Owners of Red-Tagged Homes Seek a Ray of Hope

Beneath a burst of sunlight and skies scrubbed blue, homeowners watched in shock, and sometimes tears, as officials posted red notices on their front doors, stretched yellow tape across their lawns and declared the structures unlivable because of rain-soaked, unstable soil.

Although their owners spent five days shoring up the houses against the deluge, 14 homes in the northeast Los Angeles neighborhood of Glassell Park were red-tagged this week, meaning entry is at least temporarily prohibited until the danger passes.

Relatives and neighbors helped the residents carry out a hodgepodge of precious belongings: bags of shoes, folders with birth certificates, potted houseplants and armfuls of clothes.

And they also carried the hope that later inspections would find the houses to be safe and that they would be allowed to move back in soon.

On Mimosa Drive, Antonio and Rosa Alvarado, both 80, positioned themselves across the street from their home of 32 years to keep vigil. He sat in a folding chair, she stood.

The two-story structure was red-tagged Tuesday and they returned to make sure it was intact.

From the front of the house, only minor damage was evident. Behind it, however, a hillside of mud pressed into their home, threatening to shove it into the street.

They began worrying two weeks ago, said Rosa Alvarado, when their patio broke away from the home during a downpour. During the past few days of rain, the doors swelled and sealed themselves shut, leaving only a back exit with sliding doors.

“We bought this house in 1973 because it was roomy and such a nice place to raise children,” she said. “Now we’re staying at a motel.” As she spoke about an uncertain future, a drizzle fell from the still-blue sky, and the Alvarados gave up the watch, accompanied by their son David and his wife.

Others, mostly safety officials and news media, stayed. Neighbors tried to walk a considerate line between showing concern and satisfying their curiosity.

“I don’t want to make my neighbors feel like I’m looking at their [misfortune],” Jessica Vazquez, 35, said as she walked her English mastiff Shooba on Mimosa Drive. “I live on a hillside too, just down the street, and everyone there is worried too.”

A few blocks away on Division Street, Soraya Roman, 41, stood in front of her parents’ red-tagged home and struggled to hold back tears. Behind the home, both retaining walls had given way and mud bulged through plastic stretched as a last defense at the patio’s edge. The ground crackled and creaked as earth strained and shifted.

“My parents are retired. What are they going to do?” Roman asked. The family contacted the Federal Emergency Management Agency, she said, which directed them to contact their insurance company. FEMA “told us to grab important papers and my father’s medicine, so that’s what we did.”

Next door, Gary and Glenn Mayeda rushed to their parents’ side to help them evacuate.

“My mom’s a little shaken up -- they’ve been in this house 39 years,” Gary Mayeda said as he loaded his car. “My father doesn’t even know what’s happened yet.”

Mayeda is a mechanical engineer and after inspecting his parents’ house, said he found no visible damage on the inside.

The fate of the red-tagged home, however, will be determined by the hillside behind it. In the meantime his parents will stay with him in Eagle Rock.

Representatives from City Councilman Antonio Villaraigosa’s office tried to comfort residents, offering help and a variety of emergency services.

Homeboy Industries and the Hollywood Beautification Team offered to help residents move their belongings, and the Best Western in Venice is offering free rooms for evacuees, said Joe Ramallo, the councilman’s communications director.

A few doors down, Marisela Lara, 48, surveyed the water rushing from her hillside garage to the street and said she was preparing to leave her house at a moment’s notice.

Up the hill behind her home, several feet of slick, brown earth testified to a recent mudslide.

“Look what water can do,” Lara said. Her home was red-tagged for one day after rains in 1994, she said, but this time it fortunately was not.

“Just because your home is red-tagged doesn’t mean you’re going to lose it,” Lara said. “So that’s what I’m going to be hoping for those people up the street.”