The State - News from Feb. 26, 1987

About a fifth of California’s 1,300 major state buildings could be deathtraps in the event of a major earthquake, and most of those unsafe structures are located on college and university campuses, Tom Tobin, executive director of the state Seismic Safety Commission, said in suggesting a $800-million, voter-approved bond issue to improve structural safety. Speaking in Sacramento, Tobin said that of about 10,000 official state buildings, about 1,300 are considered major structures, and of those, 75% or 80% are on college campuses. “If a major earthquake occurred in Los Angeles, 2,000 students would die at UCLA alone,” Tobin said.