Second in a series
Previously, “L.A.’s Royalty Must Serve Veterans, Not Rule Against Them”
Unfortunately, during the past two Presidential administrations, military Veterans have painfully watched this sacred land that was specifically deeded in their behalf prostituted away for non-Veteran use, with no effective line of defense against the egregious land grabbing.
As part of this pay-to-play scheme, the VA Greater West Los Angeles Healthcare System leases 21 acres of Veterans’ land to Brentwood School, one of the most prestigious and expensive private schools in the nation with annual tuition nearing $30,000 per student.
Still, the school pays less than $1,500 per month per acre for Veterans’ land for an athletic field that is off-limits to Veterans. Dirt farmers and sharecroppers would pay far more than that for this fertile ground, which was once farmed by Veterans themselves.
The VA system has a long-term lease agreement with Richmark Entertainment Group, a Hollywood / New York entertainment company, to operate the Veterans' Wadsworth and Brentwood theaters as a public cultural center to benefit and entertain the neighboring communities, while everyday Veterans, particularly patients at the VA facility, have no theater or entertainment of their own.
The VA system leases numerous large buildings to UCLA for research. UCLA also has a baseball diamond on Veterans’ land. And if the American Legion wants to use it, there's a fee of $1,500.
The VA system leases numerous acres of land to Enterprise Car Rental and Laidlaw Buses for vehicle storage. It also leases prime land and mineral rights to Breitburn Energy to operate an oil well, with the royalties going to the U.S. Dept. of Interior. It leases a large, prime building to Marriott to operate a laundry facility for their hotels.
The VA system has made endless deals with the entertainment and filming industry to use Veterans’ land and facilities for site filming and storage.
In brief, the VA GWLAHS bureaucrats have used this sacred place of Veterans rehabilitation and convalescence for commercial use.
There's More …
For decades, the VA system has had a special deal with the Pacific Palisades Riviera Country Club to use Veterans’ sacred land for parking thousand of cars so that attendees to their PGA Open Golf Tournament can be shuttled back and forth in large, noisy tour buses.
The golf tournament parking runs five days each year, and it is just one of many endless abuses and misuses of Veterans land that seriously violates the Deed of 1888.
It's important to know that there is a nine-hole golf course on Veterans land, which is supposed to be for their own recreation and rehabilitation. But it is open to the general public.
Less than a mile away is the private Brentwood Country Club with an 18-hole golf course that should be open to those who are not Veterans, instead of allowing the general public to use the Veterans’ golf course.
Even a Dog Park
There's even a public dog park on Veterans land. This abuse and disrespect is not only shameful, but does great harm to this sacred and revered land, and further negates the quietude and quality of life for convalescing Veterans by violating the spirit of the Land Grantors and their heirs that this gift is “for the sole purpose of providing Veterans with a place to heal from war.”
The violations against the Deed of 1888 and Veterans sacred land goes on and on, too numerous to list herein.
So where is the line of defense on behalf of America's military Veterans?
There has been absolutely no responsible oversight of the VA Greater West Los Angeles Healthcare System by those elected and entrusted to act in behalf of our Veterans.
Insult Atop Injury
As though leasing Veterans sacred land and facilities to the highest bidder isn't insulting enough, the VA also has a no-bid, long-term “sharing agreement” with Veterans Park Conservancy (VPC), which is not a Veterans organization but a wealthy, special-interest homeowners’ group, to build a public community park on 16 acres of Veterans land, “rent free.”
On VPC's website under “Government Support,” it has an interesting list of politicians who support the public park agenda, including former Presidents George W. Bush and William Clinton; former U.S. Secretaries of Veterans Affairs James Nicholson, Anthony J. Principi and Hershel Gober; U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein; U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman, whose 30th District encompasses the largest VA in the nation and he is the subsequent steward of this sacred trust, Gov. Schwarzenegger, a resident of neighboring Brentwood, who has two children attending the aforementioned private Brentwood School; and L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, the Supervisor of L.A.'s Third District.
While the Veterans Park Conservancy may have a list of government and community supporters, it does not have the support of any noteworthy Veterans’ organizations.
Yet they claim they are building the public park in “honor of our veterans.”
If VPC were honest about honoring our Veterans, they would honor the Deed of 1888 and leave this land exclusively for Veterans' rehabilitation and convalescence.
Serious Conflict of Interest
Veterans have always respected and shown trust in their elected and appointed public servants, particularly the L.A. County Board of Supervisors and the Veterans Advisory Commission.
