BACKGROUND
Unreinforced masonry buildings (URM) are widely recognized as the most dangerous type of construction
in earthquakes. This building type has not been built in California since 1935. Many URM buildings that
have been retrofitted in the past do not meet the requirements of Title 24, CCR for Public Schools since
they may have been retrofitted to lesser standards. Many engineers feel that a minimum 75% seismic
load criterion may provide protection against collapse but may not provide for life-safety protection and
therefore are not allowed to be used as educational facilities for K-12 schools and community colleges.
The following information provides a summary of the various California legislation requiring specific
seismic building standards for K-12 and community colleges and the history of 750 Eddy Street (Civic
Center building).
THE FIELD ACT
Following a major earthquake in Long Beach, the California state legislature took action to protect
students from earthquakes. Legislation was proposed by Assemblyman Charles Field, AB 2342, mandating
statewide seismic safety standards for public schools including community colleges. One month after the
Long Beach Earthquake the Governor of California signed the Field Act into law. The Field Act requires
that the building designs be based on high level building standards adopted by the state and plans and
specifications be prepared by competent designers qualified by state registration. The quality of
construction was to be enforced through independent plan review and independent inspection. Finally,
the design professionals, independent inspector and the contractor were also required to verify under
penalty of perjury that the building was constructed according to the approved plans.
The Field Act banned the construction of unreinforced masonry buildings for schools, and required that
earthquake forces be taken into account in structural design specifically, for a base shear calculation, and
that school buildings must be able to withstand lateral forces equal to at least 3% of the building total
mass.
Subsequent legislation such as the Garrison and Greene Acts also sought to ensure that all California public
school buildings would meet Field Act standards and that school boards would take the necessary steps
to ensure this by retrofitting or replacing at-risk public school buildings that were built prior to the Field
Act.
THE GARRISON ACT
The Field Act failed to completely solve all of the problems even though newthough new school
construction followed its standards and provisions. The Field Act as adopted, applied only to new
construction; not to existing pre-1933 school buildings. The majority of school buildings were still
structurally unsafe. Legislation to cover the criteria for continued use or abandonment of these pre-1933
school buildings was enacted under the Garrison Act of 1939
The Garrison Act primarily outlined a procedure for school boards to follow to bring their pre-Field Act
schools into compliance with seismic standards. It first required that school boards conduct immediate
examinations of such schools, to be overseen by a state architect or engineer, and then it ordered nonField Act-compliant structures to be modernized and reinforced. A major loophole in the legislation was
the fact that local school boards could avoid having to meet its standards by pleading lack of funds. If
there was a shortage of funds, the school board must attempt to obtain a bond issue to procure them.
Should the bond issue fail, or should other circumstances intervene beyond the control of the board
members, the Garrison Act absolved them of personal liability for administering unsafe buildings,
provided that they were following the safety procedures delineated by it and the Field Act. A key problem
with this legislation was its lack of time limits or deadlines for renovating old schools.
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THE GREENE ACTS
The Field Act had proven to be at least a moderate success, and seismic legislation continued throughout
the 1960s to build upon the principles in it. In 1963, the California Attorney General reinstated liability for
school board members in districts failing to comply with the Field Act, indicating a higher level of
expectations in regards to seismic safety. In 1967 and 1968, the state Legislature passed two related
pieces of legislation known collectively as the Greene Acts, which strengthened the Garrison Act by setting
deadlines for school compliance. The first Greene Act mandated that a statewide structural examination
of all school buildings be made by January 1, 1970 on a pass/fail system. The second Act forbade the use
of those buildings that failed for school purposes after June 30, 1975. The Greene Acts significantly
strengthened the Field Act by setting a schedule for seismic retrofitting, which the latter act had previously
lacked. The Field Act was also strengthened by a 1967 statute prohibiting the construction of new schools
over known active faults which had often happened previously due to the lower cost of land in such areas
Many pre-Field Act buildings were not retrofitted to conform to current codes until funding was made
available in the 1970's. The state provided funding shortly after the magnitude 6.4 San Fernando
Earthquake of 1971.
CURRENT ISSUES
The John Adams School renamed the Alemany School located at 750 Eddy Street was obtained by the
District from the San Francisco Unified School District in 1973. It was renamed the Civic Center Center in
2009. The building is constructed of unreinforced masonry (URM) with flexible diaphragms (floors and
roofs). Buildings utilizing this type of construction are the most susceptible to damage and/or collapse
during an earthquake and have caused the majority of deaths in earthquakes worldwide. These findings
are based on extensive documentation of earthquake damage over the last 125 years and have been
reflected in Building Codes in California since 1933 when URM was prohibited for any new school building
and 1935 when it was prohibited for new buildings of all occupancies.
The Civic Center Campus and indeed, the entirety of the City and County of San Francisco are located in
the highest seismic hazard zone, Seismic Zone 4 (Chapter 2-23 of Part 2 of Title 24 of the California
Administrative Code). Because of the construction type and its location in Seismic Zone 4, California
Government Code, Section 8875 – 8875.10 defines 750 Eddy Street as a “potentially hazardous building”
and required reporting and mitigation be implemented no later than January 1, 1990. The college did not
provide proper mitigation or meet this deadline.
