Sprinkler rule tied to housing permits

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BY JENNIFER ROBISON
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL

Posted: Feb. 23, 2012 | 2:02 a.m.

Southern Nevada's biggest city has a new fire-sprinkler rule, but the regulation won't affect local homeowners anytime soon.

The city of Las Vegas on Feb. 16 adopted an international building code that calls for fire sprinklers in every new home.

But because of concerns about imposing thousands of dollars in new costs per home in a flamed-out housing market, the rule won't take effect until Southern Nevada's municipalities issue 10,000 new-home permits in one year. That could take a while: Local builders pulled just 4,000 permits in 2011, and with several years' worth of vacant homes languishing on the market, it could be years before demand for new homes picks up substantially. Irene Porter, executive director of the Southern Nevada Home Builders Association, said she expects builders to pull about 4,000 permits in 2012 as well.

If the market still hasn't bounced back to 10,000 annual permits by 2015, city officials will reopen talks on whether to require the sprinklers.

Councilman Steve Ross, who sponsored the city measure, called it a "good compromise" in a tough building climate.

"Fire sprinklers are an additional cost to homebuilders, and we are not in an economy right now to implement that kind of additional cost on homebuilders," Ross said. "We want them to build homes right now."

Las Vegas' new rule resembles one already in place in Clark County. Randy Tarr, Clark County's assistant manager, said the regulation calls for a balancing act.

"Fire chiefs and building officials value the safety component that sprinklers can bring," Tarr said. "But with such bad economic times that we're in and with what contractors and home-builders are going through, it was not a good time to add this additional layer of cost into their environment. The message (the Clark County Commission) is sending is that we still see sprinklers as a safer means of construction, and we'll come back to it at a later time."

A study commissioned by the Southern Nevada Home Builders Association helped encourage local officials to think twice about mandating sprinklers now.

The study, conducted by local research and consulting firm Applied Analysis, found that fire-sprinkler systems cost $2,500 to $4,000 per home. And every $1,000 increase in a home's cost prices 1,600 families out of buying, according to statistics from the National Association of Home Builders.

Plus, sprinkler systems need routine maintenance, and there's no way to force homeowners to keep systems maintained, Porter said.

Houses are also made with safer materials today, with stronger, treated woods, improved electrical systems, smoke detectors and bans on combustible materials such as shake-shingle roofs, Porter added.

Finally, homeowners' insurance rates don't drop substantially with sprinkler systems, because insurers expect water damage bills to offset lower fire-related costs.

"You have to look longterm at what homebuyers really want," Porter said. "Do they want to pay that increased cost? We're finding that they don't."

Delaying the rule took the builders' association more than a year for "really intensive technical review" with local fire officials, Porter said. The city of North Las Vegas didn't adopt the code at all. Only the city of Henderson adopted it without conditions.

Porter said Henderson officials adopted the code several months ago, before the Applied Analysis study was done. Builders plan to revisit the issue with Henderson, she said.

As with local jurisdictions, states and municipalities nationwide are adopting the sprinkler code haphazardly.

Only California and Maryland have adopted the rule without limits or conditions. South Carolina has adopted the regulation to take effect in 2014. Missouri placed a moratorium on the rule until 2019. North Carolina requires sprinklers only in attached townhomes. Connecticut, Maine, New Hampshire, Virginia and West Virginia all voted against the requirement, while Illinois and New York use an older, sprinkler-free code. States including Alaska, Alabama, Arizona, Idaho, Kansas, Pennsylvania and Texas passed laws banning local jurisdictions from adopting the sprinkler requirement.

Contact reporter Jennifer Robison at jrobison@review journal.com or 702-380-4512.