However, there's a no-confidence vote among the Veterans community for Third District Supervisor Yaroslavsky for various reasons, but most importantly that his Senior Field Deputy is an active and prominent member of the Veterans Park Conservancy, including being a vice-president and a member of its board of directors.
Flora Gil Krisiloff, the Supervisor's Senior Westside Deputy, is not only a major player in the VPC agenda, but she is also a past-president of the Brentwood Community Council (BCC), and still very influential in the ongoing, behind the scene, decision-making process.
The community of Brentwood is adjacent to the VA, and the Brentwood Community Council and its membership of homeowners fully support the rent-free “sharing agreement” that VPC has for a 16-acre public park with the VA.
Veterans’ Groups Oppose Park
On the other hand, prominent Veterans’ organizations, including the California American Legion, the American G.I. Forum of California, National Veterans Caucus, Veterans Untied For Truth, and the Veterans Caucus of the California Democratic Party, all have major Resolutions opposing the public park.
To compound this dangerous conflict of interest, Ms. Krisiloff, who is not a Veteran, is also a member of the powerful Local Advisory Panel of the VA's Capital Asset Realignment for Enhanced Services (CARES) that reviews and makes major recommendations for the use of Veterans property.
Who Really CARES?
The Dept. of Veterans Affairs CARES Business Plan Studies supposedly represents a system-wide process to prepare the Veterans Administration for meeting the current and future health care needs of Veterans in modern health care facilities.
No matter how much warm, fuzzy and feel good” the acronym sounds, Capital Asset Realignment for Enhanced Services really sounds more like a Wall Street financial scam than an entrusted process that is supposed to protect Veterans’ property from becoming a public park and other misuse and abuse.
When our federal government enters into a “sharing agreement” for 16 acres of Veterans’ land that is considered to be one of the most valuable parcels on the West Coast, estimated to be worth nearly one billion dollars, yet leases it rent free to a non-Veteran organization for a public park, you have to ask, who really cares?
One thing is for certain, not the VA and our federal government.
Conflict and More Conflict
On Sept. 27, 2007, former VA Secretary James Nicholson, who is perso list of major government supporters, announced the results of a CARES Master Plan for Veterans property at the VA, stating:
“I have accepted the planning option No. 3, recommended by the Local Advisory Panel. This concludes the work of the panel. I want to thank the Panel for its guidance in making this decision.”
Well, that was short and sweet for the Veterans Park Conservancy but long and bitter for America's Veterans.
The fact that Ms. Krisiloff was an influential member of the Panel, and option No. 3 includes the public park by the Veterans Park Conservancy of which she is vice-president and a board member, represents one of the greatest conflicts of interest and grossest violations of public trust ever imaginable.
The fact that this was done at the expense of America's military Veterans for the benefit of Ms. Krisiloff's own neighborhood community in the Third District just rubs more salt into another painful mental and emotional wound of the Veteran community.
Unprecedented Compromises
When Sue Young, the executive director of the Veterans Park Conservancy, was essentially asked in the November 2007 issue of the Brentwood News how she was able to expropriate this16-acre parcel of Veterans land with a sharing agreement for a public park that is rent-free, she responded:
“Because this arrangement was unprecedented, it required lengthy discussions and compromises with Veterans Administration in Los Angeles and Washington.
“The agreement also called for approvals at the highest levels, i.e., Secretary Nicholson, and the involvement of the Congressional delegation.”
As though Veterans do not have enough problems trying to protect their land from the likes of Ms. Young and Ms. Krisiloff, having the VA Secretary compromising Veterans’ land rights to appease these self-serving homeowners is simply deplorable.
Even more troubling and curious is that Secretary Nicholson conveniently approved the Panel’s option No. 3 that included the Veterans Park Conservancy’s public park, on Sept. 27, 2007, just three days before his retirement.
Make no mistake; this is an extremely serious conflict of interest by former VA Secretary Nicholson. This kind of manipulation negates any respect or confidence that our federal government in general, and the VA in particular, could possibly be working in the best interests of America's Veterans.
Furthermore, these kinds of “unprecedented compromises at the highest levels of government” are extremely detrimental to not only our nation's democracy, but in preserving and protecting the Veterans Home as it was so patriotically Deeded in 1888, that the land is “to be permanently maintained as a National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers.”
Conflicts and Contradictions
Equally important, the Veterans Park Conservancy’s public park “sharing agreement” also contradicts the claims of Carolina Winston Barrie, a descendant of Arcadia de Baker, one of the land grantors of the Deed of 1888. Ms. Barrie, who is also a member of the Conservancy’s board of directors, recently declared:
“This gift was from Arcadia and Sen. John Percival Jones for the sole purpose of providing Veterans with a place to heal from war.”
