Unlicensed Contractors Targeted in Agency Sting : Crackdown: Five are arrested or cited by undercover agents. New office to deal with growing complaints opens today.

Paulo Langi--a cement contractor of sorts--walked into the gutted two-story house on Thursday after submitting a bid to replace a cracked driveway and offered to negotiate a price to do the interior stucco work as well.

The problem was, state investigators say, that Langi may be a Jack-of-all-trades, but is licensed at none.

Langi, 41, of Van Nuys, was one of five men arrested or cited Thursday in a sting operation conducted by the Contractor’s State License Board from a house in the 5300 block of Hinton Avenue. The house’s owners and a contractor working there allowed investigators to use it for the sting, said Ralph Hollier, a board investigator who led the operation.

Investigators contacted Langi and the other unwitting participants who had placed ads for repair work in a local shopper, then posed at the house as the homeowners and a neighbor who just stopped by.

Since the Northridge earthquake rattled some homes from their foundations last Jan. 17, the state agency has regularly conducted sting operations because of a steep rise in the number of consumer complaints against unlicensed contractors, Hollier said.

“We’ve tried to do operations like this at least twice a week in quake-damaged areas since last January,” Hollier said.

The agency’s Van Nuys office has received more than 300 complaints over the past four months, far above the norm, said Sam Haynes, an agency spokesman in Sacramento. More than 400 unlicensed contractors have been arrested in the San Fernando Valley since the Northridge temblor, he added.

The volume of complaints has been so great that the department is opening a special office in Van Nuys today with 10 investigators solely to handle earthquake-related contractor complaints.

Langi’s arrest was instructive because it is typical of what investigators often find in such operations and in the twice-a-week surprise visits they make to construction sites, said Dan Hitt, a special investigator with the agency.

First off, the burly Langi arrived in a truck that displayed a licensed contractor’s number that Hitt said didn’t belong to him.

He briefly looked at the driveway and then came inside to write up an estimate for the work and talk with the “owners.”

“After the holidays, maybe we can continue and do something else,” Langi said, fishing for more business. When he finished, Hitt wrote him a check for more than $2,000, half the price of the job.

When Langi accepted it, Hitt identified himself as a peace officer, told Langi he was under arrest for contracting without a license and handcuffed him.

After his arrest, Langi gave investigators yet another license number. This one belonged to Langi’s brother and had expired in August of 1993, Hitt said.

He gave investigators a third number. Strike three. That was also invalid, Hitt said.

It turned out that the company Langi represented also had used three different names in the past, and now operated under the name Langi Construction, Hitt said.

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As he was booked right on the spot--handcuffed, photographed and processed--Langi, who appeared to take the turn of events in stride, told investigators that he had applied earlier to take the test for a state license. Unfortunately, he admitted moments later, he had paid with a bad check, adding that he replaced it with a good one as soon as he could.

Thursday’s operation ended with five arrests and two misses, cases in which the contractor failed to show up or actually had a valid license. All those arrested or cited were released.

Even Langi, who asked the investigator as he was escorted to the front door: “Does this mean I don’t get the check?”