The state wants to build a $70 million emergency operations center on Diamond Head Road that could withstand a Category 4 hurricane or a powerful earthquake, comfortably accommodate dozens of representatives from state and federal agencies in one control center and run on a generator for at least 15 days.

"This will be a modern, 21st-century emergency center," said Ed Teixeira, vice director of state Civil Defense.

The proposed center, which the state is looking to build with help from federal funds, would replace the current cramped hub that state Civil Defense uses for coordinating its response to disasters — a World War I-era artillery battery in Diamond Head Crater that was converted into a state emergency operations center in the 1970s.

Officials say the new center will mean a better-managed — and potentially quicker — state response to major emergencies. And, they say, though the current center has all the technology and basics it needs, recent emergencies — including the October 2006 earthquakes — have proven the need for a larger, better-equipped center.

"The earthquake showed us that we are right to be asking for and planning and designing for a new EOC," said Teixeira, adding that the hallways and rooms at the center were so overflowing with emergency and state officials after the quakes that it was hard to move around. In a bigger emergency, he said, the cramped conditions could very well have slowed the state's response.

"If it was prolonged ... we would have had an acute space management problem," he said.

CITY CENTER PLANNED

Talk of a new state emergency operations center comes as the city is planning to build a new center of its own. Officials said the two centers don't overlap, because the state oversees operations in all the counties and tries to help first responders with large-scale needs, such as dispatching National Guard troops to clear debris from roads. The city emergency operations center coordinates first responders, such as firefighters and police.

The city's new center — planned for the corner of Alapa'i and King streets — is set to be inside a $73 million, 10-story building that will also house a traffic management center and offices for fire, police and emergency medical services departments, along with emergency dispatchers and transportation officials.

The project is expected to be wrapped up in 2012. Mel Kaku, director of the city Department of Emergency Management, said the project is on track and now has a manager. But he added that construction could take longer if at least part of the funding for design and the first phase of work isn't appropriated next year.

Given the city's tight fiscal picture, that's a possibility, he added.

State officials are looking for some federal funding for the Diamond Head emergency center, but will also go to legislators in the coming session to ask for money. Officials said if funding is approved in the coming year, work could start in 2010 and wrap up in two years. But the dismal economy has put a damper on hopes the state will pitch in enough money to attract federal matching funds.

Maj. Gen. Robert Lee, the state adjutant general and head of state Civil Defense, said even if the project has to be pushed back, it is still a priority for the state. Right now, he said, the state is spending much more than it should be on maintaining the aging emergency operations center, which has old infrastructure and faulty air conditioning.

It isn't feasible to expand the artillery battery because of its thick concrete walls and because it is underground.

"Do we want to keep sinking money into this bunker?" Lee asked.

The state issued a draft environmental assessment on the proposed emergency operations center this month, and officials say planning and design of the building is about 40 percent complete. The state got about $1.5 million in 2003 from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to design a new emergency operations center.

Teixeira said he and Lee are working with federal officials to look for more funding.

But he also pointed out that the federal government has not been pumping as much money into modernizing emergency operations centers as it was just five years ago, when Hawai'i and more than a dozen other states got funds to design or build new emergency centers or update existing ones. The state has also received state and federal money to modernize its center inside Diamond Head Crater.

MORE SPACE, FEATURES

Teixeira conceded the new center is expensive, but he noted its price will only go up, and the need for a new operations center won't disappear.

The biggest difference with the new center is that some 150 representatives from different agencies will be able to gather in one control center, equipped with flat-screen televisions, computers and communications systems. There will also be smaller "breakout" rooms to address specific components of a disaster. Large windows will overlook the control center, so those not immediately in the fray can remain informed.

The current center has no real control room, and its biggest gathering space — a conference room — seats 25.

"Basically, what we're going to try to build is what we don't have now," Teixeira said.

The new emergency operations hub also calls for expanded space for Civil Defense workers who monitor minute-to-minute changes in an emergency, along with a much larger call-in center for residents to get or report information.

The proposed two-story, 30,000-square-foot building — one story of which would be partially underground — would have about 5,000 square feet dedicated solely for operations during a disaster. In the current center, there is only about 1,300 square feet of space where representatives from different agencies can interact and monitor an emergency.

Some of that space is in hallways.

The building itself will cost about $60 million; equipping it, another $10 million.

It will be at 3949 Diamond Head Road — next to the state Department of Defense headquarters — with at least 377 parking spaces. The current emergency center has limited parking, forcing some to park along the one-lane road that leads to the center in Diamond Head Crater.

Teixeira said another reason to move the center is for the safety of crater visitors, especially because a plan for the crater envisions more visitors in coming years.

And he said once the new emergency operations center is finished, the current center will be used as Civil Defense offices and as a backup operations center if needed.