At the beginning of the Memorial Day Weekend, veterans were given an opportunity to network with employers, service organizations and healthcare providers at a job and health fair especially for them.

The second annual Vet2Hire Health and Job Fair was held from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Friday at the Outlets at Vicksburg.

“This is by far the biggest event that we’ve done,” said John Victorian, Mississippi Veterans Support Network program director. “We have roughly 52 vendors that are here.”

Casinos, law enforcement agencies, banks, community colleges and nursing homes were just some of the agencies that had representatives at the fair.

“This is an opportunity to assist veterans who are unemployed or who need additional resources outside of employment,” Victorian said.

Trustmark National Bank had Ryan Rippy at the job fair to promote a veterans training program, and Marcus Johnson was on-hand to explain other job opportunities in the company.

Applicants to the training program must prove they were honorably discharged from the military or are active in the National Guard to be accepted.

“Nobody else can apply for it,” Rippy said.

Trustmark has hosted two veterans programs a year, spring and fall, in Jackson since 2014.

“The objective of the program, after the end of three months of training, is to place people in full-time jobs,” Rippy said.

He said the hiring rates and the opportunity are good for those veterans looking to get into banking or the corporate world. Participants rotate to three different departments each month of the program to look at a variety of job options in the company.

Shelley McGraw Gray-Lewis with the Mississippi Department of Rehabilitation Services set up a table at the job fair to share with people the services the department offers disabled Mississippians including training people for jobs and making home modifications like wheelchair ramps for those who can not work.

“We help Mississippi citizens with disabilities either get back into the work force through vocational rehab or if they’re not able to work we try to keep them at home and use whatever modifications they need to stay there and live more independently rather than going in a nursing home,” she said.

Nicholas Smith, Cortay Johnson and Monica Cosby are not veterans but are looking for employment, and when they heard about the job fair, they decided to stop and look at their options.

“It’s an opportunity, and that’s something we need in Vicksburg,” Smith said.

Johnson said she enjoyed learning about the casinos, and Cosby said she liked talking to the Vicksburg Police Department.

A recent graduate of Auburn University with a degree in community planning, Nicholas Jackson came to the job fair with his mom who was working the Hinds Community College table and his stepfather who is an Army veteran. Jackson was very interested in Yazoo River Towing, Inc.

“They told me about barges and working on a boat. That seemed exciting,” he said.

Organizer Usthana Hargrove, a program coordinator with AmeriCorps in the veterans serving our military community program, was pleased with the turnout.

“The way I look at it, it doesn’t matter if we have one or if we have 500, if we can help one person today then we have achieved our goal,” Hargrove said.