VENTURA : Quake Standards for Buildings Studied

Ventura’s downtown area is just as architecturally rich--and ill-prepared for disaster--as downtown Watsonville was before the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, which destroyed much of that city’s downtown, engineering experts told the Ventura City Council on Monday.

The council is considering an ordinance that would require downtown property owners to strengthen their unreinforced masonry buildings--a process that could cost more than $2.7 million, according to an environmental report by the Santa Barbara-based Planning Corp.

Planning Corp. staff presented the report, telling the council that the city’s options range from doing nothing to requiring that every building in downtown Ventura meet strict earthquake-proofing standards costing up to $13 per square foot.

Ventura’s downtown “has a special problem,” said Steve Craig, a Planning Corp. researcher. Many unreinforced masonry buildings abut each other and share common walls, he said. Ideally, the owners of each building could save money and ensure greater safety if they cooperated on strengthening their properties, he said. But different owners may have different goals, he said.

Also, there is no way to predict how strong an earthquake Ventura should prepare for, Craig said.

The report, Craig said, “gives you an idea of what truly lies out there, lurking in the dark of the tectonic plates. You really do not know what’s going to occur.”

He also warned that merchants whose buildings are not damaged in a quake would suffer nearly as much as those whose property was destroyed, because entire blocks could be closed for safety, as happened in Watsonville.

The council is considering a graduated ordinance that would require more stringent earthquake-proofing for historic buildings and less-stringent improvements for newer or less-vulnerable sites.

A public hearing on the environmental impact report is scheduled for May 9, and the council is scheduled to enact a final version of the ordinance by Aug. 26.