Are Lake Forest Schools Safe in an Earthquake?

If the big one hits, are Lake Forest schools safe?

That's one question that will likely be on the minds of parents here and statewide as they read the results of a 19-month California Watch investigation released Thursday. The series, which will be published in various media outlets over the next few days, uncovered holes in the state's enforcement of seismic safety regulations for public schools. 

, , and all appear on a list assembled by state officials in 2002 that identified school building projects that could be hazardous in an earthquake and were in need of inspection and possibly retrofitting.

According to a state survey (downloadable here), Saddleback Valley Unified has not notified the Division of the State Architect of any measures taken to address the concerns that landed those schools on the hazard list.

But Saddleback Unified business director Jeffery Starr said in an email that state officials had flagged schools based on construction documents from when the structures were first built, decades ago. "Please note that all buildings on the list have since been modernized," Starr wrote.

Statements on the Division of State Architect's website confirms that its list of potentially hazardous schools may in many cases have been generated from outdated information: "It should be remembered that the documents on which the inventory relied may have predated the survey by as much as 65 years. Much could have happened to such buildings in the intervening years which would not show in the survey."

Starr said that all recent campus construction projects in Saddleback Unified have been certified by state officials as adhering to state building codes. The only exceptions, he said, were projects at El Toro High School and Los Alisos Intermediate that have certification pending.

According to the Division of the State Architect's online tracking system, though, three construction projects at Lake Forest schools are completed but have not been received final safety certification from the state. Projects modifying buildings at El Toro High School, Olivewood Elementary School and Serrano Intermediate School—all undertaken in the last 10 years—are listed as receiving a "Letter 3" notification, meaning their file has been closed but certification has been withheld.

However, that doesn’t necessarily mean the buildings would fall apart in a quake. Usually, "Letter 3" designations result from missing paperwork. Because local school district officials and builders can be criminally prosecuted if students or staff are injured by tremor damage at an uncertified campus, they hire their own inspectors and don’t open any structure that isn’t deemed up to snuff, said Eric Lamoureux, a spokesman for the Division of the State’s Architect. 

“We don’t believe there are any significant safety issues with any of the Letter 3 projects,” he told Patch on Wednesday.

Even if a school’s construction is sound, it could face other hazards. California Watch also created an interactive map that charts school locations in relation to earthquake faults, landslide areas and liquefaction zones. In liquefaction zones, soil can turn to mush during strong tremors, shaking buildings more violently and damaging underground infrastructure.

According to the map, Ralph A. Gates Elementary is located within a liquefaction zone. The map also shows being within one-fourth of a mile of a liquefaction zone and within one-fourth of a mile of a landslide zone.

In the coming days and weeks, Patch will be asking more questions and looking through more documents related to seismic safety at local schools. In the meantime, read California Report's investigation on earthquake preparedness statewide.

This story was produced using data provided to Patch by California Watch, the state's largest investigative reporting team and part of the Center for Investigative Reporting. Read more about Patch's with California Watch.