Tracy Monk remembers discovering the statistic that shook her world buried in Appendix C of a 1989 assessment of British Columbia school buildings. In an earthquake, the report said, schools were at up to 100 times greater risk than standard wood-frame buildings. Monk had begun reading up on school-building safety after seeing a news story about a relatively small quake in Italy that killed 26 children. "The parents were saying, 'The school should have been the safest building in town, and instead it was the first to collapse.'" With the research skills from her training as a family doctor and the passion of a mother (her daughters are 10 and seven), Monk set out to make sure nothing like that would happen in BC. "It's a clearly understood problem, and it's eminently fixable. I don't think anyone could live with the consequences of ignoring this." Other earthquake-prone regions, such as Seattle, are miles ahead in making improvements to buildings. The key, she says, is for everyone to understand that the money should not come from already cash-strapped school boards. "We should not have to decide between educating our kids and keeping them safe." Thanks in large part to the lobbying of Families for School Seismic Safety, an organization Monk founded, BC ordered a new assessment of all schools in high-risk zones, which wraps up this fall. And in June the province said it would boost capital spending by $89 million to fix 11 schools, but not until 2006. "There have been a lot of wonderful, positive words, and the will seems to be there," Monk says, but action has been slow. "The other parents keep telling me, 'Don't drop your sword and shield yet.'" Chosen charity: GeoHazards International |
