(Tom) Hello and welcome to Arizona Illustrated.

I'm Tom McNamara.

This week, May 27th is Memorial Day and we're joining you today from Armory Park in downtown Tucson.

This park was the site of the first armory in the state of Arizona built way back in 1913.

The armory was demolished in 1975 and now the park has several memorials dedicated to our military history.

This week, as we take time to remember those who served, there are still many Veterans who are currently experiencing homelessness.

Today, we'll show you one local organization trying to help.

(upbeat music) Esperanza En Escalante is a place of refuge for Tucson's Veterans.

(Suzanne) Veterans tell me when my military service ended, they just kind of dropped me off somewhere.

For the first time in my life, I didn't have any direction.

(Tom) Also meet some pasture professors at the University of Arizona Campus Agricultural Center.

(Skyler) Really amazing to kind of be able to have this full experience of a farm being in the middle of Tucson.

(Tom) And we'll meet a Tucson man who is fighting invasive plants.

(Tony) If we degrade these lands with invasive species and let them take over, it's gonna out-compete our native plants.

(upbeat music) (Tom) Now in January, 2023, the Department of Veterans Affairs estimated there were 35,000 Veterans sleeping on American streets.

That number rose more than 7% between 2022 and 23, the largest yearly rise in more than a decade.

Next, in the final installment of our series, "Where to Live," we'll show you how Esperanza En Escalante is helping Veterans find their way back into permanent housing and their way back into our country that they so honorably served.

♪ HEROIC MUSIC (Nathania) How does a Veteran become homeless and don't we have safety nets in place?

How is this even happening?

Homelessness really impacts a lot of people and with Veterans, they're experiencing a lot of different barriers.

(Jonesy) We're here at Esperanza Escalante, a transitional housing for homeless Veterans.

(Nathania) We have two different types of housing on campus here at Esperanza En Escalante, and one of them is our transitional housing.

We serve about 250 homeless Veterans every year, and we've had about 34 this year that have been through transitional housing and then successfully gone into their own housing into the community.

(Suzanne) We're right next to the Boneyard.

14 acres that was donated to us by the Air Force Base.

(Jonesy) We also have family housing here where we house families of Veterans.

(Suzanne) We probably have 550 family members of Veterans.

(Nathania) Our goal really is to work with the Veterans and get them through the barriers that they're facing that's causing a temporary homeless situation.

A lot of mental health challenges that surround Veterans, particularly PTSD and a lot of those issues that they're coming out of the military with.

(Jonesy) I wasn't no angel either, you know.

When you join the military, they teach you to do all kinds of things that you can't really use in real life, you know.

And when you come back here, you don't wanna be the person that you were when you had to go there to survive.

They teach you to be warriors, you know, and then all of a sudden you come here and it's like you can't go to Safeway and have road rage.

You know?

[ laughs ] (Nathania) There are Veterans that come to us with sobriety issues and have lost employment.

-I was going through a rehab center to help me kind of just work on my mental illness.

And what happened was they said, here's another place that you can go to, kind of a safe place, very Veteran owned, very helpful.

there's always that slight chance that you're gonna stumble and fall again.

There's a camaraderie that's built among the Veterans that live here.

We have barbecues, it helps you feel like you belong.

It gives you back your hope.

I can get my family to respect me again.

(Suzanne) Only 50% of Veterans associate themselves with the VA. That leaves a huge number of Veterans that are uncomfortable re-engaging with the military.

They aren't able to take advantage of the many benefits that are available to them.

They had a bad experience in the military and they just want to get away from that.

(Jonesy) I don't get no Veteran benefits because my blindness can't be associated with my military service.

It just seems like that they're waiting for you to hurry up and die so they don't have to wait on you.

"No, screw the government.

I'll go live in the bushes, you know, and live in these homeless encampments because nobody wants to help me."

Veterans are a proud group.

We don't like to beg.

We shouldn't have to.

It's why the suicide rate's high, you know?

Veterans don't give up easy.

They can be pushed to the point.

♪ SOMBER MUSIC (Suzanne) So in Tucson, the price of rental units and to purchase homes, the cost has gone up.

There is no rent control.

And oftentimes they find that they cannot afford to stay in their home.

They're displaced with their children, and as you can imagine, horrific thing for a proud Veteran.

- Well, me as a man, I have to put my pride aside, you know?

And, uh...

Hold on.

That's hard.

I wanted to serve.

I had a family that I was serving, so I felt that was the right thing to do.

And I wanted to wear the uniform, too, so...

I signed up for the National Guard, and then I transferred over to active duty, served four years, did back-to-back tours.

I was in Mosul, my first tour.

My second tour I was in south Iraq.

My first deployment, I got hurt.

So I got hit with the, how do I say, IED explosion.

