THE TIMES POLL : Psychological Trauma Still Lingers for Many : Quake: One-quarter of residents in San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys cite memories as biggest problem.

Last week’s terrifying burst of pent-up geological energy fractured thousands of walls and foundations but also struck deep into residents’ psyches, with half of those closest to the epicenter now saying it marked one of the worst experiences of their lives and nearly one in three saying the psychological aftershocks continue to be severe, a Times Poll has found.

In fact, more than one in four residents of the hard-hit Santa Clarita and San Fernando valleys say the lingering psychological trauma of those horrible seconds is the biggest problem they face from the quake in the difficult days ahead, the poll found.

The 6.6 magnitude quake, the largest ever recorded in the Los Angeles basin, also delivered a devastating financial punch, with 42% of those living within five miles of the epicenter reporting cracked walls, shattered windows or worse damage to their homes. Hinting at the billions of dollars in private losses in addition to the cost of repairing freeways and public buildings, 88% of the 775,000 adults in the area say they lost at least some possessions and nearly one in four calculated the damage to their houses at more than $5,000.

Overall, white middle-class residents who make up the majority in the area of the epicenter reported slightly more overall damage. But the poll also found that Latinos and poorer residents were most likely to report the heaviest damage. Countywide, 4% of Latinos and 6% of very low income groups said their homes were unlivable because of the quake. Among the respondents, virtually no whites, blacks or adults from households making over $20,000 a year said their homes were uninhabitable.

The poll, conducted this past Saturday and Sunday, interviewed adults in Los Angeles County and included 582 residents of the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys.

The margin of sampling error for both groups is plus or minus four percentage points.

The poll did not reach those living in emergency shelters and outdoors, estimated to be in excess of 13,000 people.

But they are a small share of the county population and do not significantly affect the overall findings, said John Brennan, director of The Times Poll.

For some, loss of a job rather than damage to a home or property losses is the biggest worry and comes on top of the region’s pre-quake economic problems.

Two out of five said they expect to be worse off financially after the quake than they were before.

“We’ve been hit with a double-whammy,” said Erika Schwartz, 49, a Canyon Country bookkeeper who lost her part-time job in Canoga Park because the building was badly damaged.

Two years ago the recession took away a $60,000-a-year advertising job.

“It’s scary,” she said in a post-poll interview. “We have no cushion. We’ve been living paycheck to paycheck.”

The hardships of the quake are many and widespread, with those closest to the epicenter twice as likely as those in the rest of the county to see problems ahead.

Forty-six percent of the residents of the Santa Clarita and San Fernando valleys face at least a “good amount” of hardship of all kinds, compared to only 23% in the rest of the county.

Among them is Linda Siegel, 32, a medical clerk who can no longer work during the week because traffic tie-ups would make it impossible to get home to Canyon Country from Tarzana in time to pick up her 6-year-old daughter from the baby-sitter.

Instead, she will work on weekends and have no days off with her husband, who works in Woodland Hills and faces a two-hour commute himself.

“We’re not going to see each other,” she said of her husband, Mark, a graphic artist. “He’s thinking of staying in the (San Fernando) Valley all week and just coming home on the weekends, when I will be going to work.”

Despite such problems, the poll found that three out of four residents of the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys remain steadfast in their attachment to Los Angeles and are not ready to give up on the region.

And twice as many respondents, 29% compared with 15%, think that living in New York City is more dangerous than living in disaster-prone Los Angeles. Just 3% of respondents--and 4% in the most heavily damaged areas--said they will definitely move because of the quake.

Southern California is “a wonderful place to live,” said poll respondent Sue Danielson, a real estate agent who lives with her family in the Santa Clarita Valley hamlet of Val Verde.

“The climate is great, the economy is getting better. Everywhere you go in the world there are natural disasters. It doesn’t matter where you go, you’re always going to have to come up against something. Why leave just because the earth moved?”

The Danielsons were among the 43% of residents who said they were well-prepared for the earthquake.

They had attached bookcases to the walls and stored water, food, flashlights and a first-aid kid.

In addition, the family had practiced what to do when the quake hit, assigning each of the four children, ranging in age from 7 to 16, a specific duty.

“We live out here in the boonies . . . and when you live in earthquake country, you need to be prepared for earthquakes,” she said, matter-of-factly.

“When you live in an area that has tornadoes, you have to be prepared. When you live in a fire area, you have to be prepared for fire.”

In contrast, Cheryl MacDonald, a 50-year-old nurse who lives in Toluca Lake, has decided to leave as soon as possible.

Although her property losses were negligible, the emotional damage was not.

“It was probably, all things considered, the worst” experience of her life, she said, “because I have no control over it, and I’m an in-control person. I’m very depressed. I’m upset. I want to move.”

“I really enjoy living here . . . but I don’t want to go through The Big One,” she said. “No way.”

Not only do the vast majority of residents not plan to leave, they don’t plan to get out of their cars to help solve post-quake traffic headaches.

Even though one in two commuters who live in the Santa Clarita and San Fernando valleys say their travel time will be lengthened by quake damage, 86% of those who drive to work alone say they don’t plan to switch to mass transit or organize car pools.

Residents of the rest of the county remain just as attached to their autos, with 83% saying they will continue driving alone, even though one in five consider traffic problems their most severe difficulty as a result of the quake.

The finding is worrisome because plans for trying to ease quake-related traffic congestion depend heavily on persuading those who drive alone to switch to car pools, buses and trains.

The widespread property damage and hardship related to the quake has undermined residents’ confidence, but they are strongly supportive of the elected officials’ response to the quake, with President Clinton getting a 77% approval rating and Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan 73%.

Gov. Pete Wilson’s approval rating was 59% in the two valleys.

Nearly three in five valley residents and one in two residents in the rest of the county fear that their houses would be unsafe in the event of “The Big One,” defined as an earthquake in excess of eight on the Richter scale.

And with scenes of collapsed and cracked overpasses fresh in their minds, 86% of the residents of the two valleys think freeways would be unsafe in a quake of that magnitude.

In the rest of the county, 79% said they thought freeways would be unsafe.

Moreover, many believe that the destruction wrought by such a powerful earthquake is virtually inevitable.

Half of the residents of the valleys and 58% of other county areas doubt that Los Angeles can take steps to minimize the damage from a quake that strong.

With the Northridge quake still fresh in their minds, nearly eight in 10 in the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys and more than half of those in other areas of the county say they’ve felt nervous, had sleepless nights or that they’ve worried frequently about the earth’s next devastating shudder since last week.

Some of those affected by such feelings are earthquake veterans, such as 36-year-old child psychologist Merilla Scott.

Her family’s home was destroyed in the 1971 Sylmar quake and they moved from one home to another for months, but she feels more fearful now.

Scott, who lost numerous fragile personal possessions when the quake shook her Northridge home, said that she finds herself wondering where her children will be if another one hits and that the hundreds of aftershocks continue to cause the thin veneer of normalcy she has tried to paint over her fears to crack.

“I’ll be feeling things are going to get back to normal and then we have five in a row, like we did on Friday,” she said.

Scott said she looks forward to the days when pictures are back on the walls, the garden wall is rebuilt and other damage repaired.

And she also has taken some steps to prepare for the next one, but has a long list of other precautions she wants to take.

“It definitely is foremost on my mind and it will be for a while,” said Scott, who works in a Culver City mental-health clinic.

“I have a long list of things I want to do to be prepared as time goes on . . . and I feel unsettled because I haven’t completed that list yet.”

The poll found that before Jan. 17, half of the residents of the Santa Clarita and San Fernando valleys had taken none of six recommended steps for protecting them from earthquake damage, such as securing loose objects or strapping down the water heater; only 13% of those in the two valleys had taken at least three of those steps.

Now, however, 60% of the residents of the two valleys say they have taken at least one additional precaution to protect their homes and 69% have obtained at least one additional emergency supply item.

Sylmar resident Benjamin Guzman, 22, is frantically trying to get ready.

