Cost of City Hall Move Hits $22.9 Million

You think it’s tough to fight City Hall? Try moving part of its work force.

That’s not only difficult--it’s expensive, the Los Angeles City Council learned Tuesday.

The lawmakers were informed that it will cost $22.9 million to shift 1,000 employees out of City Hall for three years so construction crews can seismically strengthen the 66-year-old landmark.

Initially, city officials believed the workers could be removed in stages, at a cost of about $6.7 million. On Tuesday, however, city budget analyst Bill Mercer said the cost would be $22.9 million because a far larger group needs to be moved at once.

The council decided to postpone a final vote on funding the move. Still, the 1,000 city employees--many of whom have spent the better part of their working lives occupying floors five through 26 at City Hall--are set to begin moving later this month to make way for a three-year, $146-million retrofit project to bring City Hall closer to the 21st Century, at least as far as building and safety codes are concerned.

A 1994 report noted that City Hall, completed in 1928, fails to meet modern construction code requirements regarding seismic and fire safety and to comply with laws designed to make buildings accessible to the disabled.

In June, 1990, after the devastating San Francisco Bay Area quake, city voters approved a $376-million bond issue to pay for strengthening 450 bridges in the city and 100 public buildings, including City Hall.

The seismic retrofitting portion of the plan calls for installing shear walls throughout the building, and, most dramatically, installing 532 steel and rubber isolators--or “shock absorbers”--under City Hall to cushion the impact of any forces unleashed by a quake.

Theoretically, the reworked City Hall should be able to remain standing after a magnitude 8.1 quake on the San Andreas fault and a 6.8 quake on the Elysian Park Fault, according to a structural engineering study.

The use of the so-called isolators at City Hall is the largest known application of this technology on a retrofitted building, city Bureau of Engineering officials said Tuesday.

Until last year, it was thought that the seismic retrofitting of City Hall could be accomplished two floors at a time, with workers on the affected floors having to move only temporarily.

But it was finally decided, after the Jan. 17 Northridge quake, that it was too dangerous for any employees to occupy City Hall’s upper floors until the retrofitting was completed. Thus it was that the relocation budget more than tripled, Mercer said.

Unaffected by the inconvenience of the move will be the City Council and the mayor, who occupy the second and third floors of City Hall. These floors are safe because they are easier to evacuate, city officials say.

The City Council’s debate Tuesday was enlivened when several members complained loudly about moving the workers to a modern office building at 221 N. Figueroa St., suggesting that a more responsible relocation place would be a struggling area in the city’s urban core. Interestingly, however, some of those who complained the loudest--including Joel Wachs and Rita Walters--had voted in favor of the move to Figueroa when the matter first came before the council five months ago.

That fact seemed to have been forgotten by the irate council members.

“The bottom line is that no one is going to invest in Broadway and Spring if we don’t invest in it ourselves,” Wachs said.

Walters, who represents the Downtown area, asked at one point if it wasn’t possible to tear up the deal with the Figueroa Street property, only to be informed that the lease had been executed and that the moving vans were poised to roll.

A check of city records showed that on Sept. 13, 1994, the council--including Walters and Wachs--voted unanimously to approve the Figueroa Street lease.

Walters also raised concerns about whether there would be enough parking for the city employees at the new building.

A final vote on funding the $22.9-million move is expected in two weeks.