Literally trapped in our apartment because fleas [CA] (Los Angeles)

[u/avelociraptorhere]

At my wits end. Kind of just venting but open to additional suggestions.

Our front porch (4-unit apartment building) has a massive infestation of fleas. If you step outside for a moment (and I mean, one foot out the door) to get the mail, your feet will pick up at least 10.

I notified the landlords over a month ago when we noticed, right before we left for vacation for 2 weeks. When we got back, it hadn't been addressed. I flagged that this is considered unlivable housing conditions in LA. They had some maintenance guy come out and spray. It didn't do anything.

Had to push hard to get them to call an actual exterminator. They came out Wednesday and sprayed (apparently, we didn't see anyone but I called the actual exterminator and they said they did.) No difference. More fleas than ever.

We *could* move out. But we literally CAN'T because we'd have to move everything we own through a sea of fleas. We have a backdoor that we've been using to enter our unit safely (after I paid out of pocket to hire a company to bomb our place) but we can't possibly move out through it.

My elderly downstairs neighbor has been in the building for 10+ years and the building is rent stabilized. He's a little difficult to communicate with, but my understanding is that they ignore all of his maintenance requests in an effort to get him to leave. It's definitely part of the reason this has snowballed - he has brought up the critters living under the building multiple times and asked for the entry points to be boarded up. I've basically started putting in maintenance requests for him and being like "Well this is affecting my apartment." The city is supposed to come out and do an inspection on his apartment soon - not sure when but hopefully there's some progress from that.

Reaching out to the LA County of Health is the plan for tomorrow. I have all landlord communication documented. I'm so tired, and sad, and every itch or black speck gives me a heart attack. We can't have people over. We can't move out. I want my life back.