LOS ANGELES — A plan by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to put up to 800 new tiny homes this year on its West Los Angeles campus drew an immediate rebuke from veterans who won a federal court order requiring the agency to build thousands of new units of temporary and permanent housing there.

"I don't think that's suitable at all," said Rob Reynolds, an Iraq war veteran who speaks on behalf of several veterans who filed a 2022 federal lawsuit asking for more housing and an end to leases 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 face the criticism of being cramped, flimsy and undignified.

Reynolds said more than 100 tiny homes placed on the campus for veterans who had camped on nearby San Vicente Boulevard have proven to be difficult for those using wheelchairs and walkers, subject to fire and not suitable for stays that can drag on for months.

VA officials disclosed the tiny home plan during a hearing this week as the agency's first step in complying with the court order.

"I feel like there is a definitional disconnect between what we present to the court and what the VA has in mind," Roman Silberfeld, one of the veterans' attorneys, told the court. "They talk about the sheds. We never talked about that."

Though not the subject of the hearing, President Donald Trump's executive order to establish a National Center for Warrior Independence on the campus was a prominent subtext. VA officials named to head the president's initiative also represented the agency during the hearing but didn't clarify whether tiny homes were solely a response to the court order or were overlapping with the warrior center.

If the tiny homes are meant for the warrior center, there could be conflict with the court if it should deem them substandard.

U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter, who issued the housing order, was also skeptical. He questioned whether a homeless veteran who has found a niche on Skid Row would see a move to a shed in the Westside as an improvement.

"Do you know the veterans in the past have been concerned about the conditions of the tiny homes?" Carter said. "We'd like to see those minimized and use the money elsewhere."

In opening the hearing, Carter nodded to the potential conflict 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 weeks of hearings leading up to his 2024 order, Carter repeatedly worried that he did not know how much demand there would be for shelters and that quickly building too many of poor quality could lead to the false conclusion that veterans don't want to be on the campus.

As an ice-breaker, Carter ordered the immediate installation of up to 150 modular homes, with individual bathrooms and kitchenettes.

"We were really close, folks, to getting that 50 or 100 units out there right away," he said during the hearing Tuesday. "I don't know if we could resurrect that. Has that been considered?"

James Shriner, appearing in public for the first time as project manager for the National Center for Warrior Independence, did not answer that question but said what would draw veterans to the campus would be wraparound services.

Shriner, who retired in May after a 30-year Army career, said the services would be concentrated in a hub located in an existing building near the center of the campus as part of a town center called for in a master plan ordered by previous litigation. He also said the plan included a 6,000-space parking lot and transit hub to enhance access.

The hearing in Los Angeles federal court marked the confluence of three orders — two judicial and one executive — that will shape the future of the long neglected campus for decades to come.

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

At the conclusion of a trial last year, Carter ordered the VA to build 2,500 units of temporary and permanent housing in addition to the 1,200 from the earlier case. Declaring that his ruling would cause "irreparable harm," the VA appealed.

With that appeal pending, Trump issued an executive order in May requiring the VA to create a National Center for Warrior Independence on the grounds with housing for 6,000 veterans. Whether that means at one time or over time in temporary housing has not been made clear.

A panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals heard arguments on the appeal last April, then issued a ruling in December upholding the housing order and Carter's nullification of leases to the Brentwood School and a parking lot operator but allowing the lease for UCLA's baseball stadium to stand.

Because the 9th Circuit decision has yet to be formally issued, Carter does not currently have jurisdiction. He indicated that the hearing was an attempt to head off disagreements before he regains the power to enforce his order.

At one point, he lauded Trump's executive order, saying he hoped that by making the campus a center for all veterans, it would, in effect, expand the jurisdiction of his case beyond Los Angeles County.

Carter said he receives calls from officials in other counties asking, "Why aren't we being included?"

At other times he said he was looking for signs of the VA's commitment to improve a record of "miserable failure."

VA officials, who have faced criticism for planning the warrior center in secret, revealed almost nothing to the court of those plans beyond the parking structure and service hub. Instead they submitted a slide show indicating the sites selected to comply with Carter's order.

The tiny homes would replace a current parking lot and grassy field adjacent to the existing tiny home village alongside San Vicente Boulevard.

The VA selected a city park with two little-used baseball fields and a popular off-leash dog area for the 1,800 permanent units, Shriner said.

Robert Fleck, acting principal general counsel for the VA, told the court the VA has sufficient funds in its current authorization to complete the temporary housing by the end of 2026 but not for the permanent housing.

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