In November it was announced that the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) had formerly requested an appeal of RB64-07/08 and RB66-07/08, which requires residential fire sprinklers to be installed in one and two family homes and town homes effective January 1, 2011. See “National Association of Home Builders Requests Appeal of IRC Residential Fire Sprinklers Requirement” for more details.
Today, December 11, 2008, the International Code Council (ICC) Appeals Board met in Chicago to determine if there was any validity to the NAHB claims that a single interest group unfairly dominated the voting at the final action hearings. At the conclusion of the hearing the ICC Appeals Board unanimously voted (3-0) to deny the NAHB claim that the fire sprinkler industry engaged in practices that violated ICC established procedure.
This unanimous decision to uphold the voting members decision to pass RB64-07/08 and RB66-07/08 reinforces that the voting governmental members of the ICC are the decision makers and will not have their votes denied by special interest groups. Much to the frustration of interested parties concerned about the NAHB influence with the ICC, the appeal hearing did not allow for phone conferencing or web conferencing of the discussions, but supporters of residential fire sprinklers can feel confident that the ICC voting process has been upheld.
The passing of the IRC residential fire sprinkler requirements reinforces the growing recognition that fire sprinklers need to play an integral role in home fire safety.
The potential impact of this code change is discussed at “Residential Fire Sprinklers Market Growth and Labor Demand Analysis“
gary turner
gary turner December 11, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Nice job ladies, gentlemen, ICC review board and all who participated to again and continually educate the public on the extremely important life safety, ecology saving and economic benefits of automatic fire sprinklers.
KUDOS!!
David DeLoach
David DeLoach December 12, 2008 at 9:21 am
Great Job to all involed! Everyone should be applauded for saving lives in America. We have an Estate Lot Subdivision in Alabaster, Alabama that we have sprinkled all the homes in. Dealing with the home owners and builders for the most part has been a good experience. Once we overcame the myths and objections to the sprinkler systems everyone was fine. Its all about educating the builders and homeowners. We have found that the custom homebuilders and pre-sale builders are more open to the idea than the spec home builders.
Ed Woods
Ed Woods December 14, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Congratulations to all concerned. Passage of the Residential Fire Sprinkler requirement WILL save lives. Period. And saving lives should be everyone’s first priority.
Home Builders Attack Residential Fire Sprinklers By Introducing State Legislation
Home Builders Attack Residential Fire Sprinklers By Introducing State Legislation January 27, 2009 at 12:45 am
[…] weeks after the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) request to appeal residential fire sprinkler requirements… in the 2009 edition of the International Residential Code (IRC) was defeated, the home builders […]