Assemblywoman BettyLou DeCroce (R-Morris), drawing on her experience as a Deputy Commissioner at the State Department of Community Affairs, which oversees code enforcement and fire safety, addressed the International Code Council (ICC) at their 10th Annual Conference in Atlantic City.
The ICC is an international membership association dedicated to building safety and fire prevention. The group develops codes used to construct residential and commercial buildings.
Stressing the need for policymakers at the local, county, state and national levels to cooperate and share information on code development and enforcement, DeCroce said, “I believe there is an urgent need for municipalities, state and national agencies to have an open a dialogue that leads to informed decision-making.
She said that a lot of the work that the ICC will do at its conference over the next 10 days can be a catalyst to that dialogue.
"The springboard for that open and cooperative dialogue should begin with the ICC,” said DeCroce. “There is a need to have a dialogue about what regulations work and which ones don’t. In an era of limited government resources, governments need to streamline regulation and employ those that have the greatest safety impact on people’s lives.”
DeCroce also mentioned the key role code development and enforcement plays in the rebuilding efforts from Superstorm Sandy. “We need drive only a short distance from here to see the devastation brought by Sandy and the many examples of how code requirements, properly enforced, made a difference”, said DeCroce.
“Buildings constructed in accordance with modern codes fared much better than older, non-compliant structures.”
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