Joseph P Dwyer Program Montgomery County, NY

Dwyer and his legacy of service, the mission of our PFC Joseph P. Dwyer Peer Support Program is to empower Veterans and their family members to find passion, purpose and hope as they transition from military to civilian life.

​The PFC Joseph P. Dwyer Peer Support Program brings United States Armed Forces Veterans, service members and their families together through Veteran-to-Veteran collaborative services, social activities, and community service, easing the transition from military to civilian life. The program is named in honor of Joseph P. Dwyer, a US Army Medic in the Iraq War who, in the earliest days of the invasion in 2003, was pictured cradling a wounded boy while his unit was fighting its way up the Euphrates to Baghdad. PFC Dwyer’s post-war struggles with PTSD resulted in his untimely and tragic death in 2008. Dwyer Program was created by then-New York State Senator Lee Zeldin, who is now a congressman representing New York State’s 1st District. Zeldin served four years in the Army active duty, having been deployed in 2006 to Tikrit, Iraq. Started in 2012, the Dwyer Program now offers peer-to-peer counseling for veterans suffering from PTSD or TBI and any veteran looking to reintegrate into civilian society. It began in Suffolk County and quickly expanded to almost half the counties in New York State.
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