(See four pdfs below)
Attention members of the media:
Every year for more than 15 years, the PGA has held a professional golf tournament at the Riviera Country Club in Pacific Palisades. Attendees take over the Los Angeles VA by parking their luxury cars on VA property. They are shuttled back and forth on luxury tour buses because the residents of Pacific Palisades do not want these cars parking on their streets.
As a result, resident Veteran patients at the Los Angeles VA and residents living in neighboring Brentwood must make enormous sacrifices so that the residents of Pacific Palisades are spared what others must endure on their behalf.
Attached are pictorial overviews from previous years of this flagrant misuse of these sacred grounds.
Meanwhile, homeless Veterans are forced to live on the outside instead of unlocking the front gates and providing emergency provisional housing where these luxury cars are being parked and then building a new, modern and permanent Veterans Home — instead of rehabbing antiquated, rat-infested buildings to house a few homeless Veterans in the future and operated by “non-profit developers.”
In 2009, I filed a FOIA request for copies of the VA's agreement with this Palisades country club, the PGA, Northern Trust sponsor, etc. along with a requesting a copy of the Deed of 1888 and Congressional Act of 1887. I was told that it would cost me $2,508.38 for this information … see attached VA FOIA letter.
For a mere $16, I was able to immediately obtain a certified copy of the handwritten Deed of 1888 from the LA County Registrar’s Office, and received a free copy of the Congressional Act of 1887 from the Library of Congress via the Internet.
What Is the Deal?
To this day, we do not know what kind of sweetheart deal the Pacific Palisades Riviera Country Club and the PGA have with the VA, particularly on Valentine's Day weekend.
Additionally, during deposition in my ACLU lawsuit against VA executive Donna Beiter and her chief of police, Ronald Mathis, then Associate Director Lynn Carrier, under oath, made brazen and unsubstantiated claims that Veteran patients were “offended and upset” for our hanging the American flag in “distress.” She could not produce one Veteran or one person who was offended by our hanging the American flag in distress in full compliance with the U.S. Flag Code.
She also declared: “The [VA’s] mission is greatly undermined by a United States flag posted upside down on its property.” And then further claimed that the “American flag hanging in distress “drained their resources” and “disrupts operations.”
Also, the Dept. of Justice and their U.S. attorneys used these same trumped-up claims in their defense of Ms. Beiter and Mr. Mathis for violating my Constitutional right to free speech. (We won, they lost.)
How can they justify what's going on at the VA right now as the DOJ/U.S. attorneys appeal Judge Otero's recent federal judgment against the VA in the second ACLU lawsuit for unlawful use of Veterans property?
They can't.
This is just more illegal use of these sacred grounds at the expense of disabled and disadvantaged homeless Veterans.
We Are Distressed – That Is Why
It is important to point out that when the VA made their incredulous claims about our hanging the American flag in distress disrupting services, it was on the “outside for three hours on a Sunday afternoon,” while this massive invasion and illegal occupation of thousands of cars and hundreds of tour buses completely disrupt services and drains VA resources, it is taking place on the “inside” for five straight days.
Equally important, it was our legally hanging the American flag in distress that led to the first ACLU lawsuit, which led to the second ACLU lawsuit, which confirmed that this property and the lives of our homeless Veterans are in “extreme danger.”
Subsequently, what's going on at the Los Angeles VA right now, all day long, Wednesday through Sunday, is highly offensive. It is upsetting to every Veteran, be he a patient or not. This illegal invasion and occupation is an excessive drain of VA resources. It overwhelmingly disrupts operations while offending Veteran patients.
Every member of the media who appreciates his or her right to freedom of the press and those who defend it, should go to the VA, particularly over the weekend. Photograph thousands of cars that will be parked everywhere throughout the VA, including on the grass of the Grand Lawn where Veterans from the Civil War and subsequent wars once walked.
Please report on this criminal invasion of the Los Angeles National Veterans Home. This is just part of the biggest land-fraud scam in American history.
Yesterday was our 309th consecutive peaceful Rally, protesting this very kind of abuse and misuse of Veterans land on behalf of tens of thousands of war-injured and impoverished Veterans. They are homeless and belong on the inside. These cars and buses belong in Pacific Palisades.
Attend the Old Veterans Guard Sunday Rally every week, from 1 to 4 on the northeast corner of Wilshire and San Vicente boulevards, west of the 405 Freeway, adjacent to the community of Brentwood.
God Bless America and the Veterans Revolution!
Mr. Rosebrock may be contacted at rrosebrock1@aol.com
Click on the following links for PDF documents:
- Freedom of Information Act Request Letter
- Photographic Documentation of Parking on VA Property
- Photographic Documentation of PGA Buses
- Photographic Documentation of No Parking Signs at Pacific Palisades
