On April 25, 2023, registration opened for the Earthquake Soft Story (“ESS”) pilot program! This unique government program offers free-money grants of up to $13,000 to eligible Los Angeles homeowners that goes toward a seismic retrofit of their “Soft Story” home, which is defined as a home with at least one floor of living space that is built above a garage. Such homes are especially [...]
Greater Los Angeles Soft Story retrofitting History Almost eight years ago, the City of Los Angeles passed two landmark Soft Story retrofit ordinances to help ensure that when the next earthquakes hit, residential condo and apartment buildings would be more structurally sound. Such multi-story buildings are called Soft Story structures, because they typically have large open spaces on their flimsy first or second floors, instead [...]
If you have what is called a “Soft-Story” home, then you are in luck and should carefully read this blog for some hot-off-the-press news about seismic retrofitting and free grant money! Earthquakes in our fair city of Los Angeles can result in catastrophic damage. For example, even if we get just a magnitude 7.0 earthquake on the Hayward fault, the resulting damage would displace 77,000 [...]
On February 28, 2023, and in the wake of the devastating earthquakes that rocked the country of Turkey just a few weeks prior, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to require the retrofitting of older, so-called “non-ductile concrete” buildings that are at a high risk of collapse during a powerful earthquake. The U.S. Geological Survey has said that such buildings “pose [...]
It is a well-known saying that those who do not learn from history, are doomed to repeat it. In the wake of the 1994 Northridge Earthquake, the City of Los Angeles, as well as those living in this earthquake-prone area, have made significant investments in developing new earthquake warning systems, enacting better building codes, and putting into practice important earthquake retrofitting programs such as the [...]
It has been nearly three decades since the January 17, 1994 Northridge earthquake, and the question on the minds of millions of Los Angelinos is: are we safer today than we were back then? Are the lives of our loved ones secure? Are our homes and commercial businesses safe? The answer to these questions is, unfortunately, more complex than one would hope…* Let’s start with [...]
If you are the owner of a multi-unit residential apartment building, then there is a pretty good chance that you have already heard about the new California Senate Bill 721, otherwise known as the “California Balcony Inspection Law”! Much in the same way that the City of Los Angeles today requires earthquake retrofitting for “Soft Story” buildings that are vulnerable to earthquake damage, the new [...]
Everyone who lives in Los Angeles knows that the city typically experiences a huge earthquake every 100 years. We are today, long overdue for the next Big One! According to the U.S. Geological Survey*, Los Angeles has a 60% chance of experiencing a large earthquake in the next 30 years! The degree to which a large quake can be catastrophic must not be understated. [...]
Most people go through life without anyone ever giving them $3,000 in cash without any catch, right? And you would never expect the government to be handing out $3,000 checks to citizens, right? Well, we are happy to report that this is happening in our great city of Los Angeles, a couple of times a year! Although Halloween was just a couple of days [...]
At Weinstein Construction, we are very excited to inform all our neighbors and friends that the California Earthquake Authority retrofitting grant program is opening back up on October 18, 2022, to take applications from Greater Los Angeles homeowners, and that Weinstein Construction remains an approved contractor for this program! The Earthquake Brace + Bolt Program The “Earthquake Brace + Bolt” (“EBB”) is a state-funded program [...]
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