In the 1999 5-year Capital Outlay Plan the District identified seismic and code upgrade projects at the 750
Eddy St building ($4,713,000) to be completed in 2004. The 2005 initial project proposal (IPP) states “The
subject campus is housed in a 91-year old building with numerous fire/life safety and structural deficiencies
that have been identified through both architectural and structural engineering surveys and applicable
code analysis. Some work was performed nearly 60-years ago to achieve modest seismic strengthening
but recent calculations show a significant vulnerability”. This finding reflects the existence of 3-story
unreinforced masonry walls in the structure that have not been strengthened or retrofitted. However,
this project was never completed.
Additional projects in the 1999 5-year Plan included new windows for the center and a new elevator. An
IPP was prepared and submitted for both projects in 2002. In 2003 the 750 Eddy St. building seismic and
code upgrade project had an approved IPP budgeted for $9,751,000 but for reasons unknown was moved
down to #8 priority. In 2007, the 750 Eddy St building seismic and code upgrade project had an approved
IPP with an increased budget of $18,130,000 but was moved down to #13 priority. Had the College
continued in 2007 with the submittal of the Alemany (750 Eddy St. building) project, which was a state
category A3 type project, to a Final Project Proposal (FPP) to the California Community Colleges Capital
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Outlay program, it would almost certainly been approved. Category A projects have the highest priority
for available funding and are not required to compete with other projects. Local contributions would have
been minimal and enrollment at the time would have been irrelevant. State funds were available for the
project and the college had some remaining bind funds that could have been used for the match. It
appears however that although the John Adams Center seismic and code upgrade project was funded and
completed, the Alemany seismic and code upgrade project was set aside in favor of new construction.
This trend continued in 2009 when the project was moved down to priority #17 and the project was
identified as a locally funded or future project.
In March of 2000 the City of San Francisco issued a Notification of Substandard Building (effectively red
tagging) in response to safety concerns at 750 Eddy Street. Further action by the City followed in June of
2004 with the filing of an Enforcement Order for Abatement and a Lien on the property. No specific
information as to City College’s response to the 2000 and 2004 actions by the City is available. The City
does not have jurisdiction over community college properties and subsequently, the 2000 and 2004
actions were dismissed.
According to the USGS, the overall probability of a magnitude 6.7 or greater earthquake in the San
Francisco Bay Area between the years 2007 and 2036 is 63%. The probability that such an event will occur
during the same time period on either the San Andreas or the Hayward faults in close proximity to the
750 Eddy site is 52%. The URM building type is universally accepted as having the highest seismic lifesafety risks. In California, for these buildings located in a Seismic 4 which house public schools, community
colleges, hospitals and essential services, the risk has been evaluated and codified as unacceptable.
There is certainty that placing students and faculty in this building in its current state puts them at risk.
Based on applicable legislation and our engineering reports, that risk, which also extends to persons
outside the building, is unacceptable. The district has been aware of this life-safety hazard since 1999 and
began planning to mitigate this hazard. Those efforts were suspended in 2006. In 2014 the District
retained architectural and engineering consultants (Thornton Tomasetti) to evaluate the structure and to
request funding as part of an effort to obtain project funding through the state’s capital outlay program.
The District completed and submitted an IPP in Summersummer 2014 and subsequently submitted the
project FPP for funding consideration in Fallfall 2014. The governor’s decision not to include a capital
outlay bond in August of 2014 has delayed that funding.
The Thornton Tomasetti report and its finding that the building was not compliant with the Field Act
caused CCSF to revisit whether the question of whether it was safe to continue holding classes in the Civic
Center building. The General Counsel and District staff reviewed the applicable laws and regulations and
the engineering findings were verified. In November 2014, CCSF Chancellor decided to complete the
Fallfall 2014 semester but not allow classes to be offered beginning January 2015.
Once this decision was made the College hired CBRE (a real estate firm) to locate alternative facilities in
the Civic Center district for the Springspring semester. Although three locations were identified,
negotiations failed to produce a viable solution. On January 5, 2015 the CCSF Chancellor was presented
with the choice of cancelling all classes for Civic Center that was scheduled at the 750 Eddy facility or
moving classes to the classrooms in 33 Gough St. and a few used classrooms at Mission and Downtown
Centers. The Chancellor decided to move the classes rather than cancel them. Between January 5 through
8, staff verified the availability of space and started the development of the schedule changes. On January
9, the Chancellor met with faculty who taught in the 750 Eddy St. facility and appraised them of the
situation.
Plans for the transition are underway and classes are schedule to start on February 2, 2015.
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Photos of URM buildings damaged in the Loma Prieta earthquake and the recent Marin earthquake are
provided below to illustrate some of the failure modes identified by the Thornton Tomasetti report.
Flexural Failure of Slender URM Column (Los Gatos, Loma Prieta Earthquake)
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Out-of-Plane Failure of URM Top-Story Wall (San Francisco, Loma Prieta Earthquake)
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Out-of-Plane Failure of URM Wall at Center of Building due to Excessive Diaphragm Flexibility (Santa
Cruz, Loma Prieta Earthquake)
Combined out-of-Plane/in-Plane/Connection Failure, note: retrofit steel survives (survives (Marin
Earthquake)
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Pounding Failure at URM corners (Marin Earthquake)
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