The Philadelphia Inquirer from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania • Page 8

-DISASTER IN NORTHERN CALIFORNIA 8-A Saturday. Oct. 21. 1989 The Philadebhia Inputfer Bush visits quake area, promises all. 1 I A Is I tz 4 gpag Its 1 i' Hjf r' 1 ill; I ill? If' iJ'.

I '-la s888; ItaiiiWstiiiiiil. I front of a police barricade blocking off a devastated portion of San Homeless see quake victims join the ranks i By Paul Nussbaum Inquirer Staff WnKr SAN FRANCISCO In the littered Civic Center Plaza in front of ornate City Hall, the new homeless are huddled with the old homeless Families displaced by Tuesday's earthquake many of EARTHQUAKE, from 1-A listed as missing might bo victims of the freeway collapse Police Capt James Hahn said that at least 52 cars remained in the rubble least Oil injunes were ported the California Office of Emer 1 gency Services said, and a hospital association said that 250 people re-: mained in hosptfals Estimates of the number of people displaced by the quake ranged from 6,500 to 12,500, and many of them -were forced to spend the nights at evacuation centers or camp out in and front yards In San Francisco's hard-hit Manna district, where scores of buildings destroyed or damaged, thou-" sands of residents formed a blocks-long line yesterday to be escorted for a brief visit to their homes Many were given only a few minutes to rush into precariously tilted buildings and grab the only items they would be able to save Officials have estimated that at least 60 buildings in the district must be demolished Mildred Olch, 71. had pulled out a pile of her belongings, including a favored painting a scene of bucolic green fields But the woman sat on a box. and dabbed at tears in her Zeyes 2 "You don't understand. Max." she snapped suddenly at her husband Lwhen he tried to assure her that they would get the rest "We may never be able to get back in our home Never Also yesterday, scientists roaming through mountains to the south pin- pointed the epicenter of Tuesday's fquake in the northeast corner of the JNisene Marks State Park, near the top "of Aptos Creek, said Joseph Cotton I Twith the Geological Survey in "Menlo Park That is about 57 miles from San Francisco, atop the San Andreas fault Accompanied by state officials as well as the mayors of San Francisco, Oakland and Alameda, Bush flew over some of the hardest-hit areas by helicopter and visited Santa Cruz, in addition to the collapsed freewayin Oakland San Francisco Mayor Art Agnos imtold Bush at one point, "We need fast rTaction We need checks written on Uhe spot "We will do what is necessary to fulfill our responsibility," said the President, flanked by state and fed-l eral officials "In terms of what it will cost, I don't know," he said Bush said the "most touching mo-; ment" of the tour was talking by phone with the father of a 6-year-old I boy pulled from a crushed car and to the doctors who had to amputate his leg to free him Bush said, "I had a chance to tell him that the American I people were rooting for him, to tell his dad that we all care Children's Hospital, where Julio I Bern men's father.

Pastor Berumen, waited with friends and relatives, was deluged with similar calls of support and sympathy The hospital is tallying toys and phone calls, and a fund has been set up for Julio I The story just brought us back to reality about how important life is," said Heidi Palkowttz, who brought stuffed animals for Julio and his 8-I year-old sister, Cathy, who was also pulled from the family's crushed car Their mother was killed Officials in various municipalities provided pdated damage igu res for buildings I In downtown Oakland, the quake I ruined 13 commercial buildings and 1,400 residential units, including housing for 100 elderly residents now in shelters, officials said More than 200 other buildings were damaged In all. Mayor Lionel Wilson estimated damage Oakland at $1 i billion not including the Nimitz collapse The hist one Amtrak railroad station in West Oakland suffered three big cracks and may have to be razed, officials said At Stanford University, president Donald Kennedy estimated that the school suffered at least $160 million in structural damages Damage to contents in the school buildings was also expected to be high A quarter of the 240 buildings on the Stanford campus were closed Officials said that 26 buildings, including 11 small dorm i tones that house around 420 students, were closed and access to 36 more was restricted At San Francisco State and San Jose State University campuses, the damage from the earthquake was more extensive than first reported, officials said In addition, the California State University system's $8 million manne research laboratory at Moss Landing, north of Monterey was destroyed The two campuses and the lab will require about $45 million in repairs, according to Cal State spokesman Stephen MacCarthy In San Francisco, Agnos said the city's iS9 million reserve fund had btcn depleted "On paper." he said, "the city is broke" The Bay Area's art treasures and museums suffered losses of at least S13 million, officials said, although jt will be weeks until final estimates can be made San Francisco's Asian Art Museum, which contains the Western world's largest collection of Asian art was hit hardest, with at least S10 million in damage to 31 pieces, according to city officials The de Young Momonal Museum, best known for its American art collection, is thought to have suffered $3 5 million to SS million in damages to its building and collection David Will man of the Inquirer Washington Bureau and inquirer wire servues tontnbuted to this arfi tie j-; -t jr i A reporter, working on a Firefighter Kent Burkhart, J.i,-,M them Southeast Asians from the city's Tenderloin district have camped alongside the dirty blankets and heaped shopping cans of the longtime homeless who have congregated here for years And for those who were homeless Before the Quake misery loves company "It was good to have the earthquake Now there's lots of shelters we'd been fighting for for years," said Keith Mcllenry. a bearded homeless advocate who was handing out free food on the plaza. "And this will raise some of the middle-class consciousness, especially of those who weren't homeless until today "When something affects the middle class, the city could really mobilize, but when it's just the poor, nothing gets done," said McHenry, an organizer of a group called Food, not Bombs, which has battled the city administration for the right to distribute free food to the homeless "Now maybe people will realize that being homeless is not some kind of punishment for being a bad person For Will Singleton, Richard Anders and their ragged companions on the plaza, the quake was also a splendid magnet for police, drawing officers away from the homeless encampment "It got all the police out of the area They were really busy elsewhere, so they couldn't harass us," said Singleton, 48, an unemployed truck dnver who has been without a home for seven months "The earthquake got all the police out of the area so we could have fires, put up tents The earthquake was a great thing Anders, a former mental patient, sat near a debns-strewn reflecting pool, still wearing the yellow identification bracelet from his latest hospital stay "I've been arrested 3S times, but no cops have bothered me since the earthquake," Anders said Of the estimated 6,000 to 12,500 displaced by the quake in Northern California, about 1,000 were added to the homeless rolls here Many are staying with friends or in public shelters hastily established in local schools But several groups of refugees from Southeast Asia who had settled in Tenderloin district tenements camped out on the plaza after the earthquake, afraid to return to their homes "We are afraid the buildings might fall down," said Vuth Meas, 18. a Cambodian who was eating nee with his family "We've been here two da)-s I donl know when we will go home again," said Saysong Thepkaysone.