Once I got out, I didn't really know a lot of things that was going on until after 2012 when I got diagnosed with TBI.

(Suzanne) Lots of Veterans tell me, you know, when my military service ended, they just kind of dropped me off somewhere.

For the first time in my life, I didn't have any direction, I wasn't sure how to move forward.

A lot of times because of that, they become homeless.

(Armondo) I feel like I was a Veteran that fell through the cracks.

And I was just trying to work jobs to jobs, trying to hold them down, couldn't.

My wife was working.

She had to stop working and take care of me.

We moved into something smaller.

COVID happened and things started happening with the landlord and forced us out.

That's when we became homeless.

Coming here at first, I didn't want to be here, you know?

Yeah, it's hard.

Ah, but.

I mean, I have a family, and I want a roof over their head.

(Suzanne) We find that just providing them an environment where they can feel safe and secure and really start to work on their goals again is just a wonderful thing and because of that we see a lot of success here.

(Armondo) It's something that people don't ever want to be in that situation.

I feel like being here has helped me.

There are other Veterans like myself in my situation and we can relate and that's a support that gets us through these kind of things.

We have resources, you have help here, you just have to ask for it.

A lot of Veterans feel like they're alone but, we're not though.

You sign up to do a good thing, you know?

Shoot, yeah, that's tough.

I think I'm good.

(Nathania) A lot of times it's just a matter of helping them find the tools and connecting them with the right resources so they can get all of these items completed and then confidently step into the community again.

- Well most veterans don't know until it's too late so we think because we're such a strong soldier we have a military mindset we can handle everything that comes our way.

(Suzanne) 80% of the Veterans that move in here will move out into their own housing.

They're used to having people not look them in the eyes anymore.

A lot of times we are just worried that they're going to ask us for something.

For fear or because we just don't understand people who are homeless.

That's part of our job here is to just let them know they're a human that we value.

We value the service that they've given to this country.

- I served in the U.S. Army for seven and a half years and I retired as a staff sergeant.

I have about a year and a half left to receive my degree.

So this place is like a second home from a soldier to transition from becoming a civilian again.

(Nathania) It's really exciting to share that pride with them and this is the perfect example of really giving back to the people that need us the most and that have served us the most.

(Jonesy) You know, I started off volunteering and when they offered me a job I said, "No, you don't have to pay me.

I'll just come and do it anyway."

I have a reason that I get up in the morning, you know, because I know I'm going to go have coffee with the guys and we're going to have breakfast in the morning and we're going to go do fun stuff, you know.

I could stay here the rest of my life.

They don't even have to pay me.

Don't tell her that.

[ Laughs ] (Nathania) It's the Veterans that serve our country and the give back and responsibility that we have to take care of them as they're coming out of really intense service to us is just, I mean it's our obligation and our duty.

(Suzanne) If there's anything that's going to remove your fear of homeless men and women, it's to spend time with them.

No one more deserving than a Veteran.

♪ "GRACE" by IDLES ♪ Give me grace ♪ Make me pure ♪ When they're knocking at my door ♪ ♪ Make me safe ♪ Away from harm ♪ Hold me in my brother's arms ♪ Make me pure (Tom) To learn more about this organization and see the stories from our series, "Where to Live", just head to the website news.azpm.org/wheretolive If you've ever driven along Campbell Avenue south of River, you've probably been charmed by the sight of the cows and horses that call the U of A Campus Agricultural Center home.

Now, it's part of a 160-acre farm that offers these stunning pastoral views right in the middle of the city.

Next, we see what goes into managing this unique landmark.

[MUSIC] (Skyler) I count myself extremely lucky that this gets to be my workspace.

Like how many people get that opportunity to go to work and see animals, see green grass, have just like a beautiful open relatively quiet place to be.

And it's really amazing to kind of be able to have this full experience of a farm, being in the middle of Tucson.

(Sara) It's just gorgeous, especially in the morning.

All of us are very much morning people.

So you get to wake up with the sun.

We've got beautiful sunrises and sunsets.

And the animals are always really eager.

They're waiting for their breakfast.

[MUSIC] (Skyler) As the animal care manager, my primary duties here are care of all of our animal herds that support our teaching curriculum.

So we have horses, cattle, and sheep currently that are on site here.

So me and my team make sure that their health and welfare is kept to the highest standards.

And then when we have students on site and we have curriculum happening, we're actively supporting those students, supporting those animals, making sure everybody's safe and comfortable.

(Katie) One thing that's really cool about our program and our farm is that we're able to take in a lot of animals who might have weird things going on medically.

So a big part of our morning is kind of getting all their medications in order.

Each of them kind of have individualized diets.

So we have to kind of prepare all those in the morning.

Most of the animals we have here are retired from whatever their past profession was.

We like to call ourselves a retirement home because they have it really great here.

