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WABO 2018 Spring Quarterly Meeting - Leavenworth
Enzian Inn Putting Course
WABO PRESIDENT’S REPORT - by Tom Phillips, CBO, ACO
Greetings Members, We just wrapped up one of the best WABO business meetings that I’ve attended. We had more attendees than I have ever seen and we had a busy agenda to match the attendance. Our members are very engaged so there were a lot of accomplishments at the meeting as you can read about in the following committee reports. We also had a lot of first time WABO attendees that we got to know during the meeting and the social event hosted by Simpson Strong Tie and WC-3 on Wednesday as well as the Thursday evening social hosted by WABO. Plus, I was able to extend my perfect record to 0 and 5 for not winning the annual putt-putt tournament. Please mark your calendars and plan to attend WABO’s annual business meeting in Ocean Shores on July 12th and 13th. Among other things, we will hold elections for officers and committee chairs. Please consider running for a Committee Chair position. Becoming a committee chair provides an opportunity to get more involved and share your talent with the rest of the membership and is a tremendous learning opportunity as you help guide one of the most active associations in the State. Committee Chairs are also members of the Executive Board which provides the leadership for WABO. Since WABO will elect a new president in July, this will be my last newsletter as president. I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has helped me with my duties in this roll. This includes the WABO members whose attendance at meetings energized me, the Executive Board for their hard work and leadership, the Officers who were only a phone call or email away for advice, and for Jenkins Management Solutions, led by Tara Jenkins, who kept all of our programs running at full speed and provided proactive assistance and advice whenever needed. WABO displays their Building Safety Month Proclamation Committee Reports
Technical Code Development Committee - Chair Lee Kranz, CBO, ACO TCD report on the Group A Hearings in Columbus (discussed at the TCD meeting in Leavenworth):
Here is a list of possible State amendments that we will be discussing at our May 14 TCD meeting (but you can review now if you want to):
Please add to this list if you have any you’d like to see in the Washington State codes. Hope to see (or hear) you at the TCD meeting on May 14.
Education Committee -Chair Rick Prosser, CBO Education committee discussed the Educational Institute success. Annual Educational Institute was successful in attendance, classes offered and vendors present. With the construction in the area parking was a common compliant among attendees. I would like to thank Tara and staff, the excellent instructors and the Marriott for the outstanding work they did. One of the many highlights of the institute was the hands-on Plumbing class presented by Steve Hart, the class was received with great enthusiasm and as prompted more of this type of training in the near future. Another agenda item was the discussion of continued training for inspectors in Eastern Western Washington. Items in the discussion included traveling hands-on type of instruction, webinars and advanced specialty classes. Planned tours to plants and large projects was also discussed during the committee meeting, committee thought this was a good idea and to research more detail. It was brought up that there may be a possibility of other jurisdictions inviting other jurisdiction inspectors and Building Officials to view projects that are unique to the industry. This could include Hospitals, Schools, Fire Stations, and High Rise Buildings just to mention a few. One request the committee had was to help Steve with setting up a Commercial Kitchen Plumbing Inspection Class. This would include helping with funding the purchase of materials and possible set up of a trailer to haul materials to training locations. Also discussing with other professional groups and agencies that could use the training. We concluded the meeting with bringing up the 2019 Annual Education Institute for all to be thinking about classes they would like to see and any other items they would like to ask at the summer and fall meetings.
Certificate & Registration - Chair Pete Rambow The Certification & Registration (C & R) committee met on Thursday, May 3, 2018 to discuss a violation report that was received. The chair of the committee is retiring and a new chair will be elected at the next WABO meeting in July. If you are interested in the chair position, please submit the leadership application to the WABO office.
Outreach Committee - Chair Todd Blevins, CBO An Awesome WABO meeting in Leavenworth! We had 10 First Timers attend and they seemed very excited about WABO. A BIG thank you to the mentors who were “volentold” to guide the mentees. The Outreach committee met with the Education committee at Leavenworth and discussed many ideas for WABO’s outreach including some provided by Gary Schenk ( Thanks Gary!). These include :
Over all a great meeting, with a lot of great ideas. We seemed to have a very energetic group who were responsive to the WABO group. As always Thanks for participating and make a great day!
WABO mentors introduce and say a few words about their first-timers!