14, a l.aotian who fled to San Francisco with his family nine years ago "Will there be more earthquakes" portable word processor, sits in after 30 hours at work, catches a wiped out much of the area In 1982, the city avoided flooding only because the runoff from record rainfall in the redwood-forested mountains above this town came at low tide Documents at City Hall show the local government formally sought relief from federal building restne-tions in floodways on the day before the earthquake Yesterday aftershocks continued throughout the day, leaving uncertainty as to whether tbey were the end of the Earth's rumblings or the precursors of an even bigger jolt And as the day moved on. punctuated by a brief visit here from President Bush the clouds grew darker and the winds colder Bush promised the government would do whatever was legally required to help the area rebuild Gov George IXuKmcjian. who had taken the 'Read my lips" oath, said be would even consider a tax increase to help Northern California rebuild City officials said that most roer Tha PhUKMpha Inqunr ERIC MENCHU Francisco's Marina district UlMt ttc- rebuild they not be identified, said they ex the bcir.dcss. the rugged-out derelicts" and the men tally ill who congregate on the Pacific Garden Mall to be organized to protest any reconstruction plan Former City Councilman Arnold Levine, a retired high school principal, said be anticipated spinted debate about whether to rebuild the city in efficient modern construct Km or to try to recreate the eclectic mix of architectural styles The Pacific Garden Mall, where most of the buildings have to be razed, includes Spanish. Gothic Moonsh and Colonial Revival archi tecture plus examples of Mtderoe and other archittvtural sty les MassLth.

the clothing dealer, said. "I know our landlords want to rebuild nght away But nght away is ODe or two ears, and weVe got a lot of immediate obligations and with our store gone, we donl bave penny coming in Towns debate whether and how to Tin PtXKWplM mqi MKMAU.S kVWU nap near the Nimitz Freeway. chants had fire and liability insurance but no earthquake insurance, and that without substantial grants and subsidized loans from the government they could not hope to rebuild Interviewed on the wooden bndge outside her home near the beach, vintage-clothing dealer Prudence Masseth kept looking at the sky "We've got all those clothes in there and if we could just get them out I could sell them nght away." she said, because her busiest time is the 10-day penod before Halloween "But they say it isn I safe In Ilollister a laming town 40 miles inland in San Benito County that was also devastated Tuesday, merchants were a little luckier than Masseth Alter nnnplaintN Irom merchants that the turning rains would wipe them out the city gave store owners five minntes in gather everything they could tmra all but the most unstable buildings REBUILDING, from 1-A build a whole new modem downtown That's going to be the question," said Harvey Nickelson. president of Coast Commercial Rank and one of the most significant players in the Santa Cruz economy Nickelson and about 100 others yesterday went to the Elks Club for a Rotary luncheon, where they discussed whether rebuilding is practical or even possible The problem is that the Pacific Garden Mall, the revived old downtown, lies in a floodway where federal regulations severely limit construction "Right now, we couldn't rebuild except on stilts, which obviously ou cant do and have a pedestnan mall one floor below." said Seal Cooneny, owner of the Bookshop Santa Cruz and vice president of the American Booksiiler's Association In 19SS. he noted the San Lorenzo River, just two blocks from downtown, overflowed its banks and In Ixw Gatos, officials followed the same policy as in Santa Cmr.

deciding that the risk of a building collapse was too great to let merchants recover their goods' "It a difficult situation because those buildings could come down at any moment. said Sue La Forge, executive manager of the Los Gatos Chamber of Commerce "On the other hand, merchants can staDd on the sidewalk and see their livelihood in there LaForge said she expected little controversy in Los Gatos. where the average borne sold last year for S.WI.SO0, about how to rebuild But in Santa Cruz, it another story "We re going to see lo it that the rebuilding serves all groups of people, especially low-income people." said Mike Rotkm. a university professor ho earlier in the decade was one of only two Socialist mayors ip Aroenca Two officials at City Hall insisting.