LOS ANGELES — The VA must build more than 2,500 units of housing for homeless veterans on its sprawling campus in west Los Angeles, a federal judge ruled Friday.
U.S. District Judge David O. Carter also said in his 124-page ruling that leases on portions of the Veterans Administration property to private schools, UCLA and businesses are illegal because they do not benefit veterans.
"Each administration since 2011 has been warned — by the VA’s own Office of the Inspector General, federal courts, and veterans — that they were not doing enough to house veterans in Los Angeles," Carter wrote.
“Despite these warnings, the VA has not made good on its promise to build housing for veterans.,” he continued. “The cost of the VA’s inaction is veterans’ lives.”
He ordered the VA to build 750 temporary housing units within 12 to 18 months and gave the agency six months to plan another 1,800 units of permanent housing.
He also ordered the agency to begin construction within 18 months on a town center and wellness area for veterans on the nearly 400-acre campus.
The VA said in a statement that it's "committed to providing permanent supportive housing to homeless Veterans on the grounds of the West LA Campus as quickly as possible."
"While we do not comment on ongoing litigation, we at VA are carefully reviewing the Court’s decision and will continue to do everything in our power to end Veteran homelessness — both in Los Angeles and across America," the statement said.
The VA did not say how it would disengage from the leases nor how much it would cost.
Friday's ruling stems from a yearslong battle over the campus that was founded in the late 1880s as a “soldiers home” for disabled volunteer service members.
Portions deteriorated over generations and homeless encampments gradually began to pop up outside its perimeter. The stretch of tents, some displaying American flags, became a dystopian symbol of government failure.
In 2022, a group of disabled veterans experiencing homelessness filed a complaint over the lack of housing on the campus near the affluent neighborhoods of Brentwood and Westwood.
"This nation cannot genuinely hold itself out as the home of the brave so long as the brave do not have a home," Mark Rosenbaum, lead counsel for the plaintiffs, told reporters Friday.
The decision comes after the federal government changed a policy last month that had disqualified some disabled veterans from receiving subsidized housing.
The new policy raised the limit on how much income a veteran can earn to qualify for housing assistance through the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s supportive housing program.
Before the adjustment, some veterans who received full disability benefits did not qualify for subsidized housing because their benefits were considered compensation and made their “income” too high.
The VA said the change was not directly tied to the Los Angeles case but instead reflected the department’s commitment to ending veteran homelessness nationally.
“No Veteran should be homeless in this country they swore to defend, and we will not rest until Veteran homelessness is a thing of the past," the VA said in a statement at the time.
