Dr. Chia Egbudiwe pulled back into his apartment garage at the Villa Fifty2 apartments in Phoenix Thursday night and couldn’t believe what he saw.
“It is disgusting. The entire area just stinks. It stinks inside my house,” Egbudiwe told ABC15. “I can’t walk out of my house without stepping on waste and it’s just such a health hazard.”
Egbudiwe saw sewage backup flooding his driveway. This was nearly a week after Egbudiwe first noticed a potential problem.
“Sunday we noticed the black thing outside the apartment had been popped off and there was toilet paper all around it so my girlfriend suggested we at least clean it up because it was pretty nasty to look at,” Egbudiwe said. “So we clean it up, closed it and contacted management, gave them a call - no answer.”
Egbudiwe chalked it up to it being a Sunday and didn’t think much of it. But with more unanswered calls on Monday and Tuesday, his frustration grew.
“Wednesday comes around and by this time it’s pretty upsetting cause we’ve called for several days. Finally, we get a response back,” Egbudiwe said.
A maintenance worker arrived but said a plumber would be needed. Egbudiwe says the property manager told him a plumber would be out soon.
“The plumber never showed Wednesday night. Nobody show[ed] up Thursday, Then, I got home Thursday night to this huge spillage. This time it was five times worse,” Egbudiwe said.
“I can’t even go home and relax you know after a long day of work and serving patients. I cant even go home and serve myself and relax and calm down," he said.
As of Friday, he says additional calls to management have still gone unanswered.
“Diseases literally can be emanating from all that and affecting everybody around breathing all that in,” Egbudiwe said. “It's a big health hazard and it’s really frustrating that we’re not being heard.”
ABC15 tried calling the property ourselves. The number listed online was out of service or disconnected. Our calls directly to the property management company in charge of Villa Fifty2, Cornerstone Property Management were sent to voicemail, a problem Egbudiwe is familiar with given there is no office on site.
“There’s no management on site, but that should be more reason for [the] manager to answer whenever somebody gives a call,” Egbudiwe said. “It’s so hard to get through to somebody even if it's just a little maintenance issue.”
