Oregon voter’s showed their concern about making children safe in their schools by approving $500 millions of bonding for seismic upgrades of schools a few years back.  The Legislature has been slow to allocate funding for the project, but some projects are being funded.  Recently, one such project was completed for the Central Elementary School in Albany, Oregon.  A masonry building almost a hundred years old, it is a well loved school with 160 students from kindergarten to fifth grade.  The $1.5 million dollar grant from Seismic Rehabilitation Grant Program (SRGP) helped tie the roof and floors to the masonry walls.  Selective walls were made into shear walls to resist the earthquake and new stairs were built to evacuate from the school.  The building is considered an historic building and the work was approved by the State Historic Preservation Office.

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