State Building Code Council staff told the executive committee on Friday that the timeline to finish work on the 2024 code adoption is compressed and that meeting statutory deadlines will require focused effort from tags, volunteers and staff.

The issue matters because the council must file a CR-102 rule-making notice and supporting documents, including a small-business economic impact statement and a preliminary cost-benefit analysis, before holding public hearings and adopting final rules by the statutory December 1 deadline. Staff identified October 1 as the practical filing target that would allow hearings beginning in early November and deliberation time before the December 1 adoption deadline.

Dustin, a council staff member responsible for managing the code schedule, told the committee the IRC (International Residential Code) tag is still completing review of existing state amendments and significant changes. Staff described the history of delays: late baseline model code publication by the International Code Council, legal challenges, limited staff capacity and heavy volunteer workload. Dustin said those factors combined have pushed the council behind its usual three-year cycle and have made the current schedule a steep challenge.

Committee discussion focused on two related questions: how the IRC tag should formally submit proposals generated by tag review, and how to accumulate economic data needed for the small-business economic impact statement. Multiple members supported a transparent, centralized list or spreadsheet of tag proposals (as an alternative to a full petition form) so that tag-generated proposals would be visible to stakeholders and subject to public comment. Staff said the petition form could still be used for document control but suggested a lightweight spreadsheet or a "third report" summarizing tag-proposed amendments to accelerate review and maintain the record.

Staff recommended forming a work group on economic impact immediately to collect data, prioritize petitions and question proponents about likely costs and benefits. Dustin said surveys and targeted outreach would be part of the plan but cautioned that prior survey efforts produced limited responses; he said combining surveys with scheduled work-group discussions and direct outreach to proponents would improve input.

On timing, staff outlined the code-reviser publication calendar: filing on October 1 yields publication in the register on October 15 and allows hearings to begin in early November. A later filing (for example, an October 22 filing) would push hearings to late November and compress the council's deliberation window before the December 1 statutory adoption deadline. Committee members discussed the operational risk of repeatedly refiling CR-102 documents if substantial post-file changes are needed; staff said minor substantive changes can be justified in the CR-103 final adoption filing but repeated refilings would create long delays.

Members also discussed funding and staffing limits. Staff and attendees noted an unfunded staff position, limited staff capacity compared with other jurisdictions, and reliance on volunteers. Committee members urged documenting staffing shortfalls in the budget presentation to legislators and exploring longer-term funding requests; staff said permit-surcharge fees and architect licensure fees provide the council's primary ongoing revenue and that any change to those sources would require legislative engagement.

Action items the committee agreed to pursue include convening the economic impact work group in August, asking tag chairs to begin compiling tag-proposed amendments in a centralized format, and bringing an updated project schedule and a budget presentation to the full council in mid-August. Staff said they would aim to have draft WAC rule changes and other CR-102 materials ready for internal review before the September council meeting and target an October 1 CR-102 filing if tag review completes on the presently projected schedule.

The committee also discussed logistics for public meetings and the desirability of scheduling additional council or tag sessions in August and September to provide hearing windows and limit meeting overlap. Staff said they would try to avoid concurrent council business meetings to reduce conflicts for members who serve on multiple tags.

The transcript records multiple speakers raising the same point: the timeline is feasible but will be difficult without additional staff or streamlined procedures, and tag-generated proposals should be clearly labeled as such when submitted to maintain transparency.