EXEMPLARY PRACTICES IN EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT
Home Earthquake Strengthening Program
Program Description: San Leandro Development Services, Building Regulations and Disaster Preparedness Divisions, produced their handbook 3 Easy Low Cost Ways to Make Your Home Earthquake Survivable to illustrate basic retrofit techniques for single-family wood frame structures. The program includes practical hands-on workshops with experts, educational videotapes, detailed construction drawings, and a streamlined package of plans and permits. The program, available for a minimal charge, begins with a simple checkup of a home's earthquake fitness. Even residents who do not do the work themselves will learn the differences between good construction and bad and how to make informed choices in hiring a contractor.
Designed to address known earthquake weaknesses in older home construction, the program also is tailored to the design features of the community's homes and is based on contemporary engineering practices and improved construction techniques learned from the 1994 Northridge earthquake. The city supplies the permit and inspection documentation to show that the home has been strengthened to prescriptive standards.
Evaluation Information: Seventy-five residents have obtained permits to begin work on their homes, and 209 have been trained to strengthen their single-family homes against earthquakes. In June 1996 FEMA presented San Leandro with its prestigious Outstanding Public Service Award for the program. The mayor presented the program to 225 mayors attending the U.S. Conference of Mayors annual meeting.
Annual Budget: The average annual expenditure for the program is approximately $15,000. This includes additional staff time to administer the program, literature reproduction, tool maintenance and replacement, marketing, and miscellaneous materials costs. It does not include program startup costs and tool and building material donations from private industry.
Sources of Funding: The city and FEMA.
Program Type: Program and handbook about a low-cost program provided by the city to help improve a homeowner's chances of surviving an earthquake inexpensively, easily, and as soon as possible.
Target Population: San Leandro, California, homeowners and their contractors.
Setting: San Leandro, California.
Project Startup Date: 1994.
Contact:
William Schock
Chief Building Official
City of San Leandro
835 East 14th Street
San Leandro, CA 94577
Tel: 510-577-3405
Fax: 510-577-6009
Last Modified: Thursday, 30-Mar-2006 09:59:41 EST