BATON ROUGE - Mayor-President Sharon Weston Broome is taking the initiative to establish a new advisory council on Veteran Affairs. The goal of the council is to create programs that can provide resources to veterans who may be in need of assistance.

"We have over 23,000 veterans in our community and they have served our community, they have served our nation. And so I believe we owe it to them to serve them and make sure that their quality of life post-military is indeed an excellent quality of life," Mayor Broome said.

On Tuesday, she and several council members held their first meeting on how to tackle several issues veterans face on a day-by-day basis.

Charles Entrekin is a six-year homeless veteran and he hopes the city can come up with solutions to keep veterans off the streets.

"We recognized that housing is certainly an issue for many veterans, small business development is an issue," Entrekin said. "Make sure that they have work to occupy themselves and a decent place to say that the biggest thing."

Healthcare, employment and education are other resources the council hopes to make available for veterans.

"I think veterans have given so much to this nation and so much to protect our country, it's important we do all we can to support them," Councilman Lamont Cole said.

With Entrekin's faith now in the hands of these men and women, he hopes to one day get back on his feet.

"During the war, everyone is behind the veteran. But as soon as the war is over they are forgotten," Entrekin said.