Veterans — Sebastian, Florida

Sebastian has about 2,233 veterans, 9.7 percent of its civilian adults, in the U.S. Census Bureau's 2020-2024 American Community Survey five-year estimates.

Those figures come from table S2101 of the American Community Survey 2020-2024 release, the latest five-year vintage, which counts 22,949 civilian adults in the City of Sebastian. Sebastian's 9.7 percent sits just above Indian River County's 9.6 percent (13,526 veterans) and well above the Florida rate of 7.4 percent. As with every ACS figure for a city of this size, each number is a survey estimate with a margin of error, so a difference of a few dozen veterans from one release to the next is not a real change.

The definition matters for reading the count. The Census Bureau's veterans topic page explains that since 1980 the veteran question has counted only people who served on active duty, and specifically excludes those who served only in the National Guard or Reserves. A Sebastian resident whose entire service was in a Guard or Reserve unit is therefore not in the 2,233.

Set against the county, Sebastian holds a large share of the north county's veterans. The 2,233 veterans counted in Sebastian are about 16.5 percent of the 13,526 counted across Indian River County in the same 2020-2024 release, while Sebastian's 26,262 residents are a smaller slice of the county's population. The rest live elsewhere in Indian River County, from Vero Beach to Fellsmere, and veterans in communities outside the Sebastian city limits are counted in the county figure but not the city one.

Most Sebastian veterans served in the Vietnam era, and nearly half are 75 or older, according to ACS 2020-2024 estimates.

The ACS period-of-service breakdown for Sebastian counts 1,012 Vietnam era veterans, 45.3 percent of the total, followed by 287 who served in the 1990 to 2001 Gulf War period, 103 Korean War veterans, 72 who served from September 2001 onward and 20 World War II veterans. People can fall into more than one period, so those groups overlap. The Vietnam share in Sebastian is higher than the statewide 34.0 percent, and the post-2001 group is small: Florida as a whole counts 322,263 post-9/11 veterans, but Sebastian only 72.

Age follows from the eras. ACS counts 1,032 Sebastian veterans aged 75 and over, 640 aged 65 to 74, 321 aged 55 to 64, 188 aged 35 to 54 and 52 aged 18 to 34. That age profile matches a city whose overall median age is 58.2 in the same ACS release, and it shapes which services Sebastian veterans use most: pensions, survivor benefits and burial benefits rather than education or first-home loans. With only 72 post-2001 veterans and 52 veterans under 35, the younger cohorts that fill veteran counts in many Florida cities are a small minority in Sebastian.

Sebastian's veterans are overwhelmingly men. The ACS counts 2,184 men and 49 women, about 2 percent women, compared with the Census Bureau's national figure that women now make up about 8 percent of the veteran population. The gap reflects the older eras that dominate the Sebastian count. Income is another difference: the median income of Sebastian veterans in the 2020-2024 estimates was $55,928, compared with $36,769 for Sebastian adults who are not veterans.

Sebastian veterans can get benefits help at the Indian River County Veterans Services office at 1235 Main Street in Sebastian, by appointment.

Indian River County Veterans Services runs two offices: the Sebastian Office at 1235 Main Street, in the City Hall complex, and the Vero Beach Office at 2525 St. Lucie Avenue. Both work Monday through Friday by appointment only. For concerns that take 30 minutes or less, walk-ins are welcome on Thursdays in Sebastian and on Wednesdays in Vero Beach.

The county lists the benefits its staff help with: service-connected compensation claims, non-service-connected pensions, VA health care enrollment, education, VA guaranteed home loans, burial benefits, dependents and survivors benefits, lost military records and homestead tax exemptions. Its resource list points Sebastian veterans to the Sebastian Area Veterans Honor Guard, Space Coast Honor Flight, the Indian River VA Clinic and the Treasure Coast Homeless Services Council. Last verified: October 10, 2026, on the Indian River County website.

The nearest Department of Veterans Affairs clinic is outside the city. The Vero Beach VA Clinic at 372 17th Street in Vero Beach is part of VA West Palm Beach Health Care, so Sebastian veterans travel south on US 1 for VA appointments.

Sebastian honors veterans at the city's Veteran's Memorial in Riverview Park on Indian River Drive, created in 2002.

The City of Sebastian says the Veteran's Memorial was created in 2002, with the Four Chaplains Memorial installed in 2012 and joined to it by a memorial walkway. The site carries memorials for the Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, Marines and Navy, a Purple Heart Memorial, World War I and II, Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War, the victims of 9-11, and Afghanistan, Iraq and the Global War on Terrorism. The city holds its Veterans Day, Memorial Day, 9-11, Four Chaplains and Pearl Harbor ceremonies there, and sells memorial bricks for the walkway and for a second location around the Clock Tower on the north side of Riverview Park.

The newest addition came from a veterans' family organization. In February 2023 The American Legion reported that Sons of The American Legion Squadron 189 in Sebastian had led a community effort that raised over $7,000 for a POW/MIA monument, unveiled at Riverview Park and placed in the park's Veterans Memorial Circle.

In Sebastian, American Legion Squadron 189 marks veterans' graves, and three public schools hold the state Purple Star designation for military families.

The squadron runs a grave-marking operation that identifies veterans' graves and marks them with bronze military markers and American flags. In 2025, Sebastian Daily reported, the squadron's re-flagging weekend was scheduled for Saturday, Nov. 1, at Winter Beach Cemetery and Sunday, Nov. 2, at Sebastian Cemetery, starting at 9:30 a.m., with volunteers of all ages invited.

County government has joined national campaigns too. In November 2022 Sebastian Daily reported that Indian River County was participating in Operation Green Light, a joint initiative with the Florida Association of Counties, the National Association of County Veteran Service Officers and the National Association of Counties, in which residents and businesses display green lights to recognize veterans around Veterans Day.

Schools count as well, because military families include children. In December 2024 Vero News reported that Sebastian Elementary School, Sebastian River Middle School and Sebastian River High School were chosen as Purple Star Schools of Distinction, a state designation for schools that support military-connected students, giving a family a Purple Star school at every grade level inside Sebastian.