Office of Facilities Planning
Newsletter #39 – May 2003

We have had a crunch of our engineering staff, now we will also have a crunch of our architectural staff. At the close of business on Friday April 18^th, Bob Lavery retired. On shorter notice though, Elizabeth Freund received orders from the U.S. Coast Guard placing her on active duty. Friday April 18^th was also her last day in the office. She will be on a reasonably extended period of military leave.

Therefore, if you have projects that were reviewed by Bob, Liz or Dean Malatino, and you owe them an addendum, address your packages to Tom Robert. He and Joe Levy will be splitting the work between them as it is received.

Roof R-Value:

Last month we printed the R-Value requirement for roofs as stated in section 802.2.4 of the Energy Conservation Construction Code of NYS. This code section requires the "minimum thermal resistance (R-Value)". The Department of State Codes Division has since published a "Technical Bulletin" allowing an area weighted average to meet the thermal resistance (R-Value) requirement.

You can view the Technical Bulletin at http://www.dos.state.ny.us/code/energycode/FAQ.htm.

It is the 12^th item at the bottom of the page.

Reminder to Architectural/Engineering firms regarding complete design packages:

Generally, plan and specifications information submitted to the Office must be as complete and detailed as necessary for contractors to bid and install the work. They must also contain all information necessary to evaluate the whole building with regard to minimum health and safety requirements. … Review and approval by the Commissioner will be based on the bid documents; i.e., those documents that form the basis of contract. (This is the second paragraph of S1008 of the Manual of Planning Standards.)

Complete documents (documents ready to be bid) are easier for our reviewers to review and the review is completed quickly. In addition, incomplete documents require larger and more detailed addenda packages, which take more of the reviewers’ time and, incidentally, the preparers’ time. In order to assist the reviewers in this office, please review design documents that have been submitted for review. If documents we presently have in the office are not complete, please make arrangements to replace the documents or portions of documents in the review queue to ensure a complete, easily reviewable package. If we start a review and it is obvious the documents or a portion of the documents are incomplete or inadequate, the Architectural/Engineering firm and the school district will be notified that the review has been stopped and the design package bypassed. We’re sorry, but this will apply to projects that have waited an extensively long period of time for a review.

Update on Mold Information:

We received some information about mold from the National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities. They are a free service of the U.S. Dept. of Education. Please save these web sites for future reference in case you require assistance or would like to read more on the subject of mold.

List of resources on mold at: http://www.edfacilities.org/rl/Mold.cfm

Indoor air quality at: http://www.edfacilities.org/rl/iaq.cfm

NCEF publication on mold at: http://www.edfacilities.org/pubs/mold.pdf

If you can't find what you're looking for between NCEF resource lists and publications, please contact them by e-mail or their toll-free number 888-552-0624.

Revised Code Compliance Checklist:

We have revised the Code Compliance Checklist. It contains new Fire, Electrical, Mechanical, Plumbing, and Gas review pages. These revisions are updated where necessary for use with the new applicable Codes of NY State. The revised form can be downloaded from our web site at:

https://www.p12.nysed.gov/facplan/forms/code_comp_chklst_anncmt.html. Please make use of this form for all your projects from this date forward. This latest revision of the form has many changes and is nine pages. Delete all of the previous copies of prior Code Compliance Checklists from your computers.

You will also find that page 3 is the Structural Responsibility Checklist and Certification, previously Form FP-SC. This page is required for every project. You may discontinue sending the FP-SC form. If you have a project for which the FP-SC form was not submitted, you need to provide either our new page 3 or a copy of the FP-SC prior to our approval. We have also made minor corrections to other pages as suggested by A/Es and our own observations.

The Code Compliance Checklist is for use with projects that are submitted to SED. If you have a project presently waiting for Mechanical review, it may be helpful if the revised checklist were utilized to re-review the project within your office to ensure a quicker turn around when the project is selected for review. If you find any item needing correction, please send an addendum before the project is reviewed.

This form is now the final version. But we are still asking for your comments regarding ways to improve it. Send e-mail comments to Joe Levy at jlevy@mail.nysed.gov. We will make revisions as necessary.

We are requiring the submission of pages 1, 2, and 3 for every project regardless of size or content. Structural and energy conservation information is required to be submitted under the new code. If you indicate certain pages as "NA" (not applicable) on page one, then you do not have to submit them. But be fairly warned, as we stated in Newsletter #29, "please be aware that we will not be able to review your projects if all applicable sections of the form are not completed." We are available to answer questions, but ask that you look up the required code information before asking us if you need to provide it. We need all of you to read the new code requirements in order to facilitate a quick review.

An Index of our Newsletters is available on our web site at https://www.p12.nysed.gov/facplan/NewsLetters.htm.

If you would like to have this Newsletter sent directly to you by e-mail, please send your e-mail address to Joe Levy at jlevy@mail.nysed.gov.