Land of Crumbling Dreams

Steven Cser, a chiropractor in Orange, knew nothing of the violent, rocky spasms millions of years ago that helped form the tangled layer-cake of rocks and sands beneath the subdivision lot where he bought an upscale home 12 years ago.

And when chunks of his backyard began sinking into the earth a few months ago, it was news to Cser and dozens of neighbors, even as they began evacuating, that they lived on the site of large, long-ago landslides that may have awakened.

It’s a familiar and depressing story, repeated time and again in California, from the Santa Monica Mountains to the Peninsular Ranges. Enamored of the view and value, Southern California home buyers are enticed into investing in hillside and ridge-top property now being built at rapid rates. And when the ground that nature whisked together slips and the houses begin falling, they are stunned and aghast.

“There are buyers who aren’t being protected,” said Serge Tomassian, an Irvine attorney and former head of the construction defects section of the Orange County Bar Assn. “People are buying homes, unknowingly, that have a history of problems--landslides, slope movements, other problems.”

Because of that, Tomassian and others are asking for stricter state disclosure laws governing what home buyers must be told about the property.

A year after an El Nino storm season that forced the evacuation of more than 1,000 homes and damaged hundreds along the California coast, landslide victims, attorneys and others have begun pushing for better protections in law or regulation.

They include better disclosure; improved city and county oversight of building; state involvement in insurance issues; and better building standards.

“There needs to be even more attention paid by the contractors and builders to their construction means and methods,” said Tom Chesley, a Laguna Hills contractor critical of some “mass production” home-building projects.

“When we see people outside the sales office in sleeping bags and tents waiting for the opening of Phase I, what do you think is going to happen with Phase II?” Chesley asked.

Advocates of home buyer protection legislation said the climate in California--natural and political--has tilted in favor of changes.

“The interest on the part of consumers is still strong,” said Assemblyman Tom Torlakson (D-Antioch), the sponsor of California’s Natural Hazard Disclosure Statement act, which passed in 1997 as a reaction to catastrophic flooding in Northern California.

That law requires property sellers to provide a separate form indicating whether state maps classify the property as potentially endangered by hazards of wildfire, river flooding, dam inundation or earthquakes.

The January 1997 flooding that damaged or destroyed 23,000 houses was the impetus behind the new disclosure requirements, Torlakson said.

“We had a lot of property owners who were surprised and said they didn’t know they were in a flood plain,” he said. “I became convinced it’s important to have more information available.

“It’s the most important investment people make in their lives--the purchase of a home. It’s a huge commitment.”

However, the law resulting from Torlakson’s bill doesn’t require disclosure of past landslides or mudslides, if they aren’t related to a local earthquake hazard zone. Torlakson said he will consider adding protection against landslides to the law.

Many landslide victims who learn their projects were built on or near landslides or above ancient landslides that were flattened, filled or buttressed with earthen berms complain that they weren’t told in advance about the damaged land.

“Where there are ancient landslides, it ought to be disclosed to everyone,” said Mike DeStefano, a former resident of the doomed Crown Cove condominiums in Laguna Niguel, where all 41 units are to be demolished after a March 1998 landslide.

“It should be right there on a piece of paper for everyone to see,” he said. “People should read it and then sign something saying they read it and understood it.”

Cser and his family plan to move at the end of the month to rented quarters as a slowly moving hillside behind his Orange house in the Vista Royale development threatens a catastrophic collapse that could affect dozens of homes.

Two one-time landslide sites are beneath that development.

Checking the newest landslide’s progress, Cser makes morning rounds around his property to see if cracks have widened, walks have shifted or whether the stress has caused more damage to his swimming pool.

Geologists have told homeowners that slope movement and damage will accelerate briefly before a massive failure, hopefully providing them with a chance to evacuate.

“Every morning I walk out there to look and see how bad it’s gotten,” Cser said, adding that he usually sees evidence of progressive failure. “I see it all the time.”

California had state laws requiring the preparation of maps showing the location of potential and former landslides, but they were repealed in 1995 under sunset provisions after 13 years in force. The laws didn’t include a mandatory landslide disclosure provision for new home buyers.

Theodore Smith, a senior state engineering geologist, said the maps resulting from the landslide hazard mapping act are not well known, but provide a basic, if incomplete, guide to landslides.

Among geologic experts, there has been no groundswell of support for mandatory disclosure of landslides, Smith said. Among developers and geotechnical firms that do work for the developers, there is a belief that once a slope is rebuilt, or engineered, it has been cleared of defects.

Developers are required to hire state-licensed geologists to approve plans to alter hillsides meeting prescribed safety standards and to obtain approvals for the reports. The geologists certify the plans would make the hills safe for residential construction, and homeowners are handed a sheaf of disclosure forms that do not have to include information on past or potential landslides, builders have said.

“Generally any information helpful to the home buyer is a good thing,” said Christine Diemer, chief executive officer of the Building Industry Assn. of Southern California. “But it’s hard to have disclosure about things that are unpredictable, like landslides.”

The procedures have been criticized, however, because of failures that have occurred through the years, including the recent landslides.

“I can’t say whether engineered slopes are good or bad,” geologist Smith said. “They probably make things more stable.

“But historically, we’ve learned that when you’ve had a landslide in the past, most likely, that’s where you’ll have one in the future.”

When landslides occur, insurance policies don’t cover damage to houses. Earthquake coverage is limited to actual earthquakes, while damage from non-earthquake land movement, or soil subsidence, is unavailable.

That’s another area of state law or policy that residents and officials in landslide-stricken areas said needs attention.

“It seems a shame that we can’t devise a way through the private sector, preferably, or the public sector, if necessary, to address this,” said Tim Casey, city manager of Laguna Niguel, where several landslides have affected scores of houses in the past few years.

“Maybe it’s time for someone in Sacramento to pick up the ball and see if the state can’t provide some insurance for landowners who experience losses due to landslides.”

Inadequate city and county oversight over rapidly urbanizing developing areas has also fueled concerns in coastal areas. In the midst of building booms, cities and counties are unable to respond by adding staff to monitor construction projects which are built faster, sometimes with less-experienced laborers.

“People assume that if the city or the county allows a developer to build there, it’s safe,” said Tomassian, the Irvine construction defects lawyer. “But they really are exerting nominal overview. They pretty much defer to the developer and his independent soil engineer, who’s being paid by the developer. The city doesn’t get involved generally until there’s a problem.

“I know we’re in anti-government Orange County, but people want to be protected,” Tomassian said. “The public agency should have a more direct involvement.”

Smith said improved laws require more thorough reviews by geologists working for cities. City Manager Casey said cities should consider whether local building rules need to be reexamined.

“Down here in south Orange County, probably every parcel of property has some geological history associated with it,” Casey said. Building contractor Chesley said the market dynamics of building booms make inspection work difficult. Builders need to complete projects quickly to shed expensive construction financing and move on to the next project; project superintendents are paid bonuses to ride herd on subcontractors to work faster; subcontractors overloaded with work use more, cheaper and less-experienced labor.

“Then the homeowner moves in and problems start to appear,” Chesley said.