North Side apartment complex residents dealing with flooding issues for more than a month

PITTSBURGH — It’s been more than a month and an active sewage backup is overflowing into a North Side woman’s apartment.

“It’s horrible. The smell is horrible,” Camillia James said.

James showed Channel 11 cellphone footage from Sunday afternoon when sewage covered her kitchen floor.

Unfortunately, this wasn’t the first time her apartment flooded. James said the flooding began on May 4 and hasn’t stopped since.

Last month Channel 11 News met her at her Allegheny Commons Apartment where she showed us the damage caused by what she believes is a clogged sewage drain.

>>> North Side woman frustrated with lack of results after her apartment flooded

“I flooded five times, and I had to get snaked about seven times, and they are just now giving me papers for incident reports,” James said.

Weeks later, the problem hasn’t been fixed.

“[My unit] has never been thoroughly disinfected they came with a yellow mop and some Pine-Sol,” she said.

On Wednesday morning with Channel 11 cameras rolling, her apartment began to flood again.

“All over again, I lost all the little bit I was trying to salvage,” James said.

Now she is desperately trying to save what little she has left, like her grandmother’s rug and other items she’s placed in boxes.

“I got no help, I had to try to scrub it and clean it myself and it’s very sentimental to me,” James said.

She told us she isn’t alone, other tenants are experiencing the same issue.

We reached out again to the Department of Housing and Urban Development who provided us with this statement:

“HUD has discussed with the property ownership the need to identify and address the systemic issue causing these problems and has recommended that ownership discuss with the resident resolution of their issues.”

But James said that’s not good enough.

“I want them to take it seriously, I want them to know that these are human beings living down here, these are people,” she said.

For now, James is going to keep her items in boxes until a permanent resolution is found.

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