On Monday, November 9, the Pasadena City Council will hold a special joint meeting with Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger to discuss homelessness, housing collaboration, and joint encampment mitigation. Two days later, on Veterans Day, the City will hold a public ceremony in front of City Hall to honor those who served. The proximity of these two events makes a simple fact impossible to ignore.
Pasadena’s 2026 Point-in-Time Count found 43 Veterans experiencing homelessness—7.5 percent of the total homeless population and 12 percent of those who were unsheltered. Veterans make up approximately 3 percent of Pasadena’s adult population. They are overrepresented among the homeless by a factor of more than two, particularly among those living on the streets. Forty-three is not an abstract number. It is the approximate strength of a U.S. infantry platoon—the basic building-block unit of ground combat forces. In Pasadena, that platoon has become a Ghost Platoon: counted in the data, yet invisible to the Housing, Homelessness and Planning Committee charged with overseeing homelessness policy. No dedicated agenda items, no focused briefings, no sustained attention.
Picture that platoon as it once stood: American service members trained to defend this country, prepared to give their lives for it, standing shoulder to shoulder in formation with discipline and purpose. Now picture those same 43 Veterans scattered across the streets of Pasadena—sleeping in doorways, under overpasses, or in vehicles—carrying the same service and the same willingness to sacrifice, but reduced to a Ghost Platoon that the city counts and then leaves behind.
This is not a data problem. The City counts Veterans. It is a priority problem.
Supervisor Barger has been clear on this issue. She has repeatedly stated that the words “Veteran” and “homeless” should never be used together, and she has supported specific housing projects and policy changes aimed at getting Veterans off the streets and into stable housing. Monday’s joint meeting is an opportunity for the City of Pasadena to align with that approach rather than continue treating the Ghost Platoon as a footnote in broader reports.
The causes are well documented. Mental health conditions (including PTSD), substance use disorders, the difficult transition from military to civilian life, and the extreme shortage of affordable housing in our region all contribute. These are not abstract risks. They are the reasons Veterans remain overrepresented among the unsheltered in Pasadena even as national and countywide numbers have declined through targeted programs such as HUD-VASH and dedicated navigation efforts.
Pasadena does not need to invent new solutions. It needs to use the ones that already work and to give them the attention they have not yet received at the Committee level. That means asking, at Monday’s meeting, for concrete collaboration with the County on Veteran-specific housing navigation, outreach, and encampment response—including targeted outreach and priority access to existing County Veteran housing resources. It means treating the 43 Veterans counted this year not as one more data point, but as people whose service should not end with them sleeping outdoors in the city they once called home.
On Wednesday, Pasadena will honor Veterans in front of City Hall. The Ghost Platoon—the 43 Veterans counted on our streets—will not be among those recognized. That contrast is precisely why Monday’s meeting matters. On Monday, inside City Hall, we have the chance to match that honor with action. The Housing, Homelessness and Planning Committee and the joint City-County discussion should make the Ghost Platoon a specific priority, not an afterthought. Veterans who are living on our streets deserve more than a ceremony two days later. Americans should not leave their service members behind.
William Paparian is a former mayor of Pasadena (1995–1997) and a former East Pasadena councilmember (1987–1999).
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