(The Center Square) – State Treasurer Stacy Garrity took her gubernatorial campaign to a key swing county on Monday evening to promote six proposals aimed at helping veterans and their families.
“Pennsylvania’s veterans, they deserve a governor who will fight for them as hard as they have fought for us,” said Garrity, a retired Colonel who earned two Bronze Stars for her military service.
Pennsylvania is home to nearly 700,000 veterans, which is the fifth-largest in the nation.
During her visit to Warringtown Township in Bucks County, Garrity laid out the programs she believed would help veterans and their families.
In an effort to get veterans to work, she said her administration would expand VA-qualifying certification tests, enforce existing credentialing law under PA Title 51, and make Pennsylvania the top destination for veterans pursuing higher education.
Garrity’s plan, for example, would cut the average LPN licensing timeline by 10 months, which she said would save veterans an estimated $18,100 in GI Bill benefits by eliminating “redundant training requirements.”
In detailing how her administration would prioritize hiring veterans, she said businesses in the state would receive a $3,000 tax credit for full-time veteran hires and a $1,500 tax credit for part-time hires. This would be claimable after one year and renewable for as long as the veteran stays on.
“When you think about it, these heroes are the most disciplined, mission driven, and proven job applicants and that’s why under a Garrity-Richey administration, we are going to make hiring veterans a priority,” she said to applause.
Arguing that the closest healthcare for veterans is often too far in various parts of the state, Garrity said she would use the Working Families Tax Cuts’ rural health funding provisions to deploy telehealth platforms across rural health systems. This proposal, Garrity said, would also expand broadband where connectivity has made care impossible, prioritize specialty services and establish rural diagnostic and lab offices so telehealth providers can send patients for follow-up care close to home.
Her plan for veterans and their families also includes establishing the state’s first permanent Gold Star Family Registry. She said this would guarantee annual personal outreach from the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, DMVA, and the Governor’s Office to every registered family, and create a permanent annual Gold Star Families Day ceremony at the Capitol each September.
In an effort to address housing issues faced by veterans, Garrity said the state, under her administration, would partner with qualifying nonprofit housing organizations to build veterans’ housing villages. This effort, Garrity’s campaign said, would combine DMVA and Department of Community and Economic Development, DCED, grants, Veterans Trust Fund dollars, and Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency, PHFA, tax credit financing that can cover 30%-70% of development costs.
The specific example she cited was Tunnel to Towers’ Harrisburg village, which will house over 80 veterans on a campus with job training, mental health support, and addiction treatment, which is located next to where the Veterans Outreach of Pennsylvania has already built a village of 15 tiny homes and a community center for Veterans experiencing homelessness.
“There is no reason that this model cannot be replicated across the state,” Garrity said. “And we will.”
The final proposal Garrity highlighted was her push to advance a constitutional amendment that would grant full property tax exemptions to all 100% disabled veterans and their surviving spouses.
“I don’t pretend to be this all-knowing governor like some governor’s you know,” she said. “I promise you that our Commonwealth’s veterans will always have a seat at the table on any veterans issue.”
In her role as state Treasurer, Garrity also highlighted that she’s returned 582 military decorations, including 13 purple hearts, 3 bronze stars, and one gold star medal.
Her speech on Monday evening featured a few other veterans who are backing her candidacy.
“What is the difference between Stacy and her opponent?” asked Dave Christian, a decorated Vietnam War veteran. “Stacy knows the needs of this veterans’ community.”
The Shapiro campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
Since being sworn-in as governor in 2023, the Shapiro administration has tackled multiple matters addressing veterans’ affairs.
In January 2025, the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry invested just under $600,000 in grants to three organizations as part of the Veterans Employment Program, aimed at helping veterans and their spouses address employment concerns.
Last year, as a result of the 2025-26 state budget, the DMVA Educational Gratuity Program received a funding increase from $320,000 to $350,000, which they said would help cover additional students, as the number of applicants at that time was expected to grow beyond projections. The DMVA wrote in a press release in Dec. 2025 that EGP applications were rising as the children of veterans who served in the Global War on Terror were reaching college age.
And in June 2025, the Shapiro administration opened the first state-funded veterans outreach center in central Pennsylvania.
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