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• updated 02/08/2012 12:15PM Warrior Ranch to build new veterans’ support center in Orange County Warrior Ranch, a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting U.S. military veterans, plans to build its western regional headquarters in Orange County. The 50-acre job training, public service and marriage retreat center has been endorsed by Aissa Wayne, daughter of film legend and former Newport Beach resident John Wayne.
  
  The center will partner corporate businesses with veterans and their spouses to prepare them for private sector jobs, while the on-site Allied Liberty Alliance will offer training for public office positions. A film school and movie production facility, inspired by John Wayne, will be open to veterans and the public, allowing them to develop filmmaking skills. Veterans will also receive resume and interview tips. A national headquarters is planned for the organization in Colorado Springs, Colo.
  
  The center will offer a number of employment services, both to veterans and to the business community. Some of those services will include corporate citizenship program development, consulting services for local businesses, apprenticeship and internship development programs, and hiring fairs, networking and placement services.
  
  Shawn and Angelica Black founded Warrior Ranch out of a desire to support troops serving overseas after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Since then, the couple has sent items, including phone cards and thank you cards, to 850,000 troops on active duty.
  
  The center’s exact site and location are still to be determined; Warrior Ranch is seeking funding toward the $5 million goal it needs to reach before beginning construction. The organization decided to build the facility in Orange County due to an anticipated demand for veterans’ services in the region. Almost half of the 140,000 troops scheduled to come home in the next two years will return to Southern California, and will need support from the local community.
  
  “Warrior Ranch will be a facility that my father, John Wayne, would be proud of. Warrior Ranch will go a long way in retraining our nation’s Veterans and helping their families,” said Aissa Wayne, executive adviser with Warrior Ranch.
  
  “We are grateful for our sponsors, like St. Joseph Hospital of Orange, which has helped so many Military families,” said Shawn Black, president and founder of Warrior Ranch.
  
  
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