In this era of tight budgets and potholes, is the $49,000 City Council travel budget a wise expenditure of public funds?
While there may be some value in face-to-face conferencing, this is the information age of 24/7-fingertip access.
Might not the $49,000 be better spent on areas critical to public safety? A city geologist with veto authority to ensure all projects, large and small, comply with seismic standards and other geological hazards prescribed in the Washington Administrative Code 365-190-120, could greatly enhance emergency preparedness and save lives.
I remember hearing a small quake under Des Moines coming in the 1990s. A few seconds later, I saw two waves roll through the house about 30 feet apart. It was only a magnitude 2 or 3.
The Cascadia quake will be about 1,000 times more powerful than the 6.8 Nisqually in 2001. The valley floor is a liquefaction zone with Oso on steroids potential. New Yorker Magazine quotes FEMA’s regional director Kenneth Murphy as saying, “Our operating assumption is that everything west of Interstate 5 will be toast.”
Fire is the primary secondary disaster in natural disasters. Could studying propane tanks potential for rolling around contributing to fires reveal that earthquake strapping and safety valves may be appropriate? That study should not take much of the $49,000 and could yield significant benefit.
It is doubtful we will see anything on the scale of San Francisco’s boondoggle, but we could benefit from their lesson. The luxurious 58-story Millennium Tower is leaning. The designers said it would settle a few inches, but it has sunk 16 inches. Everyone involved is seizing the opportunity to exercise their finger-pointing rights. Maybe their city building department should have exercised its fiduciary responsibility?
A proper foundation extended down to solid ground might have a better option. It certainly looks like another failure of the “cheapest is best,” and the “it will be fine” policies.
I urge everyone to support a city geologist as a higher priority. Let’s make a sincere effort to limit the collateral damage and save lives as the developers build out the city.
– Bob Zimmerman
