Ken Kern and owner builder
A Veteran
by KEN KERN, TED KOGON, AND ROB THALLON
Excerpted by permission of Owner-Builder Publications from The
Owner-Builder and The Code: Politics of Building Your Home, by Ken Kern,
Ted Kogon, and Rob Thailon. Copyright1976 by Ken Kern, Ted Kogon, and
Rob Thallon.
http://www.motherearthnews.com/DIY/1976-05-01/United-Stand.aspx for
complete article
Just the thought of health and construction codes can send shivers up
the spine of the do-it-yourself builder and make the heart of the
homesteader skip a beat. And for good reason. Much time has been lost,
physical energy wasted, money spent, back-to-the-landers discouraged,
and owner-builders driven off their land and from their homes because of
these all-pervading誼ut sporadically and unevenly enforced脚egulations.
What is "The Building Code" . . . what is the "Health Code" . . . it
has been estimated that掬uring 1968逆here were 5,000 different building
codes in force in the United States. No wonder that questions about
regulations are frequently difficult to answer.
Though there have been warnings in most do-it-yourself construction
books, manuals, and magazines about building and health codes, they have
mostly been just that . . . warnings that such restrictions exist and
that they must be complied with. As the back-to-thel-and movement has
gained momentum, however, more and more self-built homes have violated
these codes which喫n far too many cases吃as resulted in the taggings,
evictions from, and demolitions of owner-constructed dwellings.
Clearly, do-it-yourself builders need [1] understandable interpretations
of their local health and building codes, [2] a method of exchanging
information about the sometimes capricious manner in which local
bureaucrats enforce or fail to enforce those regulations, and [3] some
way of organizing themselves so that they have a meaningful say in how
existing codes are enforced, dropped altogether, or modified . . . and
in how new ones are written.
A very large step toward satisfying this three-part need was recently
taken with the publication of a new book, The Owner-Builder and the
Code: Politics of Building Your Home . . . which explores the murky
waters of the health and construction codes, their origins, the growing
tendency for such regulations to be written and enforced by
big-business-oriented bureaucrats . . . and the plight of the
owner-builder who feels increasingly alienated and put upon by the whole
trend.
The volume was authored by three men who take this developing problem
quite seriously: Ken Kern (a pioneer in "alternative" architecture and
low-cost construction and author of The Owner-Built Home and The
Owner-Built Homestead), Ted Kogon (a key figure in United Stand蟻
Mendocino County, California organization of owner-builders who have
successfully defended their homes from the bureaucrats),
--
when you believe the only tool you have is a hammer.
All problems look like nails.