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CODE: Reasons for concern

| December 10, 2017 12:00 AM

I am surprised that I did not read one objection Wednesday in The Press from anyone about the new building code vote by the Kootenai County commissioners.

What this means in my experience is that the homeowner will be left to deal with building their home without building codes, and potentially unscrupulous contractors. For instance, I have had or witnessed the following: improperly built foundations, inadequate truss strength, building built too close to property line, abandonment with no final inspection, and sign-off with no recourse other than expensive litigation, both in Hayden prior to required inspections, and in Bonner and Boundary counties.

Lenders require qualified builders. However, in my opinion, this smells like a possible connection between the local contractors association and the commissioners. So to heck with the consumer, and the years it took building good quality building codes, and quality inspectors to hold the line for the consumer in Kootenai County whom I highly respect and are our only protection from these crooks. Why didn’t the commissioners survey some of the consumers who got taken, from county building records, before their vote? More of the same.

JERRY BAUER

Hayden