Category Archives: Codes & Regulations
Posted in Building Systems | Codes & Regulations | Energy Conservation by Steven M. Beattie, RLA (Senior Project Manager) on February 8, 2012
Don’t buy your 2012 International Code Council (ICC) books just yet. It seems that the Pennsylvania Uniform Construction Code Review and Advisory Council recommended that the state not adopt the 2012 I-Codes according to Engineering News-Record’s (ENR) January 30, 2012 edition. You may remember all the uproar concerning the automatic passage of the 2009 code with its residential sprinkler mandate caused some big changes in Pennsylvania. House Bill 377 of 2011 was passed, which requires a 2/3’s vote from the Review and Advisory Council in order to update the statewide building code during each code cycle.
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Posted in Blogging | Codes & Regulations | Current Events | Information Technology | Politics | Social Media by Brad Breneisen (Graphic Design) on January 20, 2012
As many of you may have noticed, January 18th was Internet Blackout Day in an unbelievably successful attempt for many of the web’s heaviest hitters to show their strong disapproval of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA). As companies like Google, Wikipedia, and WordPress “blacked out” their content and urged users to endorse their opposition to the bill, SOPA and PIPA’s sponsors started to run for the hills, but the lawmakers haven’t backed down – even as the amount of endorsements against the bills allegedly shut down congress’ switchboards and melted their servers.
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Posted in Codes & Regulations | Municipal Services by Steven M. Beattie, RLA (Senior Project Manager) on January 9, 2012
With the New Year usually come new laws. Finally, a highly anticipated regulatory revision takes place in 2012, which will likely lower the cost of doing business for many local governments, municipal authorities and school districts. It’s an adjustment of limits for advertisement requirements for bids in Pennsylvania.
Act 84 of 2011, effective January 1, will increase the minimum dollar amount to advertise and seek bids for purchases and contracts from the current threshold of $10,000 to $18,500. In addition to increasing the current bid threshold, Act 84 will makes changes to the minimum amount necessary to seek telephone quotes for purchases and contracts to between $10,000 and $18,500. Any purchase a local government, municipal authority or school district makes that costs less than $10,000 will not be subject to the state’s bidding and advertising requirements. Smartly these minimum bid amounts will be adjusted annually based on changes in the Consumer Price Index. The PA Department of Labor and Industry will issue an annual change to the minimum bid amounts by January 1 of each year.
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Posted in Blogging | Codes & Regulations | Communication | Communities | Leadership | Municipal Services | Social Media by Jim Fisher (Site Engineering) on June 1, 2011
In my previous blog post, I touched on the importance and timing of public participation. Another critical element is the method. Public meetings offer face-to-face interactions, as well as an environment that allows for instantaneous “logrolling” as ideas and explanations are bantered back and forth. More and more, media such as Facebook and Twitter are being utilized by municipalities as ways to increase public participation in the policy-making process. While this certainly offers additional means for citizens to make their feelings known, especially when their schedules don’t allow for attendance at public meetings, caution must be exercised.
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Posted in Codes & Regulations | Communication | Communities | Municipal Services | Site Design & Land Development by Jim Fisher (Site Engineering) on May 25, 2011
Whether it is a comprehensive revision of a zoning map, or an update to a driveway ordinance, public participation is essential to the creation and implementation of any public policy, especially a planning-related initiative. Many times it is public participation that actually begins the planning process. Residents bring to the attention of municipal officials various issues they are seeing with new development: plastic grocery bags blowing onto adjacent properties, glare from parking lot lighting, trucks needing to cross into opposite lanes to enter or exit a warehouse facility, and so on. While such public participation can be somewhat confrontational at first (i.e. registering complaints is a confrontational act, regardless of how “nicely” it is done), the end result can be a very positive experience for everyone involved – if the municipal officials are respectful, responsive, and adequately address the concerns.
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