About
Vision
A future where Seattle is able to withstand significant seismic activity without loss of life, economic disruption, displacement, or major damage to its cultural and historic fabric.
Mission
Secure passage of legislation mandating upgrades to all unreinforced masonry (URM) buildings and providing a means to finance those upgrades through a retrofit credit program.
Success! Mandatory URM Legislation Passed
The City of Seattle has adopted code to recognize URM retrofits as part of the 2021 Seattle Existing Building Code (SEBC) in the Fall of 2024. This code recognition supports voluntary earthquake retrofits for URM building owners seeking to have their building recognized in the City's URM database as retrofitted. The URM working groups established by ASAP were instrumental in achieving this important milestone.
Retrofitting URM buildings will be mandatory in the future, once the City has established supportive resources. This represents a major victory for our coalition and for the safety of Seattle residents.
Recent Updates
We recently hosted two webinars explaining program and code updates:
Learn more about the technical standards for URM retrofit:
Ongoing Work
The City is actively pursuing resources to support mandatory retrofits:
The City has applied for federal grant funding to support the retrofit of URMs in underserved communities. The grant has been "selected for further review" by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
A proposed transfer of development rights program for URMs is being explored to allow URM owners to sell unused development rights to fund seismic retrofits.
A statewide effort is underway to identify feasible tax incentives and additional financial incentives for tax-exempt entities such as schools, non-profit, and religious organizations.
Activity to Date
The Alliance for Safety, Affordability and Preservation (ASAP!) came together to develop creative solutions to the threat to public safety, affordable living and working spaces, and the rich legacy of our region's built environment posed by the impact of future seismic events on our unreinforced masonry buildings (URMs). An event like a magnitude 6 to 7 Seattle fault earthquake has the potential to cause widespread death and injury, displace tens of thousands of Seattle's most vulnerable residents and the businesses who call these buildings home, and permanently damage some of our most distinctive historic structures. Furthermore, it would severely exacerbate the existing housing affordability crisis and lead to a surge in homelessness.
Consisting of a broad spectrum of concerned stakeholders, including developers (both market-rate and affordable), URM property owners, historic preservationists, engineers, and neighborhood associations, ASAP has been actively exploring approaches to restore and upgrade these character-rich brick buildings before the next major earthquake renders them uninhabitable, or leads to their unplanned demolition. We believe that mandatory retrofit legislation is the only way to marshal all of the concerned stakeholders and resources required to solve this issue efficiently.
The City of Seattle has grappled with this challenge since it first passed and repealed mandatory URM legislation over 44 years ago. Recognizing that an effective financing solution is a critical component of mandatory legislation moving forward, the Alliance proactively sought and received input from stakeholders and worked with them to design a financing solution that would best support the legislation's goals.
Project Benefits
The code recognition of URM retrofits:
Defines minimum earthquake safety requirements for a "retrofitted" URM building
Establishes the Alternate Method for URM retrofit, a reduced retrofit standard that minimizes cost and collapse hazard for qualifying URM buildings
The City's primary reason for encouraging earthquake retrofits of URMs is public safety. When a URM building is damaged in an earthquake, occupants can be injured or killed, and debris can injure pedestrians, block roadways, and delay emergency response. Retrofitting URMs will save lives and reduce injuries.
Retrofitting URMs will also help retain important buildings that are the heart of the historic and cultural character of many neighborhoods. Earthquake retrofits will reduce business closures after a disaster and allow for quicker recovery and a reduction in economic impacts.
Seismic retrofits of URMs support climate resilience by promoting the adaptive reuse of existing buildings and reducing post-quake debris, air pollution, and embodied carbon associated with damages, demolitions, and rebuilding.
The End Result
Seattle has an 86 percent chance of experiencing an earthquake in the next 50 years. Our work on mandatory unreinforced masonry retrofit ordinances will ensure the safety of over 1,100 collapse-hazard buildings. Future required URM earthquake retrofits will reduce the probability of injuries, fatalities, and long-term displacement for the over 22,000 people who live or work in URM buildings.
Resolving the URM dilemma will leave Seattle a safer, more resilient, and more equitable city for current and future generations. It will also serve as a model for other cities in King County and beyond that are seeking pragmatic solutions for upgrading their vulnerable buildings before it is too late.