They get all the care they need.

They have a team of veterinarians just basically on call for them all the time.

(Kacey) Our job encompasses animal care.

And that is not just their physical care and their physical well-being, but that's mental and emotional too.

And so we will take them out on walks to get them comfortable around the surroundings.

We groom a lot.

Every animal gets groomed at least once a week.

[COWS MOOING] [COWS MOOING] (Sara) These are our very, very lucky cows.

They get to live here for their entire life.

They're all retired cows from a dairy.

We've got eight dairy cows and then two beef cows.

They'll live here their whole lives.

They're just like big pasture puppies.

[MUSIC] (Kacey) I love watching the sheep run down the lane every morning.

Like, that's better than a cup of coffee, like seeing them so excited.

They know which truck is ours, and they will run to the gate.

We're hay girls.

[LAUGHTER] You know, it's like a waiter in a restaurant.

They're ready.

[LAUGHTER] (Sara) One thing that we do is really get the animals comfortable to be in labs.

So the whole purpose here is so that they could have hands-on interaction with students.

(Lara) The teaching areas we have here at the CAC We're currently in what we call the learning center.

So we have our models here.

We have stocks for life horse labs where we do gastroscopy and things like that.

[RAIN] If I'm evaluating horse for cardiac issues.

I want to know what the quality of the jugular pulse is.

Is it strong?

Is it going up the neck?

Is there jugular fill?

All of those things.

This particular lab is going to be the cardiovascular and respiratory exam lab.

So students will come out and have a chance to listen to the heart and the lungs of live horses, cattle, and dogs.

What'd you guys get for heart rate for a Marshall?

On the equine side, we are doing 30 minutes listening to the heart and 30 minutes listening to the lungs.

And going over respiratory stuff.

And then once we're done with the students and our hour is over at equine, they will shift to bovine.

(Sara) These guys, you'll notice some of them have little shaved patches on their coat.

So they were recently used in like ultrasound lab.

So students learn about how to do ultrasounds, how to palpate a cow, blood draws, how to check the vitals of a cow.

So they're wonderful teaching professors.

And they're very patient with our students.

(Skyler) One of the coolest things is that typically students don't get to touch live animals for the first few years of school.

And from here, it's almost day one.

They're out there interacting with the animals, Starting with things like safety, behavior, restraint, all of the kind of foundational stuff that then they get to build on.

[COW MOOING] [MUSIC] (Lara) I love this farm.

It's got so much history.

And it's impressive what has been built out here and what is maintained out here.

When I get just tired of sitting in the front of a computer or sitting in a chair or just not being out, I can walk down the road and look at the horses and I have rounds with Skyler and her team and it is like renewing to the soul.

(Skyler) In the afternoon, it's kind of the systemic shutting down of all of the pastures.

All of the animals are kind of quiet and happy and settling in for the night and there's just kind of this peace.

I'll sometimes be out in a pasture and I'll see somebody pull up with their kid and they say, "You know, we stop by every Tuesday afternoon after school because we have to go see the horses and that's our favorite."

They like to ask questions about the animals, what are their names, what are they used for, things like that.

They have this role with the community and people want to know, people want to be engaged.

(Sara) This is their retirement and I'm pretty sure like this is where I'm gonna retire too because it's just it's wonderful.

And it's nice that they continue to be able to work into their retirement and they really serve such a valuable purpose.

Like they're still working and teaching the future generations of veterinarians which is so so important.

(Tom) Over the past few seasons in our ongoing desert plant series, we've featured many native and drought tolerant plants that can be beneficial in your yard or your garden.

But unfortunately our region also has plenty of bad apples.

Invasive unwanted plants are the focus of another recurring series beginning today with the goal of informing and educating a wider audience.

In this case, birds, plants and passion opened up new paths for a lifelong Tucsonan.

(Tony) It was just so much stinknet.

It's like a four acre spot that is just tons of stinknet.

It's not 100% of the lot.

There's like spots here and there, but like an area.

(Tony) My name is Tony Figueroa.

I'm the Invasive Plants, Senior Program Manager at the Tucson Audubon.

"Good morning."

(Tony) We have a crew of 20 people that are permanent full-time employees managing invasive species throughout the region and trying to preserve the habitat that our wildlife and birds depend on.

[Gambel's quail calling] ♪ Ominous music (Tony) Stinknet, Oncosiphon, piluliferum.

It is a horrible noxious weed that as you can see is readily invading this vacant lot.

♪ Ominous music ♪ (Tony) This is salt cedar or Tamarix aphylla.

It is one of many species of the salt cedar family.

♪ Ominous music ♪ (Tony) This is one of our most invasive non-native grasses.

This is fountain grass, Pennisetum cetaceum.

♪ Ominous music (Tony) African sumac.

Sercia lancea.

