Seismic risk data for WA schools is incomplete and elusive • WA State Standard

Hundreds of public schools across Washington are located in areas where they could sustain damage in the event of a major earthquake. But more than a decade after the state assessed seismic risks in schools, the information has become difficult to access and difficult to verify.

Last school year, more than 378,000 students attended schools whose buildings were constructed before modern seismic codes were adopted and which did not have risk assessments or retrofits, according to data from the Washington Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction obtained through a public records request. The majority of seismic hazard data collected by school districts and the state is not shared with the public.

An additional 167,000 students enrolled in schools already assessed as having “high” or “very high” seismic risk, based on their locations and building conditions.

The school's seismic data collection is intended to map the scope of vulnerabilities across the state to prioritize building improvements and to inform emergency planning.

Other states are further ahead. California, Oregon, and Utah published school-based earthquake inventories in 2002, 2007, and 2022, respectively. The Washington Legislature has favored a more gradual approach that Gov. Jay Inslee said could take decades to complete.

“Slowly we're getting more money and slowly we're getting more information,” said Scott Black, director of program development in the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, who is overseeing the data project.

Multiple school districts provided records of seismic assessments and upgrades they made to their buildings that were not recorded as retrofits in the state data. When asked why the database doesn't recognize upgrades as updates, some districts said it displays a different version of the data.

Meanwhile, district-level reports show estimates of how much damage school buildings could sustain in an earthquake and risk information missing from state-level data.

“First, you can't see all the information, and second, all the information may not be there. It should be required,” said Dale Ann Baker, a parent and engineer who helped the Stanwood-Camano School District work on a hazard mitigation plan.

Black attributed inconsistent and missing data to districts that had not updated their records. But an analysis showed that 160 building assessments from the $3.4 million school earthquake safety project were also missing from the database, despite legislative requirements for the agency to upload those results. “This is likely an error in the data that needs to be corrected,” Black replied.

Earthquake risks

Washington has dozens of active fault lines including the largest active fault in the region – the Cascadia Subduction Zone. A large subduction zone earthquake could cause “moderate or complete” damage to about 2,000 schools in Washington, according to a 2022 report by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

But state agencies that lead school seismic assessments use different methods to determine risk levels on school campuses. The Department of Natural Resources estimates that 70% of K-12 schools in Washington are located in high seismic risk areas, based on national hazard models.

“The risk is the probability and severity of ground motion at a location: how strongly the ground shakes and how often it happens,” said Alex Stelly, assistant director of the department's Geological Hazards and Mapping Division.

The Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction classifies only 28% of the state's 2,025 schools as having high seismic risk. The office reduces the threat level to campuses that likely have stronger soil types. This approach to determining risk levels is “not very common,” Black said.

Despite these risks, there is no state law requiring school districts to conduct seismic assessments. Given the confidentiality of existing data, school communities may not be aware of the risks that have already been recorded.

Conducting structural assessments of Washington schools to assess earthquake safety has been a long-standing goal of the state. However, completion timelines set by the state task force and the Division of Emergency Management have lapsed, with assessments completed for less than half of the older schools. The 2019 legislative proposal for mandatory assessments did not move forward.

Public visibility of the database will benefit families, said Cal Ash, a member of the Seismic Safety Advisory Committee in the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. “Let's say one of your children is about to go to a new school. Well, you'll have the opportunity to look at some information and get some information about earthquake safety at that school,” Ash said.

Greater public access to seismic hazard data could also help spur building retrofits, according to Brian Terbush, earthquake and volcano program coordinator for the Washington Department of Emergency Management.

“Although it may seem scary to know that your building is dangerous in the event of an earthquake, in many ways this is one important way to get the community to help apply for these grants to fund [retrofits]Terbush said.

Plans are underway to incorporate school data into a government inventory of unreinforced buildings, which are known to drop bricks onto nearby buildings and streets during earthquakes. “Knowing where these buildings might be is really important for emergency response. It helps us plan for the future,” Terbusch said.

But first the state will have to find these dangerous buildings. The schools database could not be combined with a previous inventory due to lack of building type information, which is still missing for hundreds of older buildings statewide, and shows inconsistent information for Seattle Public Schools compared to the district's inventory of unreinforced masonry buildings.

Randy Newman, director of school facilities in the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, said the data “maybe” will be shared once more information is collected.

Track seismic upgrades

After the 2001 Nisqually earthquake struck the Puget Sound region, the Edmonds School District set out to better protect vulnerable schools. Over the next nine years, the district completed seismic retrofits at 18 schools. But according to state data, there are no retrofits in the area.

Crystal Springs Elementary School in Bothell received a seismic upgrade after a 2010 assessment called for bolting walls to the roof, adding studs to plywood walls, and shoring up storage shelves and file cabinets, according to documents from the Northshore School District. The school, built in 1956, is now undergoing an expansion, but has no ratings or retrofits in the state's data.

The Department of Natural Resources called for a survey of school districts to collect information on past seismic improvements to the database, starting with large, well-funded districts. But five years later, the survey was never conducted.

Some districts provide seismic data to the state through a voluntary grant program tied to building condition assessments required to apply for construction funds. But retrofitting is not required, and not all districts have completed assessments.

“A lot of them don't want to do it if they don't have the funding,” Black said.

