It was the rapid pounding on the door in the predawn darkness that awakened Mike Charles and his 4-year-old daughter, Brittany, alerting them to a fire in the attic of their wooden side-by-side duplex on Bouquet Street in Carnegie.

They and the tenant who lived in the other side of the two-story house found refuge in the home of their next-door neighbors, Paul and Marlene Haluszczak. The fire damaged the upper left side of the Haluszczaks' house, but firefighters limited it to that.

	Bob Donaldson, Post-Gazette Mike Charles has been struggling to rebuild his fire-damaged home on Bouquet Street in Carnegie for nine years. Limited finances and little insurance money have caused him to do the job almost single-handed. Neighbors have been complaining to officials for years about the restoration project. Click photo for larger image.

Mr. Charles, who has held a number of jobs in his 54 years, including construction work, set about repairing the house. The Haluszczaks said he could use their electrical outlets for his equipment. He gratefully accepted their offer and began the arduous task of rebuilding, primarily by himself.

But it's been almost nine years since the Nov. 14, 1997, fire and much remains to be done.

"It's too much for one person to do, especially when he doesn't work at it on a daily, weekly, monthly or even yearly basis," said Stephen Haluszczak, who lives with his parents. "We've tried to be patient, but this has gone on for far too long.

"My parents and I are concerned about our property values and quality of life," Stephen Haluszczak said. The Haluszczaks and Esther Dunich, who owns two homes on the other side of the vacant Charles house, have asked the borough to enforce the applicable laws concerning situations like this, but said Carnegie officials also have been slow to respond.

That glacial response may change today.

At a meeting in January, borough officials asked Mr. Charles if he could install the new brown vinyl siding on the entire house by September. He said yes, according to his neighbors. "I said I'd try," Mr. Charles said last night.

There's no question he didn't make it. He completed only the left side and only a portion of the front of a house the borough once had scheduled for demolition.

In response to a phone call from his parents, who live across the street, Mr. Charles appeared at the house on Monday while I was taking notes and Bob Donaldson of the Post-Gazette was taking photos.

He wanted to know who we were and what we wanted. We identified ourselves and explained what we were up to. After some conversation, he invited us in to see what he has been up to. We stepped around his tools, equipment and work sites as we walked on the pine flooring through the gutted house and climbed the dusty stairs to the attic.

Mr. Charles proudly pointed out the "entire new roof" -- rafters, cross braces, plywood and asphalt shingles. He also pointed to some of the 15 new white vinyl windows he had installed.

Asked why he hadn't completed the restoration work years ago, Mr. Charles said it took him three years to build up enough credit to buy a $70,000 home a few blocks away. He had been renting the one-story red brick house.

He said it then took him five years to get his life back together after a series of personal and occupational setbacks. He now tends bar at a North Side tavern. The bottom line is exactly that -- he doesn't have the money to finish the house by himself, let alone pay others to do the work.

His decision to get a mortgage for the brick house instead of the damaged one upset the Haluszczaks and Mrs. Dunich. They said he could have used the money to complete the work on the duplex, move into it and rent the other half as he did before the fire. Or, they said, he could have sold it and lived in the brick house.

Mr. Charles remains adamant that he will finish the house so he'll have something to pass on to his daughter. "I want to do this right rather than just throw it together," he said repeatedly. He said he works at it as time and money permit and insisted that he works at it on a regular basis.

He said his brother, William Charles, owned a majority share of the house when the fire occurred and received most of the insurance money. "I only got $5,000 out of it," he said.

It now is up to borough officials to determine if Mr. Charles did indeed promise seven months ago to complete the siding work by today or whether he really did try to do so.

I'll keep you posted.