regular season and making two scoreless playoff appearances. But while it appeared as if Varland could be ticketed for a similar role again late this season, injuries to starters Joe Ryan and Chris Paddack have made the decision harder — and perhaps slightly delayed it.

With rookies Simeon Woods Richardson, David Festa and Zebby Matthews already in the major league rotation pitching important innings, Varland is in Triple-A starting, serving as depth should something happen to anyone currently in the rotation.

“We can’t put ourselves ever in a spot where we run out of capable starters,” Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. “That is always going to be the first thing that I have to bring up when we talk about Lou and his ultimate landing spot in September as far as how he’s getting his innings.”

If the Twins need another starter, he should be the first in line and shortening him up for a relief role would leave them thin on available options for the rotation.

Varland struggled in the majors earlier this season, losing his rotation spot to Woods Richardson. But he’s made a handful of spot starts in the majors since his bumpy April and performed better. He’s also pitched notably better at Triple-A.

“I don’t know the answer,” Baldelli said of Varland’s future role. “I think you could see it play out both ways.”

Topa progressing

While there’s still a question of whether or not Varland joins the bullpen at some point this year, Justin Topa is hoping to provide the Twins a late-season addition to the relief corps.

Topa has been on the injured list all season, first dealing with knee tendinitis and then elbow soreness after going on a rehab assignment earlier this month which had to be halted.

The reliever played catch at 60 feet on Sunday with no issues, will take Monday off and then return to catch play on Tuesday and Wednesday as he keeps ramping up. He hopes by the end of next week, he can be throwing off the mound.

“It’s been frustrating, getting close and then the setback with the knee the first time,” Topa said. “Knee’s been feeling probably the best it’s felt in over two years and then obviously this pops up. But you just kind of roll with the punches and try to find a silver lining in everything.”

Though Topa is aware of the time crunch — there’s a little more than a month remaining in the regular season — he still believes there’s enough time for him to get back and impact the team down the stretch.

“I think after talking to (athletic trainer) Nick (Paparesta) and everybody, once we get past that point of doing some flat ground work and get on the mound, I think it’s going to be a relatively quick ramp up,” Topa said. “Not in the sense of we’re going to try to overdo it, but in the sense of, I threw enough in St. Paul that first go-around, maybe one or two games there.”

Briefly

Max Kepler was scratched shortly before Sunday’s game with left knee soreness and Baldelli said he spent much of the day in the training room. Baldelli said he would get imaging done on his knee, at which point the team would know more. … Baldelli did not have much of an update on Alex Kirilloff, whom the Twins pulled from his rehab assignment after he experienced what the manager called “residual back soreness.” Kirilloff has been on the injured list since June 13 and played one game in St. Paul on Friday, doubling once in his five at-bats before the Twins paused his rehab assignment.

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