Concerns are growing over the future of the Pacific Cultural center in Santa Cruz

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY, Calif. (KION-TV) — Concerns are growing over the future of the pacific cultural center in Santa Cruz as school officials navigate the challenges of ensuring the building meets strict earthquake safety standards.

The Santa Cruz City Schools recently purchased the pacific cultural center, hoping to repurpose it for community meetings and events, but officials are facing significant hurdles.

"The building, which is around 70 years old, hasn't really undergone seismic testing in a long time to see how stable the building is," Sam Rolens Chief of Communication for Santa Cruz City Schools said. "Of course, it was vacant for something close to 4 or 5 years, so what we have had to do is get structural engineers to do comprehensive testing of the building."

Early assessment from structural engineers are not promising and even suggest the building may not meet safety standards.

If the building is deemed unsafe, the district may have to.

"What the process looks like at that point is creating plans for a new building to match the footprint and style of the existing building as as much as we are able," Rolens said. "Then there will be a process of showing those plans to the public and showing those plans to the city and moving forward together and trying to create a plan that that sort of appeals to everyone."

Many people are happy the city is trying to retrofit the pacific cultural center and open it back up for community meetings and events.

"Teachers always need a place and sometimes the school is not always appropriate," Joyce Grellmann Santa Cruz resident. "If you can do it near the school, that would be wonderful, then they can gather there and and have some good meetings."

People in the area had concerns about the fear of leveling the entire site or using it primarily for parking. Rolen emphasizes the desire to keep the center.

"We talked with a lot of community members and a lot of community organizations just letting everyone know that we want a community space here as well," Rolens said. "The easiest route to that is retrofitting the existing building."

Sam Rolen from Santa Cruz City Schools about the timeline for when the community might see this space but it remains uncertain.