Disabled Dubuque veteran urges Congress to extend adaptive housing grants program

In 2007, after experiencing several indirect hits and one direct hit from improvised explosive devices, Iowa Army National Guard veteran Andrew Connolly returned home from Iraq. He wasn’t aware that one of the biggest battles he would ever fight was just beginning.

“After completing my tour in Iraq, I immediately returned to work and enrolled in school,” Connolly explained to members of a U.S. House Veterans’ Affairs Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity Tuesday. “I tolerated wear and tear on the body figuring that the pains and weird feelings would go away. … A little over a year after my return, I noticed numbness in my right foot. I thought that I had just tweaked something in my back due to the injuries that had occurred while overseas.”

After meeting with physicians at the VA Hospital in Iowa City, Connolly learned he had a slow-growing, small mass within his spinal cord. It was soon discovered that the growth was cancer, and that it would eventually lead to paralysis.

Connolly’s son, Brody, was born in July 2008 with congenital myasthenic syndrome — an all-encompassing neuromuscular disorder that requires both a wheelchair and a ventilator.

The family lived in the lower portion of an 1890-built duplex, which was not handicap-accessible.

“As the year 2009 went on, the right side of my body slowly lost feeling,” Connolly said. “By the time 2010 came around, my left side began to lose feeling as well. As my body began to dwindle from the nipples down, I investigated military grants for paralyzed veterans.”

Although Connolly would soon be confined to a wheelchair, the fact that he currently had some mobility prevented him from accessing the grant.

“I was 26, married and had a beautiful, handicapped child to support. My life spiraled downward,” he said.

Easing Some Discomfort

“For seven years, military leaders preached to us, ‘Prepare, prepare, prepare!’ That is exactly what I was trying to do. I was hoping to get the grant paperwork started early so that when the time came and a wheelchair became a permanent part of my life I would be ready,” Connolly said.

In April 2010, he reached out to then-Iowa Rep. Ray Zirkelbach (D-Monticello). The two had served together in both Egypt and Iraq, and Zirkelbach forwarded Connolly’s information to U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley (D-Waterloo). Within two weeks, the Connolly family had been approved for a Temporary Residence Adaptation (TRA) grant and construction began on their new accessible home in June 2010 — at the same time the cancer fully claimed Connolly’s legs and lower torso.

“With paralysis, I fell deeper and deeper into depression,” he said. “The list of tasks that I was able to do around the duplex grew shorter and shorter. … Life in the duplex was unbearable.”

Doorways in 1890 were not built to accommodate a wheelchair, effectively preventing Connolly from accessing his own bathroom without assistance. Even moving from one room to the next was difficult due to narrow hallways and resulted in his knuckles banging against the wall. Because the space was not built to accommodate a wheelchair, Connolly could not be self-sufficient and was forced to rely on his wife for the most basic of daily tasks.

“Today I am in my new house. Today I took a shower by myself in a 5-foot by 5-foot roll-in shower with handicapped controls. Today I cooked my own breakfast because I could reach all of the ingredients. Today I was able to watch my son, Brody, sleeping in his bedroom because I could roll through his doorway in my wheelchair. Today I am praying for all soldiers and veterans, that they may have the support and dignity they deserve, without having to jump through hoops, or have a friend in politics,” Connolly said.

“I am where I am today because I had advocates, not because I will ultimately die young as a result of serving the country I love.”

Assisting More Soldiers

Connolly was asked to testify before the House subcommittee because a bill aiming to extend the adaptive house grant program he accessed is pending before Congress.

On Monday, Braley introduced House Resolution 1671, the Andrew Connolly Veterans’ Housing Act, which is now before the Veterans’ Affairs Committee. The bill extends the authority of the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to provide specially adapted housing assistance to individuals residing temporarily in house owned by a family member for a period of five years, ending in 2016. Without the reauthorization, the program will end this year.

“This grant is important to service-connected veterans who return home with devastating injuries,” Braley told the subcommittee during his opening remarks. “These veterans need a caretaker while they rehabilitate, and these caretakers are generally family members. In order to provide disabled veterans with the independence they need while they recuperate, different types of adaptations need to be made to a family’s home with the veteran temporarily lives with them.”

Soldiers, Braley said, deserve American support on and off the battlefield.

“For many young men and women who return from combat with severe life-altering injuries, the fight is far from over,” he said. “Veterans like Andrew return to a completely new life — with new, special needs. We must ensure that they have the support they need to adjust to their new lives and feel comfortable in their homes.”

Watch Connolly’s testimony before the House subcommittee: