Old Buildings

After reading Tom Killion’s report on the earthquake’s effect on Santa Cruz (Opinion, Nov. 12), I was once again angered at the senseless loss of life we foist upon ourselves because of our misguided taste for 19th-Century architecture and cheap rent.

Every time I see an old so-called “charming Victorian” building, I think of broken bodies and crushed skulls. The sooner the amateur community preservationists get it through their heads that they are trading their nostalgia for other people’s lives, the sooner we can start having safe, modern buildings.

We in California cannot afford this foolishness. We must not continue to require owners to maintain older, unsafe buildings. Even modern methods of retrofitting can at best only be palliative. I can see the headlines after Los Angeles’ big earthquake: “Thousands Killed in Older Retrofit Buildings.” To those who take it upon themselves to force sweeping preservation, the lives lost will be on their hands.

SAM ROTER, Redondo Beach