Sprinkler Mandate Legislation

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MARK KIERAS

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Mar 25, 2014, 10:09:52 PM3/25/14

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Sprinkler Mandate May Not Be Dead

As you may recall, last year Illinois State Fire Marshall Larry Matkaitis attempted to institute a mandatory regulation requiring townhomes, condominium associations and co-ops install sprinkler systems on their property. This mandate would conflict with the City of Chicago's current Life Safety Ordinance, and more importantly, would add significant, cost-prohibitive and ultimately unnecessary burdens on area residents.

This initial attempt at such a mandate resulted in communities like ours generating such protests to area legislators - including flooding their offices with phone calls, letters and emails - that the State Fire Marshall was encouraged to withdraw the proposal in early August of 2013.

We believed that that was the end of the matter. However, I have recently been informed that lobbyists in Springfield are still attempting to push through a similarly onerous mandate resulting in further negative unnecessary regulations on area residents.

Unfortunately, the most disturbing aspect of both the initial plan and the current proposal was the attempt to circumvent the state's legislative process by pushing the proposed regulations through a committee called the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (JCAR). This relatively unknown committee is composed of 12 members of the Illinois General Assembly, and while it does have the power to impose laws, it typically handles very technical rule-making issues- not multi-million dollar public mandates that deserve significant levels of public participation and discussion prior to their passage into law.

That said, in an effort for greater transparency and to make sure that any attempts at a mandate receives full public debate, State Representative, Sara Feigenholtz (12th District) has introduced legislation with a stated requirement that any such proposal must first be vetted by the full legislature. It also establishes a task force to continue to look at the issue. To view the proposed legislation in its entirety, please click here.

Let's be clear: a mandate of this magnitude is bad public policy and economically detrimental for many of our buildings. State Representative Feigenholtz's bill is a helpful step to make sure our residents are treated fairly and that a solution for fire safety is achieved without instituting a mandate. Call the legislators who sit on the State Government Administration Committee and tell them to vote for amendment to HB 4609.

To help area legislators advocate on our behalf, I would urge you to please send a message to the State Government Administration Committee via email or phone call before 1 pm tomorrow to the following:

Representative Jack D. Franks

63rd District
(217) 782-1717
(815) 334-0063

ja...@jackfranks.org

Representative Emily McAsey

85th District
(217) 782-4179
(815) 372-0085

RepE...@gmail.com

Representative Robert W. Pritchard

70th District
(217) 782-0425
(815) 748-3494

b...@pritchardstaterep.com

Representative Jaime M. Andrade, Jr.

40th District
(217) 782-8117
(773) 267-2880

state...@gmail.com