When it first opened in 2015, Blue Butterfly Village was hailed as a rare sanctuary for women veterans overcoming homelessness.
But some tenants now say conditions at the taxpayer-subsidized San Pedro townhome complex have become so bad, they’re willing to give up their rental subsidies and take their chances on finding a home they can afford on their own limited income.
“I’d rather be freaking homeless than continue to live [at Blue Butterfly],” said Jade Easley, who served in the U.S. Army for nearly a decade.
She said that in 2024, the city’s Housing Department inspected her unit and found violations, such as faulty smoke detectors, defective stairs and bad plumbing. She said she frequently heard mice crawling in her walls.
Easley said she told property managers last year that locks on one of her doors were broken. The next month, she suffered a break-in. Seven months later, she said, the door still hadn’t been fixed, so she paid out of pocket to repair it herself.
Easley left Blue Butterfly earlier this year. She now lives with her two children in Tucson, Arizona. She said she moved there because rent is cheap enough to cover with her VA disability benefits. But she is now cut off from her social support system.
“This was not a choice to live here,” Easley said. “I’ve lived outside before. I’ve lived deployed. But I never experienced mice in my home for that long of a period of time, clawing at my walls as I’m trying to sleep, and my kids running to my room saying something’s trying to get them.”
What happens after veterans get housed?
Easley is one of 12 current and former tenants who filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles County Superior Court last week against Blue Butterfly’s nonprofit landlord, Volunteers of America.
The tenants allege the organization and its affiliated groups have neglected the property, have failed to provide safe and habitable housing and have harassed residents who complained about worsening conditions.
According to the lawsuit, the property — which is nestled in a hillside down a winding private street lined with other abandoned military housing structures — has become infested with snakes, insects and other wildlife. Coyotes have crawled under poorly maintained fences, tenants say, and black widow spiders have taken over their patios.
Other alleged problems at the property include broken street lamps, sewage overflowing from defective septic systems, trash piling up as collections stopped and lax security that allowed one unit to operate as a “drug den” for years.
“It really has been stressful,” said Alisa Randell, a Public Counsel attorney representing the tenants. “There have been impacts on folks’ mental health because of all of these issues not being able to get their homes fixed and not feeling safe and secure at this property.”
Raytevia Evans, a Volunteers of America spokesperson, declined an interview. She emailed a statement, saying the organization could not comment on active litigation.
“We regularly inspect our properties, including Blue Butterfly Village, and respond promptly to maintenance and safety requests from our residents,” the statement read. “We remain deeply committed to ensuring Blue Butterfly Village serves as a supportive environment for female veterans and their families, and we continue to collaborate with municipal partners and property management to address any outstanding maintenance or operational needs.”
Blue Butterfly Village is located down a winding private road. Residents must drive past derelict former military housing in order to reach their homes.
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The allegations come at a time when L.A. has been making progress on bringing unhoused veterans indoors. According to this year’s regional homeless count, about 2,250 veterans currently experience homelessness across L.A. County on any given night. That represents a decrease of about 42% from levels of veteran homelessness seen in 2020.
But veteran advocates said some of that decrease is the result of placing people in substandard housing where habitability concerns go unaddressed.
Rob Reynolds told LAist the Blue Butterfly allegations are similar to complaints he has heard from veterans placed in new housing on the VA campus in West L.A. He said those complaints also involve alleged lack of security, frequent staff turnover, pests and broken plumbing.
“I hope the plaintiffs in this case are successful in holding the defendants accountable, and I hope this leads to greater oversight and accountability for the property management groups operating veteran housing in Los Angeles,” Reynolds said. “They deserve better.”
Units received public funding, then failed city inspections
Easley said she spent about one year couch surfing and living in her car before moving into her unit at Blue Butterfly. At first, she said, her new home was “rainbows and sunshine,” describing it as a life-changing opportunity that gave her a reason to keep living.
