Veterans To Get A Lift To Brick VA Clinic Through Ocean Inc. Ride Share Program

BRICK, NJ — When the Department of Veterans Affairs announced it had finally awarded a contract to build a new clinic to serve veterans’ health care needs in Ocean County, it was good news for thousands of veterans in the area.

The new facility not only will be able to accommodate more veterans, it will have far more parking, meaning veterans will not have to walk multiple blocks to get to the clinic building to get the care they need.

That good news, however, is tempered by the fact that the new clinic in Toms River is not expected to open until the spring of 2024.

In an effort to address one of the biggest problems at the existing James J. Howard Clinic in Brick — the lack of parking — the federal spending package approved in December included $55,000 for Ocean Inc. to provide transportation to the Howard clinic. The funding was part of the $1.7 trillion package approved in late 2022 by the House and Senate and signed into law by President Joe Biden.

The program is anticipated to assist 100 veterans through Ocean Inc.’s EZ Ride system, OCEAN Inc officials said.

Connie Fahim, a spokesperson for Ocean Inc, said the program to serve veterans will be an offshoot of its Senior Isolation Transportation program. That existing program already helps seniors who need assistance getting to social events or medical appointments.

The program will create accounts that allow the veterans to contact Uber or Lyft for rides to and from the clinic.

“Once we get the funding, we don’t have to plan long,” Fahim said. “We’re just going to attach this to our existing program.”

“Expanding these services to older and disabled veterans honors their service and ensures they will be able to access the medical care they need without putting their own health and safety at risk due to inadequate parking and transportation options,” officials said.

Ocean Inc. has had a contract with EZ Ride to provide transportation for isolated seniors for nearly five years, Fahim said. “Nobody was doing this before.”

The veteran transports are a natural progression, she said.

The start date hasn’t been set; it’s a matter of when the funding is released to the state and the state sends it to Ocean Inc. Fahim was estimating springtime for the program’s launch.