Mary C. Comerio joined the faculty in the Department of Architecture at Berkeley in 1978. As an architect, she has designed numerous public and private facilities including market rate and affordable housing. Her research on the costs and benefits of seismic rehabilitation for existing buildings has been widely published.  She is the nation's leading authority on post-disaster reconstruction.  Professor Comerio's most recent book, Disaster Hits Home: New Policy for Urban Housing Reconstruction, was published by University of California Press in 1998.