Safety of College Gymnasium Questioned : Earthquakes: Cal State Dominguez Hills building ranked 80th in state list of structures that could be hazards. School officials downplay the report.

A gymnasium at Cal State Dominguez Hills is listed among the top 100 state-owned buildings that pose potential hazards in the event of an earthquake, according to school officials and the state Seismic Safety Commission.

The gymnasium, which is designated as the school’s primary emergency shelter, is listed in a January commission report that assigns a priority ranking to more than 1,000 state buildings for more detailed structural analysis, said Fred Turner, a structural engineer for the safety commission. The Dominguez Hills gymnasium is 80th on the list.

However, officials at Cal State Dominguez Hills say they are not concerned about possible hazards related to the gymnasium because the commission listing is not based on a comprehensive structural study.

“There hasn’t been a physical integrity study done that’s said ‘Yes, this is dangerous,’ ” said university spokesman Greg Klerkx. He said the gymnasium, constructed in 1977, was designed to meet building and earthquake-safety standards.

“As far as we’re concerned, it’s a safe building,” Klerkx said.

However, Tom Tobin, the commission’s executive director, said the building is made of non-ductile concrete, which cannot bend or stretch during an earthquake without breaking.

“It’s the kind of building that can have a significant failure in the event of an earthquake,” Tobin said. “I would say it definitely needs to be looked at further.”

The commission report is an update of a seismic hazards survey prepared in April, 1981, that took into account building size, age and type of construction, number of occupants, size and frequency of earthquakes in the area and the number of lives that could be saved by retrofitting the building. The information was entered into a computer to come up with a ranking, Turner said. It did not include an on-site inspection.

Because the state does not have the money to physically examine every one of its 16,000 buildings, the survey is intended as a guideline for determining funding of engineering studies of individual state-owned buildings, state officials said.

The updated report, which lists more than 1,000 University of California, Cal State University and state office buildings, provides cost estimates for rehabilitation.

The buildings with the highest ranking are those that state officials believe pose the highest risk in an earthquake, Tobin said.

Upgrading the Dominguez Hills gymnasium to meet current seismic safety standards would cost $2.3 million, according to state estimates.

Dominguez Hills uses the gymnasium for physical education classes and intercollegiate athletic events. It is also the school’s primary disaster shelter, Klerkx said. However, if an earthquake occurs, the gymnasium would be evacuated along with other school buildings as part of the university’s earthquake preparedness plan, he said.

The university defends the building’s designation as an emergency shelter based on its past performance during earthquakes, Klerkx said.

“We’ve never had any incidents with this building” even during the Whittier earthquake, Klerkx said, referring to the 5.9 temblor of October, 1987. “As far as we’re concerned, we’re comfortable with the fact that it’s an emergency shelter.”

Tobin said the gymnasium’s listing at 80th is not to be taken lightly because three buildings at Cal State L.A.--Salazar Hall, Martin Luther King Hall and John F. Kennedy Library--ranked lower in the 1981 survey but suffered structural damage in the Whittier quake.