He has strapped his water heater to the wall, bought a new flashlight, put a wrench next to the gas line and stored 10 gallons of water and a stash of canned food.

The dressers, which fell onto the Guzmans’ bed moments after they leaped up, are now attached to the walls.

Still, he said, he expects the trauma of running out of his still shaking house to see mobile homes exploding all around him to stay with him for the next six to eight months.

“Sometimes at night I kind of wake up wondering if and when another one is going to strike,” said Guzman, a commercial loan service officer and a full-time college student. “The quake kept going and going and going and to me, every time there is an aftershock, I wonder if it’s going to keep going.”

Valley’s Reaction to the Quake

Residents of the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys reacted to the quake differently from those in the rest of Los Angeles County, according to a Jan. 22-23 poll of 1,116 Los Angeles County adults.

Bad Experience

Q. Would say (the Northridge earthquake) was one of the worst experiences of your life, or would you say it was a very bad experience, or not all that bad, or would you say the earthquake was hardly a bad experience at all?

Santa Clarita/ Rest of San Fernando Valleys Los Angeles County One of the worst 52% 21% Very bad 33% 40% Not bad 7% 24% Hardly a bad experience 2% 8% Didn’t feel quake 5% 6% Not sure how bad 1% 1%

Hardship

Q. How much hardship will you and your immediate family suffer in the weeks and months to come because of aftereffects of the recent earthquakes: will you suffer a great deal of hardship, a good amount, not much or no hardship at all?

Santa Clarita/ Rest of San Fernando Valleys Los Angeles County Good amount or great deal 46% 23% Not much 52% 74% Don’t know 2% 3%

Pressing Problems

Q. What is the most pressing problem you have now as a result of last Monday’s earthquake? Is there another problem or difficulty that is almost as pressing?

Santa Clarita/ Rest of San Fernando Valleys Los Angeles County Psychological aftereffects 27% 16% No utilities 11% 3% Traffic 9% 21% House damage 5% 1%

Home Damage

Q. Was your residence or anything in it damaged or destroyed...? If so, would you say the damage was only minor, such as broken dishes or pictures that fell off the wall...or major, such as did windows shatter or did cracks appear in the walls or did they cave in or did you home become unlivable?

Santa Clarita/ Rest of San Fernando Valleys Los Angeles County None 11% 53% Minor 59% 39% Major 29% 6% Unlivable 1% 2%

*

* Fully 42% of the people who lived 5 miles or less from the epicenter had major damage, compared with 24% of those 6-10 miles away and 18% of those in the 11-20 mile zone.

* Nearly 3 in 10 (28%) say they had earthquake insurance prior to the Northridge earthquake, up from 14% in the Valley before the 1987 Whittier quake. Only 12% intend to get earthquake insurance now, 42% still have no intention of getting insurance.

Aftereffects

Q. Would you say you have had psychological aftereffects, such as sleepless nights, or do you frequently worry about another earthquake, or are your nerves on edge or do you worry about the safety of your family?

Santa Clarita/ Rest of San Fernando Valleys Los Angeles County Severe effects 28% 13% Not so severe 42% 33% Not sure how severe 8% 5% No psychological after effects 21% 47% Don’t know 1% 2%

Price Gouging

Q. Have you experienced what you consider to be price gouging?

Santa Clarita/ Rest of San Fernando Valleys Los Angeles County Yes 21% 9%

Source: Los Angeles Times Poll

How the Poll Was Conducted

The Times Poll interviewed 1,116 adult residents of Los Angeles County by telephone Jan. 22 and 23. Telephone numbers were chosen from a list of all exchanges in the county. Random-digit dialing techniques were used so that both listed and unlisted numbers could be contacted. Interviewing was conducted in English and Spanish. Results were weighted slightly to conform with census figures for sex, race, age, education and employment. An oversample of 582 San Fernando Valley and Santa Clarita Valley residents is included and weighted to its proper proportion in the countywide sample. The margin of sampling error in the total and valley samples is plus or minus 4 percentage points. For other sub-groups the error margin may be somewhat higher. Poll results can also be affected by other factors such as question wording and the order in which questions are presented.