When the Department of Veterans Affairs agreed in January 2015 to transform its sprawling West Los Angeles grounds from a patchwork of aging buildings and sterile medical facilities into an inviting campus with housing for homeless veterans, everyone knew it wouldn’t happen overnight. And the VA lived down to expectations at first, moving slowly to launch the lengthy environmental study required before it can start building the 1,200 units of housing and amenities called for in the campus’ draft master plan.
Now, however, the VA is showing much needed urgency: It plans to hire a principal developer, a kind of uber-contractor who will expedite implementation of the master plan and work out how to stage the development of the hundreds of units of housing along with shops and a town center. Once the environmental study is completed, the principal developer would have the authority to hire other developers to work on various pieces of this vast project.
So naturally, some people are complaining that the VA is going too fast. The Brentwood Homeowners Assn., which represents many of the VA campus’ neighbors to the north and west, contends that the VA is proceeding illegally and imprudently in hiring a developer before the extensive environmental study is completed. Indeed, the study isn’t expected to be finalized until July 2019. What if the completed study necessitates a change in the master plan? What if it shows that the planned construction work and new housing would significantly increase traffic on the already traffic-choked streets of Brentwood?