Hi All,

I thought I'd bring you up-to-date on the water heater legislation going on in Sacramento. I was unable to attend the 7/7 session due to other commitments, but this is how things are shaping up.

On July 7th the bill went before the Senate Housing Committee and passed along party lines.

The next committee schedule to hear this bill is the Senate Appropriations Commmittee. It has not been calendared yet. In the interim the California Apartment Association along with the Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles have filed a formal "Oppose" to this legislation. Of course I fully expected some association of something to oppose a long time ago, so this is not unexpected.

In the interim there has been some progress though. They did make a formal determination that the original legislation which is now used to require homeowners to retrofit water heaters upon sales of their homes, or upon installation of new water heaters also applies to rental units. Therefore, what is on the table is a matter of enforcement insofar as the rental units are concerned. There is a lot of conversation, possible compromises on the table, back and forth on one issue to the next. The problem is that they do not wish to have enforcement by any means. Well, I say, "hard cheese."

Hopefully the next calendared committee meeting will fit into my schedule and I can attend and bring the human element into this situation and see if I can sway that against putting a few words in writing in a lease agreement. It is still hard to believe that folks can't afford $13 to keep someone on their premises safe.

If it goes down in defeat, a lawsuit by someone in the future will no doubt settle this matter once and for all. But it will get settled at some future point in time, sooner or later.

It would be easy to say I'd love to see a series of 5.0 quakes to give them all a wake up call, but I don't think I'd wish to see folks upset and suffering to prove a point.

Petra

• The Seismic Safety Zone