On his way home on a recent Saturday afternoon, Richard Paul Ivy, 60, pushed a walker that doubled as a storage cart for his belongings. He was headed for a bed on the sidewalk next to Wilshire Boulevard, beneath the 405 Freeway overpass.
“It’s nothing super duper or anything but it’s a bed and blankets,” Ivy said.
The Army veteran, who said he drove small armored vehicles during Vietnam, now camps just a couple hundred feet from the VA Medical Center in West L.A. You can see the campus from his bed. Ivy said this access to medical care is the only reason he’s alive.
“Last year I had two heart attacks,” he said. “All my medical is free. It’s really cool that I’m so close, I get the help I need.”
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