In a perfect world, those who served this country should never want for food, shelter or security, as the proper payment for their selflessness.

But, as we well know, this is not a perfect world.

On Friday, in Lewiston, a little-known government program closed shop. The Homeless Veterans Re-Integration Project had its quarters in the CareerCenter, out on Mollison Way. It existed for less than a year.

The official reason, in government-speak, is the HVRP failed to meet the dictated performance thresholds mandated by its federal grant. The program, with four offices statewide, was operating on a one-year, $200,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Labor with options for renewal. (As of Friday, it was not being renewed.)

But the real reason is bureaucracy. The grant is disappearing, according to officials, because it just didn’t help enough homeless veterans, according to the benchmarks prescribed by the grant.

Therefore, it disappears in a puff of ill-logic: Not helping enough homeless veterans?

Isn’t helping one enough?

“We need to get back into the reality of customer service, not numbers,” says Rick Nugent, the local employment counselor for the program, and a veteran. He was out of a job as of Friday, but hopes to latch onto another program.

All he’s done the past year is bring about 20 local veterans from the streets into shelters, and walk, or more accurately, drive them through the various processes of procuring housing, securing veterans benefits, finding them medical and sometimes mental health treatment, and hopefully, earning steady employment.

There was “Robert,” a 58-year-old Air Force and Vietnam veteran, who spent the winter of 2007 homeless. The HVRP got Robert shelter at Hope Haven, food at the Trinity Jubilee Center, and a subsidized apartment in Norway with old furniture scrounged from Bates College.

In March, Robert suffered a series of heart attacks that left him fighting for life in Massachusetts VA hospital, and rendered him just about unemployable.

At least, though, he has a home to come back to.

This is not the case for “Karen.” She’s a 34-year-old Navy veteran and mother of a four-year-old in Oxford County, who found herself homeless due to domestic violence. The program helped her into abused women’s programs, transitional housing and a part-time job.

But she lost her day-care, so her job fell through. She was still living at a women’s shelter, as the program explored other opportunities.

Most important, she and her daughter were safe.

Government programs end all the time, sometimes rightly so. Taxpayers should get their money’s worth, and if a program is under-performing, then, well, it’s clock should run out. The cold reality of fiscal restraint, as it were.

This sounds great, but when measured against the cold reality of an American military veteran, living in the streets, this approach is downright icy. Last fall, a national study estimated one in four homeless persons are veterans.

In Maine, the number is thought to be between 1,000 and 2,000, though nobody really knows for certain. It’s not like these soldiers are standing at attention to be counted. Finding them, Nugent says, means asking one by one.

Yet the numbers are unimportant. This country has an obligation to its veterans, just as we citizens are obligated for their service. Without their sacrifices, we wouldn’t enjoy the freedoms we take for granted.

It’s the reason placing a flag on a floor, like in Farmington, elicits such controversy. Too many of America’s best and brightest were harmed or killed defending the values that flag represents.

And too many young Americans are still in harm’s way today.

It’s a real shame a government program aiming at helping homeless veterans is being cut for not helping enough homeless veterans. With all respect for efficiency, every homeless veteran that needs support should get it.

Not just enough to satisfy some artificial guideline in a government grant.

Maine’s Department of Labor has an extensive veterans program run by Paul Luce, a veteran from Lewiston. Commissioner Laura Fortman has vowed the agency’s support for transitioning HVRP vets into other programs.

So, hopefully, in upcoming weeks, when these vets need to call somebody for help, there’s a helpful voice on the other end of the line. Otherwise, this is a travesty.

Veterans like Robert and Karen cannot lose perhaps the best friend they’ve had – their advocate – to a government that says homeless vets, you know, should be helped.

As long its done in bulk.

Anthony Ronzio is the Editorial Page Editor for the Sun Journal. He can be reached at [email protected], or 1-800-782-0759, ext. 2285.