MARK WAITE / PVT Nye County Veterans Service Offers Russ Barnum, left, and Ken Shockley, stand outside their new trailer behind the Nye County Planning Department on Highway 160 just north of the Bob Ruud Community Center and in front of the Pahrump town annex building by the municipal swimming pool. Advertisement

Nye County veterans won't be without a place to file for compensation benefits or seek help, after the Nevada JobConnect office was closed at the Calvada Eye and moved to the Great Basin College addition.

Ken Shockley, veterans service officer in Pahrump, is now stationed in a trailer behind the Nye County Planning Department on Highway 160 just north of the Bob Ruud Community Center and in front of the Pahrump town annex building by the municipal swimming pool.

Shockley said he made the move March 20, the same day Nevada JobConnect moved out, after only having about a week's notice. Shockley said he had to move out that day because JobConnect was bringing all their furniture with them to the new offices on East Basin Avenue.

Originally the plan was for veterans services to remain in the modular building at the Calvada Eye, he said. It will be occupied by county administration and the nuclear waste repository project office.

Despite his modest trailer -- Shockley said it doesn't even have a bathroom -- he sees the bright side of the move.

"It's a county facility, so we don't have to pay any rent whatsoever. So we're saving rent money which is nice with the budget crunch. We're saving almost $18,000 just in rent alone," Shockley said.

The charging of $1,700 per month for the veterans service office at Nevada JobConnect was a sticking point Commissioner Butch Borasky raised last summer over the issue of the county leasing the manufactured building at the Calvada Eye.

The veterans service officer can help veterans apply for pensions, death and burial benefits, widow's pensions, education benefits, the GI bill and home loans. Shockley has been the Pahrump veterans service officer since the position was created in March 2006.

"There's a lot of services that we provide for our customers," Shockley said. "Right now there's an estimated 8,000 veterans in Pahrump. We got 1,200 clients we got paper work trail on. Granted not all of them need our services, but we're just barely touching the tip of the iceberg."

Shockley's new telephone number is 751-6372, his fax number is 751-6371.