It has a tremendous ability to invade riparian areas and any spot that has a little bit of extra moisture.

♪ Soft piano (Tony) It's important to protect our desert habitat because the Sonoran Desert unlike anywhere else on earth.

And it is so rich in plant species and animal species that if we degrade these lands with invasive species and let them take over it's going to outcompete our native plants.

And then beyond that it has fire risks associated with it.

(Tony) Native plants provide food resources for insects, for birds, for mammals, and it's just this whole ladder of sustainability for the desert creatures.

(Tony) We're here at my happy home.

My wife and I, Lindsay, we purchased this place back in 2010 on the east side of Tucson, not too far from Saguaro National Park.

The standard 70s era neighborhood on a quarter acre, your standard residential lot.

It was mostly bare soils except for this fig tree back here which as a Figueroa it meant a great deal to me to get a place that had a fig tree.

My Nana and Tata had a big fig tree in their backyard and it was always just a special connection with that smell of those plants.

I'm a Tucson native and grew up going camping, going hiking.

My dad had a had a camping club with me and my siblings called the Itchy Foot Campers.

I've always felt this love for nature and animals.

Growing up watching the Discovery Channel and the Desert Speaks, PBS Nova, Nature.

♪ Nature theme music (birds chirping) Oh yeah, this is my first flax of the year.

Wednesday was my big time to just geek out and learn and appreciate things.

But I never knew that that was a possibility for a career field.

My parents are both retired military now, and I always had this perception that you either join the military, you go into healthcare, you become a teacher or a lawyer.

Those are like the job fields available to be a successful adult.

So I didn't want to deal with blood and guts, so I decided to go into the pharmacy career path, and I worked as a pharmacy technician for a long time.

♪ gentle music (Tony) And then in 2010, my wife and I, we got married, and we started taking summer road trips.

She was a teacher, so we'd save all of our vacation for the summertime.

Just take a big road trip, just camping out of our car and occasionally in a motel when we needed to take a shower.

But we'd keep on going to national parks, national forests, national monuments.

Our biggest trip was 8,600 miles.

We went from here to the Florida Keys up to Maine and back.

And it was in doing this that I would just make the joke, "You know, man, this is a beautiful place."

"Somebody should do something about preserving this and protecting it for the future."

I went back to school, went to the U of A to get a degree in wildlife conservation management and the School of Natural Resources, and it was through doing that that I got exposed to a lot more opportunities.

And that was where I kind of just changed my whole career path was through hiking in the Tucson area, going to these beautiful places and realizing, "Why not me?"

♪ Gentle music (Tony) One of my goals for this is a teaching and learning experience.

I always joke that this is the Figueroa Botanical Gardens to my friends and recorded over 35 species of moths and butterflies in my yard throughout the years.

I have over 200 species that are native to the region, growing either as annuals or perennials.

And there's always a show going on.

Some of my favorite plants, Perry's penstemon, that is our native penstemon to this region of Arizona, attracts butterflies and hummingbirds.

Desert marigolds are one of my favorite flowers.

Just got this bright yellow flower on it.

♪ Gentle music Chuparosas.

I've seen it shoulder high out in the deserts of Yuma, so if it can survive in the Yuma Desert, it can survive in your backyard.

Brittlebush is a great desert shrub.

You'll see it just covering hillsides and just giant yellow flowers.

♪ Gentle music (Tony) I've created water harvesting features digging basins in the backyard so that I'm not losing my soil anymore.

♪ Gentle music Slowly but surely I'm starting to infect people in the neighborhood with that passion for growing native plants.

Like a little bit really goes a long ways and you just got to start somewhere.

Just digging a hole is often enough and putting some rocks around it.

(Tony) I work at Tucson Audubon which is a birding organization and that is a common question that I get is, "Why are you doing the work that you're doing?"

"I thought you're supposed to just be looking at birds."

And it's painting that picture of birds rely on our native plants.

They rely on the insects that are feeding on our native plants.

They rely on the seeds that our native plants produce.

This is reality.

Like these are the natural things of the earth.

Not our computer screens, not our iPhones.

When you come out in these places you feel that enrichment and that joy of, "Wow, I didn't know that that creature existed here before.

I've never seen that thing before."

"Oh, there's a Praying mantis on this plant.

I didn't know that those were around here."

A lot of my original inspiration for the yard was to attract hummingbirds and other native birds.

It's just such a beautiful experience.

Put a bunch of different species right on top of each other and they know how to live together, they know how to get along.

♪ Mandolin plucking (Tom) If you'd like to learn more about the beneficial and invasive species of plants in our desert, just head to our website, azpm.org/desertplants, and we'll be updating that frequently.

Thank you for joining us here on Arizona Illustrated.

I'm Tom McNamara, and we'll see you again next week.

(upbeat music)