The Bus Stops Here --and Homeowners’ Problems Start

The low point was me standing in my backyard at 5:20 in the morning tossing Grade A jumbo eggs at an idling MTA bus.

There I was, a new Los Angeles homeowner.

A nearby bus layover--a rest stop for drivers--was generating constant noise and fumes. Complaints to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority were doing no good.

“These guys are unbelievable,” I told my wife, Maggi, as I got out of bed. “That’s it. I’m getting the eggs.”

Sad to say, the eggs did not get the layover moved. That would take much more.

Now as we mark the first anniversary of owning our beloved Spanish-style tile and stucco house in the west San Fernando Valley, we are both maddened and amused by the many wacky experiences we’ve encountered.

Just a taste: We’ve had a disappearing swimming pool expert, and an insurance agent who sent our mail to a mystery address. We hired a company that swore it was authorized to install earthquake gas shut-off valves while the gas company swore it wasn’t. And we appealed an excessive sewer fee for eight months before a city official finally told me I was wasting my time.

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Immediately after moving into our house late last May, Maggi and I realized that the bus stop behind our West Hills property was a problem. Sure, we knew there was a stop there before we bought the house. But we did not realize that the MTA layover meant drivers began arriving about 5 a.m. each day and left their engines running during 20- or 30-minute breaks.

We heard and smelled them well into the night. We felt the layover could be moved to the other side of an adjacent medical center, away from homes.

Maggi made the first calls to the MTA. We were instructed to list bus numbers and times so that supervisors could monitor the activity. We spent the summer cooperating with the instructions, even as I privately cursed the buses. By September, we were meeting with MTA administrators and other city officials at the stop along Medical Center Drive.

As you probably guessed, nothing much came of it. Soon after, the eggs were launched. Still, we kept track of the buses.

By the end of December, we were skipping regional administrators (they’d had their chance) and were calling and writing to Julian Burke, the MTA’s chief executive officer, and Councilwoman Laura Chick. Burke asked James P. Reichert, executive officer for transit operations, to look into the matter.

In January, Reichert wrote me a pleasant letter explaining that the layover would no longer be used “for late night, early morning and weekend service.” Wrong. I wrote another letter.

In March, we met with MTA administrators at their Chatsworth office. That’s when they finally said the layover would be moved, though the stop would remain. A partial victory.

Nowadays, some drivers continue to take breaks at the stop despite a small “Do Not Layover” sign. We’re still jotting down bus numbers and times.

Of course, our homeowner challenges all overlapped.

Last fall I noticed that our bill from the Department of Water and Power showed our water usage decreasing while our sewer fee remained high.

I made calls and wrote letters to the city’s Bureau of Sanitation and Board of Public Works. The problem was, the city temporarily uses an average citywide sewer rate for new homeowners--one that, in our case, by April was more than twice what it should have been, according to our water usage. I was told that there was an appeals process and that adjustments were made in some cases. But months after contacting the city, our appeal was going nowhere.

At last, I was granted a telephone review with Commissioner Valerie Lynne Shaw of the Board of Public Works.

“I agree with you. This is unfair, but this is government,” Shaw told me in early May. “You got caught up in a bureaucratic process.”

She said that although the sewer fee ordinance was considered unfair by many new homeowners--city workers say complaints are pouring in--she had no authority to do the right thing. I was free to appeal to the City Council, which could vote to amend the ordinance.

“Based upon the city ordinance, there is no remedy,” she said sympathetically. “You have no recourse.”

The bright side, as I was told by an appeals representative, was that by this time next year our sewer fee really would be based on our own water usage. This year’s overbilling, when it comes down to it, was a gift to the city.

I’ve developed a new appreciation for government gadflies.

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By the way: The previously mentioned swimming pool expert touched up our plaster pool when we moved in. When a newly installed seal around the deck collapsed, I called him. He never called back. Thankfully, I never got a bill either.

Our home insurance, which came dangerously close to expiring, has been renewed. My agent has yet to explain why our policy documents initially went to an address I’d never heard of.

And it turned out the company we contracted to install our gas shut-off valve was authorized in Los Angeles after all. The problem was that the license number the company includes on its stationery was valid in Orange County but not here. The Southern California Gas Co. recognized the company only under its new L.A. license number. Whatever, we are officially in compliance with the city’s earthquake valve ordinance.

Do you suppose I should warn the MTA that our first child, a girl, was born Friday? Don’t babies need an abundance of peace and quiet?

Man, I sure hope I’m all done with those eggs.