Molalla's Seismic Design Category, explained

Under the seismic model IBC and ASCE 7 use for new construction, Molalla is Category D. High seismic hazard - this is the category most of coastal California, the Pacific Northwest, and other active fault regions fall into. Code mandates significant seismic detailing and restricts irregular structural configurations. This is the category the Brace + Bolt scope (cripple-wall bracing, foundation bolting) is built for. Nationally, Molalla ranks above 86% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 86th percentile.

Where Molalla sits in Oregon

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.329g, short-period spectral response 0.726g, 1-second spectral response 0.343g. Among 80 Oregon cities in this dataset, Molalla ranks 55 for seismic hazard, the 32th percentile within the state. About 10,134 people live in Molalla, Oregon.

What a retrofit costs in Molalla

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for Oregon. 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 Molalla address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced Molalla'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.