LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Lending a helping hand is something that comes easily to Mike Denham. 

“It’s nice to get to clean stuff up, instead of seeing it cluttered and thrown on the side of the road. We can take it and if donatable, we can get rid of it,” Denham said. “If not, then we take it to the landfill and it just gives me a sense of accomplishment.”

Denham is a junk removal specialist with Louisville’s veteran owned and operated Sgt. Junk-It.

They were called along with the Veteran’s Club Inc. when one of their own needed help.

“We sort of did housing first aid and were able to get them unit and now we’re looking into long term housing his client has a section 8 voucher in hand from HUD-VASH but we were concerned that the unit would not pass inspection,” Amy Luckett, social service program coordinator with Louisville Metro Government Office of Resilience and Community Services said.

The veteran in need of help has been in his current unit for over a year and could stay there, but in its current condition, the unit would not pass inspection. The veteran’s mother also passed away earlier this year, and the veteran has stored many of her belongings in his unit. He was fine with Spectrum News 1 telling his story, but the veteran didn’t want to speak on camera or be identified by name in this article.

The grant that the Louisville Metro Office of Resilience and Community Services receives for this runs out at the end of the month, so there are no longer funds for the city to help this veteran. The Office for Veterans couldn’t assist either, meaning the Louisville veteran was on the verge of facing homelessness. That’s when they recommended Veteran’s Club INC. 

“If we can get a hold of this now, then this veteran stays in his home and ultimately it alleviates a further problem of homelessness which we have a problem with anyway,” Jeremy Harrell, Founder and CEO of Veteran’s Club Inc. said. “It’s about meeting veterans where they are and getting in front of these issues.”

Harrell got in contact with Denham and the Sgt. Junk-It team and that’s when they got to work. 

A job that keeps Denham coming back.

“It’s just knowing that I was able to help somebody, make their life a little easier hopefully and get them to pass their inspection, that’s the big thing,” Denham said. “They’ve got to have a place to live.”

The veteran will have an inspection done next week on his unit.