Quake

A major push launched after the 1994 Northridge earthquake to retrofit concrete buildings and apartment structures has all but come to a halt after only 5 percent of the voluntary work was done, according to the city Department of Building and Safety. That’s mostly because the strong local economy is fueling a real estate revival, and the prospect of quickly closing deals overshadows the need for structural improvements, according to local structural engineers. “There was a kind of real estate awakening to do seismic retrofitting after Northridge,” said Richard Hess, owner of Hess Engineering Inc. in Long Beach and chairman of the existing building committee of the Structural Engineer Association of California. “But the urgency isn’t there anymore.” Even the devastating earthquake in Turkey this month has done little to further stimulate the process. “Californians get jaded,” said Bob Steinbach, principal building inspector with the L.A. Department of Building and Safety. “After Northridge, there was motivation to get repairs done. It weighed heavy on people’s minds, and they wanted to get retrofits done. Now people laugh and kid about Northridge.” Since 1994, state legislators have passed laws requiring the retrofitting of hospitals, schools and other public structures. But there has been little political support for more wide-ranging requirements. Steinbach said major retrofitting was first urged by the city’s Building and Safety Commission after the Northridge quake. While there was an early push at City Hall to make the work mandatory, property owners protested because of the cost involved. As a result, the work became voluntary. Still, the city targeted 20,000 “soft story” apartment buildings in which the ground floor was composed of parking or other open space as well as thousands of buildings made completely of concrete, which are prone to collapse during temblors. Steinbach said there is no exact record of how many concrete buildings exist in the city because many were constructed before officials started keeping records in the 1920s. But he estimated that only 5 percent of all the apartment and concrete buildings targeted have been retrofitted since 1994. “It’s difficult to propose retrofitting and make it mandatory,” he said. “It’s easier to get owners to fix things if it’s not as financially burdensome.” Insurance companies, many of which stopped or restricted earthquake coverage after Northridge, are back in the game giving lenders reason to relax seismic requirements and push loans for purchases of existing buildings. While new buildings constructed in the city must meet new and stringent seismic safety and building regulations, existing buildings are not subject to the same requirements and often are only upgraded upon changing hands. Structural engineers find it more difficult to convince owners and lenders that such voluntary changes are needed. “It’s a hard sell,” said Doug Silver, a structural engineer at Sherman Oaks-based Seismic Design Consultants Inc. “You don’t have many owners doing anything voluntarily.” In the aftermath of the Northridge disaster, insurers, which lost millions in property claims, tightened coverage for earthquake damage and increased premiums. Lenders were more cautious about making sure that existing buildings they financed met strict earthquake and safety codes. But as the economy heated up, the climate changed. Some lenders that several years ago pushed to have detailed seismic reports have become more anxious to get projects underway. “It’s ultimately up to the building owner to find a lender, and there’s all levels of lenders,” Silver said. David Cocke, principal at the Los Angeles office of Degenkold Engineers, said earthquake safety “is just not a priority anymore.” Many owners who had evaluations of retrofitting costs done on their buildings following Northridge have since let plans stall out or die. Some engineers say that builders are many times under pressure from lenders and financiers to get projects in under bid. As a result, cost has been a major obstacle to seismic improvements at existing buildings because earthquake retrofitting can cost up to $100,000 or more. And there are now fewer incentives to undertake such work. During the first 12 months after Northridge, the city of Los Angeles used federal funding to cut permit fees for earthquake retrofitting and sped up the approval process. Now, with those incentives gone, there is little to encourage owners to voluntarily retrofit buildings. And if companies do undertake upgrades, there is often little payoff in lower insurance rates. There has been limited compliance in some key areas. In 1994, Los Angeles passed an ordinance requiring retrofitting for “tilt-up” buildings constructed before 1976. Those tilt-ups, where concrete walls are first built on the ground and then lifted into position as part of the foundation, pose the threat of a roof cave-in during an earthquake. Thus far, just over half of 2,500 tilt-ups in Los Angeles have been retrofitted, but the high cost is keeping the rest of the work from being done, Steinbach said. To rejuvenate the retrofitting effort, the Structural Engineers Association of California is pushing for a tax break or other financial incentives for the work. Short of that, most say it’ll take another earthquake to prompt building owners to take action. “(Builders) don’t talk about it to the same extent,” said Dee Zinke, executive director of the Los Angeles/Ventura County chapter of the Building Industry Association. “The codes have changed, new ones have been passed, and people feel like they’ve addressed earthquake safety.”