ORLANDO, Fla. — Jarold Walters was outside a gas station trying to figure out how he was going to eat and where he was going to sleep when a man wearing a “Go Army” lanyard approached and asked if he was a veteran.

Navy, said Walters, who served during the Gulf War.

I can help you, Michael Bailey said.

“I told him, I don’t believe you,” said Walters who had been homeless for a year, sleeping in an unairconditioned car with his girlfriend and, after losing the car, in the street.

Four weeks later, Bailey handed Walters the key to his new apartment.

Bailey works for Pathlight HOME’s new “No Buddy Left Behind” program, which aims to find and then house homeless veterans in Orlando. The initiative, paid for by a $150,000 grant from the Cigna Foundation, started in February and has helped 24 veterans, eight of whom are now in permanent housing. Most of the others are in temporary places while case managers work to find them long-term homes.

Bailey was homeless for many years after his 1984 discharge from the U.S. Army. Now, with his lanyard around his neck and a clipboard at the ready, he drives up and down Orange Blossom Trail and other areas where he knows he’s likely to find homeless people. When he spots someone, he rolls down his window and says, “You wouldn’t happen to be a veteran?”

If the person says yes, he asks for their MOS, meaning their “military occupational specialty.”

“And after they tell me they are 51 November, 76 Bravo, 12 Charlie, then I know they served in the military. And that’s when we start our assessments,” Bailey said.

The Veterans Administration and other agencies offer services to help homeless veterans, but experts say many are reluctant to seek out that aid.

“They’re resistant to asking for help because they’ve been taught and they’ve been trained that you can do these things yourself. You can make it on your own,” said Carl Falconer, CEO of Pathlight HOME and an Army veteran.

Pathlight, founded in 1992 to help the homeless and low-income individuals, owns two housing complexes in Orlando, where rent is $725 a month and includes access to a job center, food pantry and donation closet, where residents can get clothing and other household items.

“Once we’ve got them here, we get them stabilized, we help them increase their income, and a lot of times, they’ll move to a bigger and better situation,” Falconer said.

Florida has the second highest population of homeless veterans in the country, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, second only to California. In Central Florida, there are more than 200 homeless veterans, according to the Homeless Services Network, accounting for nearly 10% of the region’s homeless population.

The new program has been successful, Falconer added, because the outreach is done by people who’ve faced the same challenges: They’ve served in the military and been homeless.

Bailey said navigating the VA can be frustrating, and he knows veterans who get angry with the system and give up. He encourages them to try again, telling them he applied three times before the VA approved disability payments for injuries he suffered in the Army.

“You served your country, now your country is ready to serve you,” Bailey said.

If a veteran is eligible for disability income, a case manager at Pathlight will work with the VA to get them their benefits and then offer them one of Pathlight’s affordable housing units.

If a veteran is not eligible for disability, Pathlight works with the Homeless Services Network, which has grant funding from the VA to help homeless veterans find housing and get other needed services.

Bailey, who said he suffered from post-traumatic stress because of his Army service, did not initially try to get any benefits. He wanted to distance himself from the military. He began drinking and using drugs and his addictions eventually meant he could not hold down a job, he said.

“A lot of veterans are medicating feelings and reality,” Bailey said. “It’s sad in a lot of ways, they just don’t want to remember certain things. The substance abuse part is not wanting to feel.”

At his lowest, Bailey was living behind a dumpster in a Pizza Hut parking lot in Perry, a small city south of Tallahassee, relying on a sympathetic employee to bring him leftover food and, occasionally, a change of clothes or a fresh blanket.

In 2006, he was arrested on drug charges and spent 30 months in prison. That was a catalyst for him to get clean, Bailey said, and he has not used drugs or alcohol since 2007.

Bailey moved to Orlando in 2014 when he got a job at the Coalition for the Homeless, where he worked as a manager for 10 years. When Pathlight received its grant to do veteran outreach, Bailey took that new post.

“I’m still overwhelmed that I got hired on for this position to reach out to my veteran brothers and share my experience,” Bailey said.

Walters receives Social Security disability payments due to cirrhosis of the liver. With that income, Pathlight was able to get him and his girlfriend, Marta Kimera, into one of its apartments, where they have been living since mid-April.

But even with the Social Security income, the couple struggles financially. So Pathlight is now helping Walters apply for additional disability income and other benefits through the VA for a back injury he suffered while on duty.

Kimera said she is thrilled about the new apartment and a chance to finally sleep well, which she could never do when they were on the street or in their hot car.

“It was scary. It was very scary,” she said. “Because you just have to watch your back.”

The big payoff of his job, Bailey said, is handing a fellow veteran a set of apartment keys. He also presents them a certificate with a photo of the American flag. “Welcome Home, Veteran,” it reads.

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