I am writing to you in reference to the Subject Regulatory Matter.  As a Licensed Tradesman and Contractor, Tradesman Education Service Provider, and former Member and Chair of the Commonwealth of Virginia Board for Contractors, I support the proposed regulation changes and elimination of the requirement for Continuing Education.  My reasons are as outlined below:

1. The regulation requiring Continuing Education was originally presented to the Board when I was a member.  It was the position of the State Administration at that time that this requirement was needed because Tradesmen were not keeping current with code changes.  I did not support the regulation and only voted in favor of it when it was clear that Continuing Education would ONLY focus on Code Changes.  Since the inception of Continuing Education the Virginia Uniform Statewide Building Code has undergone two (2) changes.  The associated changes to the Plumbing, Mechanical, and Fuel Gas Codes have all been relatively minor, yet the cost to each tradesman (or company as the case may be) for the biennial training remains, whether there are no Code Changes or many Code Changes. 
2. Virginia moved from the BOCA Codes to the ICC Codes in the mid to late 1990’s as the ICC absorbed BOCA and other regional codes into a single, more national approach to code administration.  At the inception of the ICC Codes, there were many changes, however I believe that all of the codes are relatively mature at this point, and moving forward, code changes will truly be very minor and mostly administrative in nature as new products are developed and brought to market.  We cannot change the laws of physics, and the bulk of the actual content of the present codes rely on fundamental application of these laws.  Nevertheless, Tradesmen still have to sit through 3 hours of training for Plumbing, 3 hours of training for Mechanical, and/or 1 hour of training for Fuel Gas every two (2) years.  As a training provider, with mature codes such as we now have, I can truly say that it is very difficult to fill the required amount of training time with code changes, yet I am bound to this requirement by the current regulations.
3. Based on my experience as a Board Member, I am confident that the Board for Contractors has maintained records of any increase or decrease in complaints for Tradesmen – especially complaints for Code Related infractions – since the inception of Continuing Education.  My recollection based on the years that I sat on the Board subsequent to the institution of Continuing Education were that the vast majority of complaints before the Board dealt with financial, criminal, or ethical issues and complaints about Tradesmen relating to their performance relative to Code Issues were extremely rare.  Therefore I would question the actual value that Continuing Education brings to the Citizens of the Commonwealth.
4. I further recollect that one of the main goals of the Board was to seek out agreements for Reciprocity with other States and jurisdictions.  I know that the State of North Carolina (which coincidentally instituted Continuing Education for Plumbing and Mechanical before Virginia) abandoned the requirement for Continuing Education.  At present, I do not believe an agreement for Reciprocity exists between Virginia and North Carolina.  Should Virginia eliminate the necessity for biennial Continuing Education, I believe the Codes and Regulations of Virginia and North Carolina will be very similar such that an overture toward Reciprocity would be more amenable.

In closing, I feel compelled to quote from perhaps one of the most gifted individuals to hail from our beloved Commonwealth, Thomas Jefferson:  “That government is best which governs least, because its people discipline themselves.  If we are directed from Washington (heads of an organization) when to sow and when to reap, we will soon want for bread.”

I for one say it is time to stop our dependence on our government to tell us how to run our lives, our trades, and our businesses.

Trusting that my comments will be met favorably by the Board for Contractors, I wish all of you well, and remain,

Sincerely,

Robert M. Kirby, P.E.