BAM MONTHLY COLUMN
Pam has been at the Capitol every day working on the Fire Sprinkler Bill, Residential Code and the Energy Code.
Here is one of her email updates. Sharon
Members:
The House and Senate both went into session at 3:00 pm this afternoon and immediately recessed for a few hours to prepare for the days bills. I emailed you earlier with notice that the Sander subcontractor registration bill was up on the floor. The bill sailed off the floor with a whopping vote count of 118-11. As I had indicated in an earlier email, the bill included two amendments made by Rep. Westrom. One amendment clarifies those covered by the handyman exemption do not have to register again. His second amendment extends the notification time for a contractor to come into compliance with the registration prior to DOLI issuing any fines.
After much discussion with all parties in the house and senate and authors of both the subcontractor bill and the DOLI technical bill, it was decided that the conference committee for the DOLI technical bill would be held on Monday morning at 10:00 am. The senate version of the DOLI technical bill has the FS language and we are working with all sides to make sure that language survives. We also believe the technical bill may be amended with the language from the subcontractor bill which was passed today. Even so, the subcontractor bill will remain viable for additional action if needed.
While I was concerned about the legislature running out of time to compete action on conference committee reports, it appears as if the House and Senate will go beyond the self imposed Monday adjournment date. This is good news as it gives us more time to accomplish a better deal and find our way onto a bill that will not be vetoed.
The House and Senate have adjourned until Monday. So there will be no report tomorrow. I will give you a complete update from the conference committee actions during our Monday noon conference call.
On another note, we believe Channel Five KSTP is doing a fire sprinkler story on Sunday evening. Once again our media star Todd Bjerstedt will be representing the industry in front of the camera.