When is the Veterans Affairs Department going to meet its responsibility to house chronically homeless veterans in Los Angeles on the large tract of government-owned land that should have been put to this use long ago?

Maybe sometime in 2014, according to the department’s estimates, or halfway through President Obama’s second term, if he is re-elected. For a president who has made eloquent promises about the nation’s duty to veterans, that is a dismal expectation.

The problem predates Mr. Obama, of course. The sprawling 400-acre property in Los Angeles was deeded to the federal government in 1888 expressly for use as a home for disabled soldiers and sailors. But the Veterans Affairs Department long ago strayed from that mission. No long-term housing exists there anymore, though a large V.A. hospital with short-term treatment beds occupies part of that land.

Over the years, the property has been turned over to uses completely unrelated to the department’s mission, like athletic fields, a nine-hole public golf course, theater stages, hotel laundries, rental-car and bus storage, even oil wells and a dog park. Yet it’s unclear how much rent the department has collected from various businesses like Marriott Hotels or where that money has gone.