Date: November 1991

Author(s): J. H. Willenbrock

The pressure to incorporate technological changes into the residential home building process has intensified over the last 5 to 10 years. New products have appeared in the market place and new building systems have been proposed. Barriers to adoption of those new innovations arise from many sources. One of these sources is the resistance of the building code system and the local building code officials who administer these codes. It has been stated that instead of facilitating change, the building code framework often impedes change. One of the underlying causes for this "resistance to change" is that the building code officials are not always up-to-date with regard to the technological changes which are being advanced. Perhaps a supportive reason is that some building code officials are not entirely familiar with the contents of the building code that they are administering.

The primary objective of this project, therefore, was to develop a training program which would (1) establish a minimum level of knowledge abut the contents of a representative building code and (2) sensitize the building code officials to the procedures which can be used to facilitate change, as well as, to the cost/efficiency benefits of some of the current innovative products/systems being promulgated.

PHRC Research Series Reports #17 and #18 provide the final versions of the Participant's Manual and the Instructor's Manual that were originally developed and then tested in a pilot training course which was presented to 29 Building Code Officials and Inspectors at Penn State on October 1-3, 1991. The material in the course was based upon Chapters 1-8 of the CABO One and Two Family Dwelling Code. Material related to current Technological Innovations in the residential housing industry and the future training/certification opportunities for Building Code Officials and Inspectors is also included in the course.

The lessons learned during the pilot training course resulted in revisions to the manuals and to the original course outline, the final version of which appears in PHRC Research Series Report #19. A set of color slides and the drawings for the Case Study House that is used in the course completes an educational package that can be used to present similar courses throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Additional education related to the technical issues of building affordable housing, which also meet the performance requirements of the applicable residential building code, will improve the performance of Building Code Officials/Inspectors. Fair, consistent interpretation of the building code requirements will also encourage residential builders to become more familiar with the requirements of the building code. As a result, the consumers who are purchasing the homes will receive a higher quality product for their investment.

The future direction of training, using the material that has been developed, can proceed in a number of directions. One direction is the periodic presentation of three-day concentrated courses at central locations in Pennsylvania by a team of instructors that receive funding from the Department of Community Affairs. Such a delivery system would reach the limited number of practicing Building Code Officials/Inspectors who can afford the time and cost expense that is required. This delivery system would become more attractive if the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania adopted a state-wide Residential Building Code and if the course became a partial basis for state certification.

Another delivery system, which would also reach people who are studying to enter the profession, would present the course at local community colleges over an extended period of time (2 one-hour sessions/week for the required number of weeks, etc.). Once interested course faculty are identified, a "train the trainers" program could be jointly presented by the Pennsylvania Housing Research Center, PENNBOC (the Pennsylvania Building Officials Conference) and the Department of Community Affairs to begin such a delivery system.