The Legislature hereby finds and declares the following:

(a) This state is located along a major tectonic plate boundary that is part of the Circum-Pacific seismic belt, and it is inevitable that earthquakes will continue to occur along the state’s numerous faults causing extensive damage to property and potentially extensive loss of life and injury. In the last decade, this state and its residents have endured a number of moderate earthquakes resulting in injuries, loss of life, and in excess of thirty billion dollars ($30,000,000,000) in property damage. Projected losses in future earthquakes could exceed one hundred fifty billion dollars ($150,000,000,000) as was the case for the recent Kobe earthquake in Japan.

(b) Moderate, potentially damaging earthquakes occur on the average of every couple of years somewhere in this state, and another great earthquake in southern California can be expected within the next 20 to 30 years. However, recent increased seismic activity in the San Francisco Bay area and Los Angeles Basin, coupled with new estimates of long-term seismic patterns, suggest that the seismicity in this state has been anomalously low in the recent past, and we may be returning to a normal period of more frequent large earthquakes. Also, a damaging earthquake near San Diego cannot be ruled out.

(c) Continued advances in the knowledge and practice of science, engineering, and other earthquake-related disciplines are critical to the development of state and local earthquake risk reduction programs and practices that lead to improvements in existing and new buildings, dams and utility systems, transportation facilities, communications systems, fire and toxic materials safety, and disaster preparedness.

(d) It is important to all California residents that new and improved cost-effective earthquake risk reduction measures be developed that will appreciably lower the potential for death, injury, damage to property and disruption of lives and businesses in this state.

(e) It is the consensus of the California engineering and scientific communities that while damaging earthquakes are inevitable in this state, significant levels of earthquake risk reduction will be achievable if steps are taken to provide the needed focus and coordination of earthquake risk reduction efforts.

(f) In 1986, the Governor signed Senate Bill 1667, which formalized this state’s commitment to the establishment of a center for earthquake engineering research within the state, but this center has yet to be established.

(g) The National Science Foundation has indicated that it may fund such a center on a competitive basis at a level of two million dollars ($2,000,000) per year for five years beginning in 1996, if the center matches the foundation contribution on at least a dollar-for-dollar basis from nonfederal funds.

(h) A center for earthquake engineering research will provide a much needed multidisciplinary, integrated research program to develop new and improved cost-effective earthquake risk reduction measures.

(i) A center for earthquake engineering research will enhance California’s worldwide competitiveness in the fields of earthquake design and construction and may serve as a catalyst for developing new products and services that have global implications.

(j) Therefore, it is in the interest of the safety of all California residents and visitors that a center for earthquake engineering research be created to develop, through research and application, new and improved, cost-effective risk reduction measures that will reduce the potential for death and injury and damage to property.

(Repealed and added by Stats. 1996, Ch. 966, Sec. 2. Effective September 27, 1996.)