ImageCat awarded the Phase II Study of the California Governor's Office of Emergency Services' (OES) Data Standardization Project

Long Beach, CA- February 2005. The Phase Two of the Data Standardization Project will test the implementation of procedures suggested in the Phase One Guideline, "Data Standardization Guidelines for Loss Estimation - Populating Inventory Databases for HAZUS®99" and begin the process of consistent and comprehensive database development for loss estimation within California. The result of the test cases will provide a "feedback loop" on the ease of implementation of the suggested procedures, as well as identify any additional procedures required, resulting in an updated Guidelines document, including extension to HAZUS®MH. In addition, the development of the "Building Stock Translation Utility" will greatly reduce the amount of effort required by the user to update or replace "mapping scheme" data within HAZUS®99 and HAZUS®MH, and will be utilized and tested as part of the pilot study conduct. Finally, the "calibration" of HAZUS® using the San Simeon earthquake as a test case will allow the assessment of the contribution of each suggested enhancement to improvements in loss estimates, and suggest the best approach for running HAZUS® in real-time in similar areas of California where enhanced database development may or may not have occurred.