VA promises hundreds of tiny houses at its West LA facility; veterans want something good

The US Department of Veterans Affairs’ plan to build up to 800 new tiny homes this year at its West Los Angeles facility has quickly drawn veterans who won a court order requiring the agency to build thousands of new temporary and permanent housing units there.

“I don’t think that’s fair at all,” said Rob Reynolds, an Iraq war veteran who is representing several veterans who filed a federal lawsuit in 2022 asking for more housing and an end to the leasing of large portions of the 388-acre campus to outside interests.

The 8-foot by 8-foot sheds have become a staple of quick solutions to homelessness but have faced criticism for being cramped, flimsy and indecent.

Reynolds said more than 100 tiny homes located at the veterans camp near San Vicente Boulevard proved difficult for those using wheelchairs and walkers, because of the fire and unsuitable for months-long stays.

VA officials unveiled the small home plan during a hearing this week as the agency’s first step toward complying with the court order.

“I feel like there’s a defining disconnect between what we present to the court and what the VA thinks,” Roman Silberfeld, one of the veteran attorneys, told the court. “They talk about sheds. We never talk about that.”

Although not the subject of the hearing, President Trump’s order to establish the National Center for Warrior Independence on campus was a prominent feature. VA officials appointed to lead the president’s program also represented the agency during the hearing but did not specify whether the tiny homes were a response to the court order or were related to the veterans center.

If these small houses are made into a warrior center, there may be a conflict with the court if they see that they are of low quality.

US District Court Judge David O. Carter, who issued the housing order, was also skeptical. He asked if a homeless veteran who found a place on Skid Row would see it as an improvement to move to a shed on the Westside.

“You know veterans in the past were worried about the conditions of the tiny houses?” Carter said. “We would like to see those taken down and spend the money elsewhere.”

In opening the case, Carter nodded to the potential controversy but hoped to avoid it.

“Let’s make a pledge,” he said. We all want the same thing, it’s just a matter of how we get there.

During the weeks of hearings leading up to his 2024 order, Carter repeatedly worried that he didn’t know how much need there would be for the shelters and that building too many of the poor quality too quickly would lead to the false conclusion that veterans don’t want to be on campus.

As an icebreaker, Carter ordered the immediate installation of up to 150 modular homes, with individual bathrooms and kitchens.

“We were very close, folks, to getting those 50 or 100 units right away,” he said during Tuesday’s hearing. I don’t know if we can wake that up.

James Shriner, who appeared in public for the first time as the program manager of the National Center for Warrior Independence, did not answer that question but said that what will attract veterans to this center will be the ongoing services.

Shriner, who retired in May after a 30-year career in the military, said the services will be housed in an existing building near the center’s campus as part of a city center called for a major plan ordered by previous cases. He also said the plan includes a 6,000-space parking lot and a transit center to improve access.

The trial in Los Angeles federal court marked the coming together of three orders — two justices and one executive — that will shape the future of the long-neglected institution for decades to come.

The VA is under a continuing order from a previous lawsuit to build 1,200 units of permanent housing. Its failure to meet the 2022 deadline to have more than half completed — it was only 54 — led a group of veterans to file the current lawsuit, eventually certified as a class action lawsuit.

At the end of the trial last year, Carter ordered the VA to build 2,500 temporary and permanent housing units in addition to the 1,200 in the previous trial. Declaring that his decision would cause “irreparable harm,” the VA filed an appeal.

Pending that appeal, Trump issued an executive order in May for the VA to build a National Center for Warrior Independence on the grounds to house 6,000 veterans. Whether that means one time or later in temporary housing is not clear.

A panel of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals heard the appeal’s arguments last April, then issued a decision in December that upheld the housing order and Carter’s cancellation of the Brentwood School’s lease and the parking lot operator but allowed the lease of the UCLA baseball stadium to stand.

Because the 9th Circuit’s decision has yet to be officially issued, Carter does not have regulatory authority at this time. He stated that the hearing was an attempt to end the disagreement before he returned to the power to ensure that his order was followed.

At one point, he praised Trump’s executive order, saying he hoped that by making the campus a center for all veterans, it would actually expand his jurisdiction beyond Los Angeles County.

Carter said he gets calls from officials in other states asking, “Why aren’t we included?”

At one point he said he wanted signs of the VA’s commitment to improving a record of “miserable failures.”

VA officials, who have faced criticism for secretly planning a veterans center, have not revealed anything in court about those plans beyond a parking structure and a service center. Instead they sent a slide show showing the sites selected to comply with Carter’s order.

The tiny homes will replace the current parking lot and grassy field adjacent to the existing townhomes along San Vicente Boulevard.

The VA chose a city park with two lightly used baseball fields and a popular 1,800-space dog park, Shriner said.

Robert Fleck, the VA’s acting attorney general, told the court that the VA has enough money in its current authorization to complete temporary housing by the end of 2026 but not permanent housing.