Rancho Santa Margarita Municipal Code Ch. 10.01 Authority, Purpose and Findings

Footnotes:

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Editor's note— Ord. No. 16-06, § 2, adopted Oct. 26, 2016, repealed the former Ch. 10.01, § 10.01.010, and enacted a new Ch. 10.01 as set out herein. The former Ch. 10.01 pertained to similar subject matter and derived from Ord. No. 10-08, § 2, adopted Dec. 8, 2010; and Ord. No. 13-03, § 2, adopted Dec. 11, 2013.

(a) Authority. Health and Safety Code Section 17958 et seq., authorizes the City to adopt ordinances and regulations imposing the same requirements as are contained in the California Building Standards (California Code of Regulations, Title 24) adopted by the State pursuant to Health and Safety Code Section 17922. Health and Safety Code Sections 17958.5 and 18941.5 permit the City to make changes or modifications to the California Building Standards as are reasonably necessary because such changes or modifications are needed due to climatic, geological, or topographical conditions.

(b) Purpose. The Fire Official and City Building Official recommend that certain changes and modifications to the 2025 California Building Standards are reasonably necessary due to local conditions within the City, certain changes and modifications are of an administrative or procedural nature or concern themselves with subjects not covered by the California Building Standards, and certain changes and modifications are reasonably necessary to safeguard life and property within the City of Rancho Santa Margarita.

(c) Findings of local conditions.

1. Climatic conditions:

A. Orange County is located in a semi-arid Mediterranean-type climate. It annually experiences extended periods of high temperatures with little or no precipitation. Hot, dry (Santa Ana) winds, which may reach speeds of 70 M.P.H. or greater, are also common to the area. These climatic conditions cause extreme drying of vegetation and common building materials. Frequent periods of drought and low humidity add to the fire danger. This predisposes the area to large destructive fires (conflagration). In addition to directly damaging or destroying buildings, these fires are also prone to disrupt utility services throughout the County. Obstacles generated by a strong wind, such as fallen trees, street lights and utility poles will greatly impact the response time to reach an incident scene.

B. The climate alternates between extended periods of drought and brief flooding conditions. Flood conditions may affect the Orange County Fire Authority's ability to respond to a fire or emergency condition. Floods also disrupt utility services to buildings and facilities within the County.

C. Water demand in this densely populated area far exceeds the quantity supplied by natural precipitation; and although the population continues to grow, the already-taxed water supply does not. Due to storage capacities and consumption, and a limited amount of rainfall future water allocation is not fully dependable. This necessitates the need for additional and on-site fire protection features.

D. These dry climatic conditions and winds contribute to the rapid spread of even small fires originating in high-density housing or vegetation. These fires spread very quickly and create a need for increased levels of fire protection. The added protection of fire sprinkler systems and other fire protection features will supplement normal fire department response by providing immediate protection for the building occupants and by containing and controlling the fire spread to the area of origin. Fire sprinkler systems will also reduce the use of water for firefighting by as much as 50 to 75 percent.

2. Topographical conditions:

A. Natural; slopes of 15 percent or greater generally occur throughout the foothills of Orange County. The elevation change caused by the hills creates the geological foundation on which communities with Orange County is built and will continue to build. With much of the populated flatlands already built upon, future growth will occur on steeper slopes and with greater constraints in terrain.

B. Traffic and circulation congestion is an artificially created, obstructive topographical condition, which is common throughout Orange County.

C. These topographical conditions combine to create a situation that places fire department response time to fire occurrences at risk and makes it necessary to provide automatic on-site fire-extinguishing systems and other protection measures to protect occupants and property.

3. Geological conditions:

The Orange County region is a densely populated area that has buildings constructed over and near a vast and complex network of faults that are believed to be capable of producing future earthquakes similar or greater in size than the 1994 Northridge and the 1971 Sylmar earthquakes. Earthquake faults run along the northeast and southwest boundaries of Orange County. The Newport-Inglewood Fault, located within Orange County was the source of the destructive 1933 Long Beach earthquake (6.3 magnitude) which took 120 lives and damaged buildings in an area from Laguna Beach to Marina Del Rey to Whittier. In December 1989, another earthquake occurred in the jurisdiction of Irvine at an unknown fault line. Regional planning for reoccurrence of earthquakes is recommended by the State of California Department of Conservation.

A. Previous earthquakes have been accompanied by disruption of traffic flow and fires. A severe seismic event has the potential to negatively impact any rescue or fire suppression activities because it is likely to create obstacles similar to those indicated under the high wind section above. The October 17, 1989, Santa Cruz earthquake resulted in one major fire in the Marina District (San Francisco). When combined with the 34 other fires locally and over 500 responses, the department was taxed to its fullest capabilities. The Marina fire was difficult to contain because mains supplying water to the district burst during the earthquake. This situation creates the need for both additional fire protection and automatic on-site fire protection for building occupants. State Department of Conservation noted in their 1988 report (Planning Scenario on a Major Earthquake on the Newport-Inglewood Fault Zone, page 59), "unfortunately, barely meeting the minimum earthquake standards of building codes places a building on the verge of being legally unsafe."

B. Road circulation features located throughout the County also make amendments reasonably necessary. Located through the County are major roadways, highways and flood control channels that create barriers and slow response times. Hills, slopes, street and storm drain design, accompanied by occasional heavy rainfall, causes roadway flooding and landslides and at times may make an emergency access route impassable. There are areas in Orange County that naturally have extended emergency response times that exceed the five-minute goal.

C. Soils throughout the County possess corrosive properties that reduce the expected usable life of water services when metallic pipes are in contact with soils.

Due to the topographical conditions of sprawling development separated by waterways and narrow and congested streets and the expected infrastructure damage inherent in seismic zones described above, it is prudent to rely on automatic fire sprinkler systems to mitigate extended fire department response time and keep fires manageable with reduced fire flow (water) resources available for a given structure. Additional fire protection is also justified to match the current resources of firefighting equipment and personnel within the Orange County Fire Authority.

Additional amendments have been made to the California Building Standards Code and other supplementary codes. Such amendments are hereby found to be either administrative or procedural in nature or concern themselves with subjects not covered in such codes. The changes made include provisions making each of said codes compatible with other codes enforced by the City.

The amendments to the 2025 California Building Standards Code (California Code of Regulations, Title 24) set forth herein, and indexed in the following table, are reasonably necessary because of the local climatic, geological and topographical conditions presented.

(Ord. No. 16-06, § 2, 10-26-2016; Ord. No. 19-06, § 1, 11-13-2019; Ord. No. 22-01, § 1, 11-9-2022; Ord. No. 25-05, § 1, 10-8-2025)