Political Quotes

“I rise in support of S. 1789. This bill is vitally important to California. Passage would permit the expenditure of Federal-aid highway funds for the seismic retrofitting of bridges. Under current law, States cannot use Federal funds for seismic retrofitting--only for structurally deficient or functionally obsolete bridges. The recent Northridge earthquake demonstrated that bridges that have not been retrofitted will, in fact, collapse. As an engineer, I can tell you that unretrofitted bridges are structurally deficient. Of the 10 bridges that collapsed, 9 had already been determined to be in need of seismic retrofitting. The California Department of Transportation [CALTRANS] has developed a good seismic retrofit program that has investigated and prioritized over 24,000 bridges. But because of budgetary problems, California has been forced to spread the seismic retrofit program over a period of 3 years. While CALTRANS estimates that the program will cost over $1.5 billion, it is far less than we are going to spend to restore the damaged highways. Governor Wilson has estimated the damage at $15 to $30 billion. The damage to the transportation system was in excess of $2 billion. But I am here to tell you that this disaster could have been much worse; 106 other bridges in the Los Angeles area are also in need of seismic retrofitting.”