Mired in Frustration

Barefoot and barely awake, Fred Fiazi thought he was wading through six inches of water when he awoke one morning and found a liquid disaster waiting for him on the first floor of his comfortable Canoga Avenue home.

Moments later, Fiazi realized he was standing in raw sewage. He contends the flooding resulted from a city sewer line that backed up into the toilet in his guest bathroom, causing hundreds of thousands of dollars in damage to the home’s cement foundation, appliances, fancy carpets, furniture and cabinets.

During the last 14 months, as Fiazi and his family waited for the city to pay for repairs, they lived on the home’s second floor, without a kitchen or heat. But about a month ago, the Los Angeles city attorney’s office rejected their claim.

Fiazi said the ordeal has left him financially drained and deeply depressed and has fractured his family.

“I cannot eat, and I cannot sleep,” said Fiazi, who continues to live on the second floor by himself, explaining that his wife and two teenage sons have moved out. “I’ve lost over 20 pounds in the last month. I just checked the dictionary for the words despair and desperation and that’s where I am. . . . I’m at the end of my rope.”

Fiazi said the family commissioned environmental studies, which showed that the house continues to breed E. coli and other bacteria and fungi at rapid rates.

George Grove, an attorney representing Fiazi, said he plans to sue the city within the next two weeks, seeking more than $400,000 to fix the home, replace damaged possessions and pay for medical bills. Grove has also been working to get Fiazi’s insurance company to settle a claim the family filed roughly a year ago.

A spokesman for Los Angeles City Atty. James Hahn said his office rejected Fiazi’s claim because the home lacked a back-flow valve, which is required by law and which he contends would have prevented the backup.

Grove said it is his understanding that the city law requiring back-flow valves was enacted after the Fiazi home was built in 1963 and is not retroactive. Even if the law did apply, Grove contends, it would not remove the city from liability.

The attorney said that in 1996 the city was digging in front of Fiazi’s low-lying home and broke the sewer system, then attempted to repair it. Further, Grove said, the pipe that runs in front of Fiazi’s house is no longer adequate because of the area’s population growth.

“As a result of the breakage and the inadequate size of the pipe there was a backup,” Grove said.

The city official who handles sewer matters could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Stuck in a bureaucratic quagmire, Fiazi, a 53-year-old general contractor, continues to live in his sewage-damaged home.

The family’s once-lovely furniture is in disarray throughout the house. Black mold grows openly on the walls along the floor. Big chunks of drywall have been removed from the first-floor bathroom and living room so the material could be tested for bacteria and fungus.

But for Fiazi none of it compares to the misery of losing his family.

“I genuinely love my family . . . the most valuable thing I had was taken away,” Fiazi said as he pounded his fist on a table, moments before bursting into tears.

“This place used to have the noise of children in it. I used to hear my wife blowing her hair dry in that bathroom. But now what can I do? I’m a grown man sitting here crying like a baby.”