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MY POV - “We don’t know them all, we owe them all.” This is a tender and persuasive phrase expressed by someone unknown—but a phrase that is a universal sentiment of everyone when we speak of our military veterans.
Everyone, that is, except for politicians from the Westside, private entities, land developers, and others who sought to hinder building housing for veterans at the West Los Angeles Veterans Administration complex.
Bobby Shriver remembers well. He is the former mayor and member of the Santa Monica City Council, and son of Sargent Shriver, who visited the facility in 2004 only to find many totally empty buildings with asbestos in the ceilings, and upside-down broken toilets on the floor. A veteran was sleeping outside in a dumpster.
An easy fix, he thought. The largest facility for veterans in America should certainly have appropriate housing units built-rehabilitated.
Meanwhile, Senator Diane Feinstein and Congressman Henry Waxman supported legislation that prohibited an "enhanced-use-lease" covering any land or improvement, the Veterans` Benefits and Services Act of 1988, or the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Act of 2008, unless specifically authorized by law.
Interestingly, my research revealed that while the VA has hundreds, if not thousands, of housing projects, the Waxman-backed law affected only one project, the West LA campus. Shriver told me that Senator Feinstein later realized she was wrong and got the legislation repealed.
Frustration began to mount when Shriver sought answers. After numerous failed attempts to meet with powerful Congressman Henry Waxman, in whose district the facility was located, he resorted to organizing a lawsuit filed on June 8, 2011...
ACLU SoCal filed a lawsuit known as Valentini v Shinseki against VA Secretary Eric Shinseki and the director of the VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System on behalf of homeless veterans with severe disabilities. The veterans were represented by a number of Pro Bono law firms that included Ron Olson of the famed law firm Munger Tolles & Olson.
In 2014, Robert McDonald, retired executive of Procter & Gamble, became the eighth United States Secretary of Veterans Affairs. Shriver knew that McDonald would understand marketing and the benefits of providing a service to people who were dependent on dumpsters for housing, especially those who had served the nation. Shriver decided to fly to Washington,D.C. to meet with McDonald to discuss a possible settlement. There was an appeal pending and on January 28, 2015 a settlement was reached: West LA VA would become the first land use plan. The statute created an oversight board charged to oversee therapeutic and health plans, and to organize those activities which were to be formed and financed.
Shriver created a nonprofit, Vets Advocacy, to monitor progress.
The Master plan proposing 1200 units and amenities was designed by the noted firm of Johnson Fain. A few years later the developer, Safran, Century and US Vets, was hired. 450 units are soon to be available for homeless veterans. Real estate developer and civic leader Dan Rosenfeld served on the VA`s advisory board..
It was a major victory, considered Shriver. It settled a long-standing lawsuit involving the West LA medical campus. A plan designed to end homelessness among veterans in Los Angeles County was moving forward, and new permanent and supportive housing would be built, which would include under-served populations such as female veterans, aging veterans and those who are severely or mentally disabled.
It was the right thing to do. In 1888, the 600-acre site, once part of an immense cattle ranch, was deeded to the United States for the specific purpose of providing a home for disabled veterans, which it did for nearly 80 years, but which now is leased out to private companies. It was a precise stipulation. However, with time, and with the city’s reach toward the ocean, this became attractive and expensive real estate stimulating immense interest for private local development. The increased value of that land complicated the bond of veterans to their entitlement. Constantly under scrutiny for development or sale, the 600-acre parcel has already eroded to 387 acres.
Residents had also expressed views that may have influenced local politicians. For example, a representative of Brentwood Homeowners Association once said: “We know there is a homeless problem out there, but the Veterans Administration property is not the place to solve it.”
The passage of the Los Angeles Homeless Veterans Leasing Act, H.R.5936, in 2016, written by Republican Congressman Jeff Miller, spurred redevelopment of the West LA property, ascertaining that veterans, especially homeless ones, are being helped. It is a plan, said Congressman Ted Lieu, which will move us closer to bringing back the West LA VA property to its founding mission: to serve and house veterans in need.
The Congressman also said that because of mismanagement and neglect, significant portions of the campus was leased out to private enterprises that were doing anything but serving veterans. Medical care did not meet expectations for excellence. Large chunks of the land were used for parking lots, a parrot sanctuary, a rental car company, and other purposes that did not principally benefit veterans.
Earlier this month, President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at turning the West Los Angeles Veterans Affairs Medical Campus into the nation's largest center for homeless veterans` care. The order calls for the establishment of the center as the "National Center for Warrior Independence" offering homeless veterans the chance to seek and receive care, benefits, and a range of services, including substance abuse treatment and support for productive work.
The stated goal is to house 6,000 homeless veterans
Rob Reynolds, a U.S. Army veteran and longtime veteran advocate in an interview with the Westside Current said " The land meant to be a soldiers` home. That`s not my opinion-it`s historical fact".
Twenty-one years have passed since a stunned Shriver witnessed a veteran sleeping in a dumpster in the West LA land gifted only to veterans. A personal advocacy program began, one that turned to lawsuits and political strife. Evident was also the yearning by some to profit from that expensive real estate. And also openly expressed was the desire of locals to keep all homeless out of the exclusive area.
Providing a community to those who served us must always remain the central purpose of the West Los Angeles Veterans Administration campus.
Pericles, the general and statesman during the Golden Age of Athens, said it best: “What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments but what is woven into the lives of others.”
Nick Patsaouras oversaw the A Bridge Home ( ABH ) for Mayor Eric Garcetti that included a Homeless Shelter on the VA site, and parts of this comment are drawn from his book, "The Making of Modern Los Angeles".
(Nick Patsaouras is an electrical engineer and founder of a Los Angeles-based engineering firm with a portfolio spanning commercial, residential, medical, and entertainment projects. A longtime civic advocate, he ran for Mayor of Los Angeles in 1993, promoting his vision of using transportation as a catalyst to rebuild the city post-riots. He has served on key public boards, including the LA Department of Water and Power, Metro, and the Board of Zoning Appeals.)
