{"id":253903,"date":"2026-07-28T17:58:06","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T17:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/253903\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T17:58:06","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T17:58:06","slug":"philadelphia-to-host-14th-annual-vetfest-at-city-hall-on-july-29","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/253903\/","title":{"rendered":"Philadelphia To Host 14th Annual VetFest at City Hall on July 29"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>VetFest 2026 will honor more than 40 veterans and connect veterans from the five-county Philadelphia area with resources at City Hall on Wednesday, July 29, from 11 a.m.\u20134 p.m. The event, now in its 14th year, will remain free of charge for attendees.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Attendees should come to the Courtyard and the North Apron of Philadelphia City Hall, North Broad Street and JFK Boulevard, to attend the event.<\/p>\n<p>VetFest is organized by Philadelphia&#8217;s Office of Veterans Affairs (VA) and places special emphasis on honoring veterans, including Vietnam veterans who often did not receive a proper welcome home. Outreach for the event has been conducted through word of mouth, veteran service organization networks, and increased social media engagement to spread information about VetFest and related VA services.<\/p>\n<p>New this year are vendor resources for veterans, broadening access to services beyond city borders to include dependents and caregivers. Mission Barbecue is catering VetFest 2026 for the first time. Food trucks will also be available. Entertainment will be provided by the Intruders, the Blue Notes, and the Urban Guerilla Orchestra, funded by generous donations.<\/p>\n<p>VetFest aligns with America&#8217;s 250th birthday celebrations and the nation&#8217;s ongoing recognition of veterans&#8217; sacrifices.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Without this population, without these people, these brave and courageous individuals, [America] wouldn&#8217;t have made it to 250,&#8221; said Gregory Wright, director of the City&#8217;s Office of Veterans Affairs, <a href=\"https:\/\/philasun.com\/local\/veterans-assemble\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">in a statement shared with The Philadelphia Sunday Sun<\/a>.\u00a0&#8220;A lot of our veterans don&#8217;t necessarily get the praise that&#8217;s deserved, and sometimes it can feel like an alienating experience when you come home, and you have to adjust. It looks so different that it can make you feel siloed even when you&#8217;re surrounded by community.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;So, walking up to a veteran and [remembering] to just say, \u2018Thank you for your service and welcome home&#8217; \u2014 that goes a long way. That acknowledgment means the world to them,&#8221; he continued.<\/p>\n<p>According to Wright, the Office of Veterans Affairs has seen a 100% rise in veterans filing claims and accessing benefits such as real estate tax exemptions. The office has added two new staff members to handle the increase in requests for services.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"VetFest 2026 will honor more than 40 veterans and connect veterans from the five-county Philadelphia area with resources&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":253904,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[1756,69,71,70],"class_list":["post-253903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-events","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=253903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=253903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=253903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=253903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}