Government Relations - Chair John Brickey, CBO WABO Spring 2018 Legislative Committee Report Amy Brackenbury, WABO lobbyist, provided a debrief report on the legislative activity, successes and disappointments for the 2018 Washington Legislature’s 60-day session. The highlight of 2018 legislative successes was passage of E2SHB 1622 concerning the state building code council funding, administrative support and rulemaking authority. The passage of ESHB 1952 allowing cities with electrical permitting and inspection programs to engage in electrical contractor licensing and electrician certification compliance was disappointing to WABO and sets the stage for requiring cities to perform those functions in the future. The legislature also passed ESSB 6109 to add the International Wildland Urban Interface Code to the State Building Code. Implementation of the WUI Code is dependent upon statewide mapping of the WUI areas. It is currently unknown when the mapping effort will get underway and how long it might take. Looking to potential future legislation, Amy related that the known and obvious issues of importance and/or concern include:
The report concluded with comments by legislative chair Brickey encouraging cities to consider implementing electrical permit and inspection programs to complement all the other construction codes cities administer and enhance local coordinated customer service.
Accreditation - Chair Andy Higgins, MCP, CBO, ACO COAP Update - History
- Current
- Next Steps:
Charter and Strategic Planning - What does the future of this program look like?
Members in attendance shared the following suggestions:
ICC Committee Action Hearing Reports
C. Ray Allshouse, AIA, CBO,ACO - City of Shoreline First of all, thanks for your approval of my WABO scholarship request to attend a portion of Group A Committee Action Hearings this past week in Columbus. I was able to sit through the entire IBC – G Committee hearings and a modest portion of IBC - FS. This got in the way of my intent to testify in support of M48, Jim Tinner’s mechanical fastening of ducts proposal. Apparently, he got wrapped up in the CLT discussion as well, and missed it himself! He intends to pursue a Public Comment to get it on the PCH Agenda in the fall, so we can still try to help the effort at that time. I was very pleased that I could contribute to the approval of the CLT proposals. I did not anticipate the resistance on G54 (Exterior wall separation between units), but feel is worth another shot. I think we need to jump into the discussion on G93 regarding the incidental use limitation. We should also pay attention to G122 since it barely squeaked by (“such as” needs to be dropped). I will talk to Steve regarding G127 since it is an A117 related issue (Classroom acoustics). Maybe we help Jon with his further editing of FS9. Let’s hope we can come up with a fix for FS11/12 issue. Notwithstanding the opposition, I think we still need to do something on this issue. We should look at the “clean up” of FS24 We probably ought to take a position on FS46 Firestop Labeling. Since I was at the Hearings, I was able to recruit Dave Cantrell to speak in support of Gary’s restroom sightline proposal, but I did not check to see how it fared. I would have liked to spend more time at the Hearings, but had to get back to work for at least a portion of the week.
James Tumelson - City of Kirkland I had the opportunity to participate in the code development process for the first time in Columbus, Ohio from April 16th - 20th. I struggled to locate the actual room where the testimonies were taking place due to the massive expansive conference center in Columbus. When I first walked into the conference center I notice a couple hundred folks that appeared to be extremely engaged in the process. I began to witness one of the most democratic process I ever seen personally. The dais stretched from one edge of the conference room almost entirely to the other end. These fourteen folks on this panel asked either the friendly open ended questions or the pointed extremely difficult questions to answer. I then watched as the moderator effectively orchestrated the direction and content of the code proposals. I was made aware that a proposal that I was to testify on was coming up as this highlevel understanding begun to reveal itself to me. I then had to relocate to the adjacent conference room where the mechanical code panel was established and testimony was occurring. When I approached the mic, the first thing that I noticed was an image of myself that was approximately 15 feet tall. I had an internal dialog that this is being streamed onto the internet and when I opened my mouth to say my name I noticed the physical delay in speech. This delay was brief and presumably it was only noticeable to myself, I managed to complete the entire testimony. The proposals that I testified on were M127-18 and M127-18-CAIN-1. The committee approved the proposal with the friendly minor floor modification that was added by the solar industry. This directly impacts the work that I conduct on a regular basis. This proposal clarifies that rooftop-mounted solar thermal collectors and their mounting systems need to be constructed of noncombustible materials not the entire structure as the previous code language could have been interpreted. This portion of the code development cycle was a privilege to participate in and I appreciate and look forward to future opportunities.
