The 70E general committee responses to all 400+ PI's are posted. Many refer to a particular FR such as FR-30. Where are these? Or do we wait for the first draft in March?

In the past, the first step to make change in an NFPA document was to submit a proposal. Now, this is called a public input (PI).

In the past, a committee would take actions on a proposal by accepting it, rejecting it, accepting it in principal, accepting it in part, or accepting it in principal and in part. Now, the action on a PI is resolve or make a first revision (FR). To resolve a PI is like rejecting a proposal. If the committee wants to make a change to the section mentioned in the PI, it is called a first revision. The committee has the option to use the PI as submitted or not. Some PIs will show up in the first draft exactly as submitted. The committee can also re-write any and all of the section.

With the 70E committee, we start by breaking into sub-committees to look at the PI’s. Each sub-committee makes a recommendation to the 70E committee. When the 70E committee meets as a group, they may or may not agree with the recommendation of the sub-committee. Votes are taken for each resolve or FR during the committee meeting but it is not official until the committee member returns the official ballot.

I don’t remember when the first revision will be accessible for everyone to view but March of 2016 sounds about right. When the first revision is posted, everyone will have a chance to make comments; the window to make comments is not long. I would highly encourage everyone to read the first revision and make comments on the FRs you do not agree with. It is interesting that out of the 400 plus public inputs, most were submitted by committee members or co-workers of committee members.

Charles R. Miller