For five months, Joseph F. Miller and his four-person team worked out of temporary offices at the Liberty Building while they waited for the Watertown Vet Center to be finished.

On Friday, Mr. Miller was able to show off the new veterans center at 210 Court St. to a crowd of veterans and political and military leaders.

Before an official ceremony to mark the center's grand opening, Mr. Miller took U.S. Rep. John M. McHugh, R-Pierrepont Manor, on a tour through cozy, intimate rooms decorated with leather chairs, lamps and vases of flowers.

"Who did the decorating, Joe? I commend them," said Mr. McHugh as he walked through the library, waiting room and group meeting room. "It's beautiful. It's like a home."

Mr. Miller, a retired lieutenant colonel and Watertown team leader, said the center would help provide readjustment counseling and other services to men and women returning to the area after combat duty abroad.

"Vet centers are a very important part of combat veterans adjusting from military service back to the civilian sector," he said.

The national Vet Center Program was established in 1979 by an act of Congress in the wake of the Vietnam War. The centers were designed to help struggling Vietnam veterans readjust to civilian life.

The centers, a service of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, offer free services to combat veterans and their families.

Center staff members provide counseling for readjustment to civilian life and sexual trauma and bereavement counseling. They also coordinate with other veterans service organizations on outreach and educational efforts.

Until now, the closest vet center was in Syracuse. Following a recent increase in federal funding that allowed for the creation of more centers, Watertown was identified as an "underserved location."

Renovations on the 3,000-square-foot space in the Liberty Building, which cost $200,000, were completed in January.

Attending Friday's ceremony, Maj. Gen. Michael L. Oates, commander of the 10th Mountain Division and Fort Drum, said the local center was going to "be really helpful."

"Some soldiers don't want to approach the mental health services we provide on post because of the stigma associated with the services," he said. "A vet center, with a vet speaking to another vet, has much less stigma."

Gen. Oates said the Watertown Vet Center would offer a "greater degree of anonymity" than on-post facilities.

Although he didn't have hard numbers, anecdotally Gen. Oates said 40 percent of soldiers who went overseas would need some form of counseling or mental health care on their return. The need for services only increases with longer and multiple tours, he said, which makes the Watertown Vet Center that much more valuable.

"I couldn't be happier having it here," he said. "It's really going to improve the ability to provide vet services to all veterans of past wars and, more importantly, to us and to our current crop of veterans and their families."

Working from temporary offices at the Liberty Building, the three Watertown counselors already have developed an initial caseload of about 45 clients, Mr. Miller said.

They've also started two groups: one for married couples and one to help veterans of Operation Enduring Freedom or Operation Iraqi Freedom. Mr. Miller said they were putting the final touches on a bereavement group, which he hoped to start in the next 30 days.

In her remarks Friday, Assemblywoman Dierdre K. "Dede" Scozzafava, R-Gouverneur, said veterans in need of counseling and other services often would call her office for advice.

"Sometimes you hear an undertone — it's called pride — being afraid to say, 'There's something more there, maybe I need a little help,'" Ms. Scozzafava said. "It's wonderful for me to be able to refer them to the vet center."

Mr. McHugh said the vet center would provide the "latest generation of heroes" with the services that are their due after having fought to preserve American freedoms.

"The important factor is what it will do to assist returning veterans to readjust and reassume what we hope is a leadership role," he said. "They require a helping hand and that's what this will do."