Angela Haupt - City of Kirkland I recently attended the ICC Committee Action Hearings in Columbus, OH. I was there for 5 days of hearings. In that time I testified on behalf of the Washington State Building Officials Technical Code Committee on 3 proposals. They pertained to sound transmission between dwellings and public spaces, a definition for efficiency dwelling units and adding ch 4 references to chapter 3. Each of the three proposals were approved by the committee. There were a number of interesting and concerning proposals submitted for consideration this code cycle. Among the most exciting are the Tall Wood Building proposals that were all approved by the committee. Though the testimony on both sides of the issue took a while. It was promising to see all of the proposals move forward for consideration at the Public Comment Hearings. Among the more troubling proposals was a requirement for new special inspection of electrical. The TCD had 8 of 17 proposals approved by committee. Public comments will need to be submitted for a number of our submittals. One other activity that took place during the hearings was testing of the new voting technology. ICC has invested in Iphones to be used as voting devices at the upcoming PCH. During the CAH the people were asked to check out a device and during breaks, sample questions were asked. The group answered the questions using the device as well as on a sheet of paper. ICC was planning on comparing the 2 to verify that the devices are in fact working properly. I am looking forward to attending the Public Action Hearings in Richmond in October.
Tim Woodard- City of Blaine When I read I had to provide a synopsis of my trip as a condition of the TCD Scholarship I kind of cringed. I'm not the best literary and my wife will be the first to tell you she cannot believe I passed English in college; however, considering there is a $1,500 reward I'' do my best to make it bearable. My experience started with an adventure. I got stuck in a foreign country for almost 3 days. Granted it was Canada and everyone spoke English it was still frustrating. This all started when I chose to fly out of Vancouver, B.C. The reason for this choice was geography. I live in Blaine, WA that sits directly on the border of the US and Canada. It is approximately a 30 minute drive to the Vancouver airport where as Seattle is approximately 1 1/2 hours (+ traffic). Prior to arrival in Toronto we were redirected to Ottawa as the Toronto Airport had grounded all planes. Freezing rain was causing all sorts of problems for the city. The storms continued and I wasn't able to get on a pane out of Toronto to Columbus, OH until April 17th. I arrived midday to the hearings and was immediately greeted by Lee and some of the individuals from Seattle. Their companionship immediately made me feel fore at ease and I quickly became engrossed in the testimony and no longer thought about the troubles I had getting there. Lee made it a point to introduce me to some of the key players in the code development process. These are the guys that speak on many of the subjects and carry a certain amount of weight when they do. He also introduced me to some members of other ICC Chapters that were at the hearings. The overall group that was there from Washington made it a point to make everyone feel included by setting up group texts and trying to organize lunch and dinner together to allow everyone to unwind from long days of testimony. The process became somewhat clear after only a little bit of time watching. People testified on behalf of the change they were proposing and then other supporting testimony was heard. After that the opposing group had a time to be heard. Then supporting rebuttals, and then opposing rebuttals. The process itself seems very fair to all sides; however, the process does become hijacked during some proposals. One of the very first proposals for the Means of Egress Committee was E2-18, this proposal was for the introduction of a new standard for measuring slip resistance of "Hard Surfaces." The proponents of this change were mostly all industry representatives and had a parade of what seemed like 20 people all saying the same thing. Each person was given their allotted two minutes. It only took a few Code Officials to get up and testify to the unenforceable nature of the change to seal the fate of the proposal; however, all 20 of them rebutted for two more minutes each. Something that should have taken 10 minutes ended up dragging on fro nearly 90 minutes. My coffee was barely working through this period of time. Although this was annoying I came to understand it is necessary to allow everyone to be heard. The code proposal I testified on was E16-18. The proposal itself was approved as submitted; however, I had worked with Lee to create a floor modification that the Committee didn't approve. I feel like I ended up with the perfect experience though. I learned the process through CDP Access on how to submit a floor modification and got to testify to the modification as well as the proposal itself. I even gave rebuttal testimony. It was actually really exciting. The code change that impacted me the most was E81-18. This was a proposal to require window guards on all operable windows with a grade change of greater than six feet. The proponent of the change brought with him Commander Jason English. The Commander gave testimony on how not having guards on a second story window of his military housing complex contributed to the loss of his four year old boy. To be a father and listen to that testimony left me feeling vulnerable and brought tears to my eyes. In that moment I would have signed anything to pass legislation or code change to address every concerns raised by this group. It would obviously been an emotional decision and I'm glad there were more experienced code officials and consultants that itemized the changes we have made to the building code in regards to this issue. Then it hit me. What we do matters. Although this proposal was over-the-top the code itself has taken steps to save countless lives. It made the change through a formal, fair process in which everyone that wished to speak was heard. I'm proud of what we do and attending this event solidified purpose and meaning for my chosen profession. In conclusion, I want to thank WABO for all the work they do and I hope I can contribute in some way to processing its goals further. |
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Washington Association of Building Officials
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