The Trump administration canceled $33 million worth of federal funds meant to help pay for earthquake retrofits in California, sparking “grave concern” and a call to reconsider from Sen. Adam Schiff, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday. Schiff wrote to U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem urging that the funds be reinstated.
“The cancellation of this program includes the cancellation of $33 million in funding that could have enabled the retrofit of between 750 and 1,500 multifamily buildings,” Schiff wrote. Reinstating the funds would enable Californians to make “the necessary investments to prepare their homes and housing units for the next major earthquake before it hits.”
Originally greenlit through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, part of Noem’s department, the grants were intended to help retrofit the vulnerable “soft story” apartment buildings that crushed people to death when they collapsed during California’s last major urban earthquakes: the 1989 Loma Prieta quake and the 1994 Northridge quake, reported the Times.
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