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The executive director of the Hawaii Public Housing Authority is suing the city over damage caused to his home by April’s flooding.
Hakim Ouansafi is suing not in his official capacity, but as a homeowner. And he is suing on behalf of hundreds of other East Oahu homeowners who suffered damage from the April 13 flooding. Ouansafi filed a class-action lawsuit in state court on Friday.
The lawsuit claims that the damage to his home was caused not just by runoff, as the city claims, but also by wastewater and sewage that had overwhelmed the city’s wastewater system. Ouansafi claims that as residential development and public works projects progressed in areas adjacent to the Wailupe, Niu Valley, Kuliouou and Hahaione streams, the city failed to adequately evaluate, repair and maintain existing flood and drainage systems.
Ouansafi’s home is at the entrance to Niu Valley.
City spokesman Andrew Pereira said the city was reserving comment on the lawsuit because Corporation Counsel Donna Leong had not yet seen it.
