Tower of Hope Helps Wounded Veterans with Service Dogs

September 11, 2001 will always be a day that will standout for the nation but for Cathy Carilli, she decided to turn her tragedy into the Tower of Hope.

The Tower of Hope is a non-profit program that provides service dogs to wounded veterans.

Carilli, a Sleepy Hollow resident, created the Tower of Hope because she wanted her husband’s legacy to reflect who he was, what he was about, and all the good that he did in his lifetime – not how he was taken from the world in the World Trade Center attacks.

“I wanted to provide Veterans who were injured interally and externally with the support that they needed,” said Carilli. “I could not think of any better way to pay them back for serving their country.”

So far, the Tower of Hope has been able to provide about 60 dogs to wounded veterans across the United States. Each dog is trained to alert their veteran if they are about to have a seizure of if they need more medication. With the cost of training one dog around $25,000, the Tower of Hope depends on their yearly fundraising events to provide veterans with their companions.

“A service dog is a constant companion for them [Veterans],” said Carilli. “Every single of the Veterans has said that not only has it helped them physically, but mentally and emotionally too.”

This year, the Tower of Hope will be hosting two events to help raise money to fund service dogs.

• The 6th Annual Lighting the Path gala called “Proud to be an American” will be hosted at the Double Tree hotel in Tarrytown on Oct. 11.
• The 3rd Annual “Walk for Wounded Veterans” will be on Nov. 3 at Tibbetts Brook Park in Yonkers.

With their goal of raising enough money to train 100 dogs in 1,000 days, the Tower of Hope relies on donations to help the veterans. 

For more information on how to get involved with the Tower of Hope.