Malone's Seismic Design Category, explained

USGS's ASCE 7-16 seismic design model - the same standard building codes use - places Malone in Seismic Design Category C: Moderate seismic hazard. Code adds irregular-building restrictions and requires bracing of some nonstructural components (e.g. tall shelving, water heaters) in addition to structural detailing. Rank it against the rest of the country and Malone sits at the 79th percentile for seismic hazard among 4,875 US cities.

How Malone compares

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.339g, short-period spectral response 0.516g, 1-second spectral response 0.108g. Among 170 New York cities in this dataset, Malone ranks 1 for seismic hazard, the 100th percentile within the state. About 5,373 people live in Malone, New York.

Retrofit economics for Malone

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for New York. A typical retrofit still runs $5,000-$10,000 nationally, about $7,000 for a common single-family job.

Insuring against this, not just retrofitting

Outside California, earthquake coverage is typically sold as an endorsement added to a standard homeowners policy, not a separate product - worth asking about directly when getting a home-insurance quote for a Malone address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced Malone's numbers. The guide to what a Seismic Design Category actually means covers why a category is never a substitute for an engineer's assessment of one specific house.