Decades of Service for Veterans
About the Campus
The Veterans Administration Hospital District in Waco, Texas -- also known as the Veteran Affairs Medical Center (VAMC) -- is a complex of Mediterranean Revival buildings. The United States Department of Veterans’ Affairs began construction on the facilities in 1931, to care for World War I veterans.
The nearly-flat terrain of the complex has an open, park-like setting with mature oak trees.
The VAMC consists of three geographically distinguishable areas.
The first is a hospital and residential area located at the north corner of the complex. This area consists of a divided entrance boulevard (Memorial Drive), a massive six-story main building, a lower flanking administrative building, and a small grouping consisting of another administrative building and three residential buildings.
These three residential buildings — Buildings 19, 20, and 21 — make up Freedom’s Path Waco.
A second area, located further to the south, is made up of 14 monumental patient care buildings arranged in two concentric rings around a central oval mall. The outermost buildings, situated along Doris Miller Circle, were added between 1944 and 1945, when the hospital was expanded to accommodate World War II veterans and remade to look the earlier installations.
The third area is situated along the western edge and consists of utilitarian support buildings, such as laundry building, warehouse, a garage, and a storage building.
About Doris Miller
On December 18, 2014, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) honored Doris Miller for his heroism by naming the VAMC after him. Born in Waco in 1919, “Dorie Miller” joined the Navy in 1939 as a mess attendant -- one of the only occupational specialties then open to a Black man. In January 1940, he was assigned to the USS West Virginia, stationed at Pearl Harbor. During the attack on Pearl Harbor by Japanese forces on December 7, 1941, severe damage prevented Miller from manning his assigned battle station, and he was ordered instead to the bridge, where he helped move the vessel’s mortally wounded captain. Afterwards, on his own initiative, Miller took over an unattended machine gun and fired at incoming Japanese planes. Although untrained, he laid down effective fire and only stopped firing when he ran out of ammunition and the ship began to sink. Even then, he persisted in helping his fellow sailors to safety until he finally made his way to shore. Miller was the first Black American to receive the Navy Cross. He was killed in action in 1943.
The Building Utilization Review and Repurposing Initiative (BURR)
In 2011, the US Department of Veterans Affairs addressed several issues through a creative program called the Building Utilization Review and Repurposing (BURR) initiative. Based on an audit of all VA facilities it was determined that there were approximately over 1,000 vacant units on VA Medical Center campuses. The VA was spending millions to maintain the buildings and at the same time, it was reported through the Annual Homeless Assessment Report that there were over 65,000 homeless Veterans. Through the Enhanced Use Lease (EUL) program, the VA decided to make a bold attempt to recruit the private sector in an effort to eliminate functional Veteran homelessness, reduce the number of vacant buildings on its campuses, and enhance the provision of services being offered to its homeless, disabled and income limited Veterans through creative partnerships with developers and non-VA service providers.
Solutions for Veterans has completed 9 out of the 40 permanent supportive housing EUL projects initiated by the VA since 2011 to end Veteran homelessness, and has 3 additional projects in development: Waco, Texas; August, Georgia; and Kerrville, Texas.
The PACT Act, which became law on August 10, 2022, broadened the VA’s existing EUL authority and provided the VA with $922 million allocated to the EUL program. Freedom’s Path Waco is one of the projects funded by the PACT Act.