Edmonds, Bellevue, Northshore and Bellingham school districts are among the state's 163 consolidated school districts and schools with no seismic assessments or retrofits in the state's data, although all four districts provided retrofit records for this story.

Omitting retrofits from state data could result in higher risk ratings for schools, as the state estimates that many high-risk buildings would be considered low risk when retrofitted.

Districts often assign someone to update their records after construction projects, said Jeff Rogers, director of environmental health and safety for Tacoma Public Schools, “but often times that doesn't happen because the project manager is never told, 'Hey when the upgrade is done, I have to You must provide this information to [the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction]“.”

Missing information is also due to changing interpretations of what counts as an update.

Tina Christiansen, a spokeswoman for Seattle Public Schools, said updates may not be classified as retrofits when they are part of full renovations or only affect parts of the building. “There is no partial refresh or promotion option,” Christiansen said, adding that the criteria used to rank promotions could not be confirmed because a former employee left the district.

The School Earthquake Safety Project, which evaluated one in eight school buildings, did not make these distinctions. “In reports, the terms ‘seismic upgrades,’ ‘retrofits,’ and ‘structural retrofits’ are used interchangeably and generally mean the same thing,” said Lloyd Travis West, a geophysicist with the Department of Natural Resources. But more than 50 seismic and structural upgrades recorded in the project reports were not included as updates in the state data.

Seattle Public Schools updated its list of seismic retrofits to distinguish between building renovations and replacements in response to questions about this story, but continues to list additional retrofits that were not found in the state data.

Seismic improvements totaling $16 million in the Bellingham School District are also missing from the data, although the district confirmed the projects were added.

Tyne Wilton, director of capital projects for the Edmonds School District, noted that building condition assessments, which the district completes, “are not about verifying whether buildings meet code requirements or testing how well they can withstand extreme forces including wind, rain, earthquakes, or fire. ”

Earthquake safety experts say comprehensive assessments of buildings and ground conditions are the best way to identify schools at risk, compared to satellite images or building drawings alone, where schools often have multiple wings built in different years.

“The safety of buildings is very dependent on the structural materials, so I think on-site work is very valuable,” Ash said.

Steely echoed the call for assessments, saying, “The more fully we know what structures are built to withstand earthquakes, and the site conditions at that school that either increase or decrease shaking, the better we can as a state plan upgrades and mitigation measures.”

Sources 1/ https://Google.com/ 2/ https://washingtonstatestandard.com/2024/09/30/earthquake-risk-data-for-washington-public-schools-is-incomplete-and-out-of-reach/ The mention sources can contact us to remove/changing this article

What Are The Main Benefits Of Comparing Car Insurance Quotes Online

LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / June 24, 2020, / Compare-autoinsurance.Org has launched a new blog post that presents the main benefits of comparing multiple car insurance quotes. For more info and free online quotes, please visit https://compare-autoinsurance.Org/the-advantages-of-comparing-prices-with-car-insurance-quotes-online/ The modern society has numerous technological advantages. One important advantage is the speed at which information is sent and received. With the help of the internet, the shopping habits of many persons have drastically changed. The car insurance industry hasn't remained untouched by these changes. On the internet, drivers can compare insurance prices and find out which sellers have the best offers. View photos The advantages of comparing online car insurance quotes are the following: Online quotes can be obtained from anywhere and at any time. Unlike physical insurance agencies, websites don't have a specific schedule and they are available at any time. Drivers that have busy working schedules, can compare quotes from anywhere and at any time, even at midnight. Multiple choices. Almost all insurance providers, no matter if they are well-known brands or just local insurers, have an online presence. Online quotes will allow policyholders the chance to discover multiple insurance companies and check their prices. Drivers are no longer required to get quotes from just a few known insurance companies. Also, local and regional insurers can provide lower insurance rates for the same services. Accurate insurance estimates. Online quotes can only be accurate if the customers provide accurate and real info about their car models and driving history. Lying about past driving incidents can make the price estimates to be lower, but when dealing with an insurance company lying to them is useless. Usually, insurance companies will do research about a potential customer before granting him coverage. Online quotes can be sorted easily. Although drivers are recommended to not choose a policy just based on its price, drivers can easily sort quotes by insurance price. Using brokerage websites will allow drivers to get quotes from multiple insurers, thus making the comparison faster and easier. For additional info, money-saving tips, and free car insurance quotes, visit https://compare-autoinsurance.Org/ Compare-autoinsurance.Org is an online provider of life, home, health, and auto insurance quotes. This website is unique because it does not simply stick to one kind of insurance provider, but brings the clients the best deals from many different online insurance carriers. In this way, clients have access to offers from multiple carriers all in one place: this website. On this site, customers have access to quotes for insurance plans from various agencies, such as local or nationwide agencies, brand names insurance companies, etc. "Online quotes can easily help drivers obtain better car insurance deals. All they have to do is to complete an online form with accurate and real info, then compare prices", said Russell Rabichev, Marketing Director of Internet Marketing Company. CONTACT: Company Name: Internet Marketing CompanyPerson for contact Name: Gurgu CPhone Number: (818) 359-3898Email: [email protected]: https://compare-autoinsurance.Org/ SOURCE: Compare-autoinsurance.Org View source version on accesswire.Com:https://www.Accesswire.Com/595055/What-Are-The-Main-Benefits-Of-Comparing-Car-Insurance-Quotes-Online View photos