But during the COVID-19 pandemic, Easley said, the property managers changed and problems in her townhome were left to fester. At the time, she was running a licensed, in-home daycare.
“I was actually pretty proud of myself because I finally was owning my own business,” Easley said. But she said neglect by the landlords left her home too unsafe to operate the daycare.
“I didn’t want to be in my own unit,” she said. “I didn’t want other people to be in my unit, so I just stopped that completely.”
A car with a popped hood is parked in a driveway outside of a townhome at Blue Butterfly Village in San Pedro.
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Disputes between landlords and tenants over habitability are fairly common in L.A. But the situation at Blue Butterfly is notable for how much taxpayer funding has flowed into the property.
The property consists of 74 two-bedroom townhomes. They were repurposed from existing structures that previously provided housing to military families stationed at a nearby Navy base. That housing was closed in 1997. The complex was redeveloped in part with about $12 million in state and local funding, loans, waived development fees and donated land.
Tenants living at Blue Butterfly typically pay up to 30% of their income on rent, with government-funded housing vouchers covering the rest. Some vouchers are administered through the HUD-VASH program, specifically targeted to housing veterans, while others are funded through mainstream Section 8 vouchers.
When landlords fail to fix deteriorating conditions, the local governments that administer these vouchers can place housing units under “abatement,” meaning rental subsidies will be withheld until homes pass future inspections.
LAist discovered through a public records request that the Housing Authority of the City of L.A. has placed at least three units at Blue Butterfly Village under abatement in recent years.
In 2024, Housing Authority officials told a Volunteers of America subsidiary they would not provide rental subsidies until the landlord fixed a faulty toilet, a broken bedroom door handle, a damaged refrigerator and dishwasher, non-functioning smoke and carbon monoxide detectors and cleared a mouse infestation.
‘It makes you feel like nobody cares’
Anesha Aird, a U.S. Navy veteran, spent about two years without stable housing after retiring from the military. She said she was usually able to pay for short-term hotel stays, but she spent some nights in her car.
Like Easley, Aird said her early days at Blue Butterfly were positive. But over time, her requests for maintenance and increased security on the property were ignored, she said.
At first, “we had proper security that stopped you at the gate, asked you where you were going, checked your name against a ban list to ensure that you were allowed to be on the property,” Aird said. “All of that is gone.”
Anesha Aird stands in front of her townhome at Blue Butterfly Village in San Pedro.
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When the attached townhome next to hers burned down in February 2024, the unit was left as a burned-out husk for about nine months, Aird said.
Before the repairs began, Aird said, she asked management to relocate her. She said she worried the construction noise and irregular work hours would disrupt her son’s home-schooling and trigger her post-traumatic stress disorder.
She said management denied her request.
“There are veterans here — veterans like myself with extreme PTSD and bad anxiety and depression,” Aird said. “It makes you feel like nobody cares.”
Tenants say they faced retaliation after asking for repairs
The tenants’ lawsuit alleges that Volunteers of America and other defendants violated the city of L.A.’s tenant anti-harassment ordinance by threatening to remove tenants and blaming them for conditions that landlords are responsible for maintaining.
Randell, the tenants’ attorney, said the lawsuit asks the court to require the landlords carry out repairs, restore services, end alleged retaliation and pay damages to compensate tenants for alleged overpaid rent and emotional distress.
“This site has a lot of promise,” Randell said. “We just want to see it live up to its promise.”
A spokesperson for the L.A. Housing Department said it currently had no records of open complaints or violations at the property. Officials with the Housing Authority of the City of L.A. did not respond to LAist’s request for information on current conditions at the complex.
Aird said she recently came home to find a three-day notice warning of a potential eviction on her door. She said she did not believe the threat would hold up in court. In any case, she plans to move out once she can find another building where she can use a housing voucher.
“I served this country honorably for 20 years,” Aird said. “All I’m asking is that I get treated with that same respect.”