In her letter to then-President George W. Bush, and published in the Veterans Park Conservancy's Winter Newsletter of 2003-04, Ms. Barrie proclaimed, “Dear Mr. President: My family's intention was clear. The land was given for the benefit of the veterans themselves.”
Whose Side Are You on?
So, how is it that Ms. Barrie makes statements on one hand that Veterans truly agree with, and then on the other hand, belongs to a non-Veterans organization that Veterans seriously disagree with? Is she being true to the wishes of the guiding principles of her ancestor's Deed to Veterans, or simply answering to the dictates of the Veterans Park Conservancy?
Ms. Barrie cannot speak out of both sides of her mouth by trying to please both Veterans and the homeowners. Her word must be true in accordance with the Deed of her ancestor, Arcadia de Baker. It cannot ring hallow with America's Veterans.
Polarizing Figure
With unbending loyalty to her community and the Conservancy, Ms. Krisiloff serves her fellow homeowners first and foremost in Brentwood where she lives, and at the expense of Veterans and their deeded land rights, which ultimately impacts their healthcare services.
Consequently, Ms. Krisiloff has become a polarizing figure in the Veterans community and her unilateral work has become detrimental to the entrusted responsibility of serving all residents of the Third District, as well as nearly 26 million military Veterans across America who essentially have access to the largest VA in the nation if the occasion requires.
A Fiefdom of Their Own
Instead of the “Four Kings and Queen” overseeing Veterans land, the new ruling royalty has become the Veterans Park Conservancy group, a former VA Secretary who kowtowed to the wants of a community instead of the needs”of the Veterans that he was entrusted to serve, and a Senior District Deputy of the all-important Third District who is not a Veteran, yet serves on boards and committees that are counterproductive to the best interests of America's Veterans.
And, this self-anointed royalty continues to treat Veterans’ sacred land as their own fiefdom while dictating as self-serving kings and queens to use and abuse this exclusive property for their own public amusement, recreation and entertainment while Veterans are trying to heal from war in privacy and quietude.
A Time For Choosing
Without equivocation, Supervisor Yaroslavsky must immediately terminate Ms. Krisiloff as his Senior Field Deputy, otherwise any credibility as a responsible watchdog for Veterans land will be forever destroyed.
The damage that Ms. Krisiloff has already done to Veterans’ sacred land, and her breach of trust against Veterans is just too serious to allow her any further interaction as an entrusted public employee.
There's simply too much at stake when it come to serving the needs of America's Veterans and protecting their sacred land for healing and rehabilitation, to be playing anymore politics.
A Time to Rescind
Because of the enormous conflict of interest and impropriety by those entrusted to work in the best interests of Veterans, but didn't, the option No. 3 plan that Secretary Nicholson approved, and the corresponding Veterans Park Conservancy public park sharing agreement that he also approved, must both be rescinded if there is to be any measure of respect or credibility to those who are entrusted to serve and protect the best interests of Veterans.
Accordingly, the L.A. County Board of Supervisors and their respective commissioners of the Veterans Advisory Commission must act in consortium and demand, that in the best interests of America's Veterans, these two documents must be immediately and permanently rescinded.
The Veterans Revolution
As a result of the continuous land grabbing without any trusted and formidable line of defense by our local government against the federal government, fellow Veterans have unified and are peacefully demonstrating against the VA and the Conservancy’s public park and other abuse and misuse of their sacred property at the revered National Home.
This Sunday's Rally will be the 51st consecutive of “The Veterans Revolution” to “Save Our Veterans Land.”
Veterans certainly respect and appreciate the work and dedication of the commissioners as well as the Board of Supervisors, and Veterans believe that they will continue living up to their entrusted job of serving for the greater good of all and defending Veterans land from any and all misuse and abuse.
The Man Who Will Become King
Veterans are also very confident that Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, will continue to be his own man and make decisions that are in the best interests of America's Veterans.
And Veterans firmly believe that he will not compromise their land nor will he ever appear on the Conservancy’s list of government supporters, like his predecessors.
Veterans are hoping that Secretary Shinseki will stand firm like a benevolent and trustworthy king to protect, preserve and defend their beloved National Home and the Deed of 1888.
Mr. Rosebrock, a military Veteran from the Vietnam War era, may be contacted at dutyscalling@aol.com
