From the Star Ledger:
All new houses would be required to have sprinklers, under bill on Christie’s desk
The deadline for Gov. Chris Christie to sign or veto legislation that would require every new single or two-family home built in New Jersey to have a sprinkler system is Thursday.
Today, a coalition of fire safety officials and union heads joined the bill’s sponsor, Assemblyman John Wisniewski, to urge Christie to sign it.
“Of all the reasons to support this bill, the most compelling is also the simplest: Fire sprinklers prevent injuries and save lives,” Wisniewski (D-Middlesex) said.
The bill (A1698) passed the Legislature in March nearly along party lines, with most Democrats supporting it and most Republicans opposing it. It passed once before in January 2014, at the end of the last two-year legislative session. But it died when Christie failed to take action on it before the session expired in what’s called a “pocket veto.”
Wisniewski said the requirement would add about $4,000 to the cost of a 2,000 square foot home.
“I think about that number. A $4,000 investment on a structure that usually runs about $400,000. It’s a small fraction of the overall cost,” he said, adding that many insurance companies will offer discounts for homes with sprinklers.
…
Assembly Minority Leader Jon Bramnick (R-Union) said most Republicans opposed the bill because it would add to the cost of housing.“In New Jersey, where things are so expensive, we don’t want to mandate another cost that will be passed down to the buyer,” he said. “We were concerned about more mandates, more costs and consequently more regulations with respect to families buying homes.”
I’d guess probably closer to $6-8k when translated to end-customer pricing.
Other issue is all the pesky attics in NJ, especially given the cold snap of this past winter. Frozen attic sprinkler piping sounds like a real joy. Most plumbers would look at you sideways if you asked them to run water piping through an unconditioned attic. Even in commercial sprinkler systems, running sprinklers in large areas of unconditioned space generally require more complex dry sprinklers, where pipes are kept under air pressure and not full of water.
In the Southern US, this is seldom a problem, hell, there are plenty of houses I’ve seen down south that put water heaters in the attic. Up here that would be considered absolute idiocy.
Let me guess, the installation would require a licensed residential sprinkler installer too, right?
Of course it would.
Guarantee some residential sprinkler company is lobbying the Krap out of Wisnewski and the rest of the legislature.
I have seen water heater and gas burners in small unfinished attics in Long Beach area.
I saw one house with a little pop up hole to attic you entered with a ladder that had the whole mechanical up there. Pretty cool. It even had the main electric box up there. That house could have seven feet of water and still could take a nice warm shower.
Wow heating oil prices have been shooting up in April and May a very rare occurrence.
All those folks who locked in one year heating oil contracts between November 2014 and Feb 2015 cant be liking which way oil is heading as when contract expires on a zero degree day in Jan 2016 they might get a four buck a gallon delivery. Ouch.
And the next six months is all warm weather so they wont get to buy many $2.20 cent gallons of oil. Come Fall everyone will be begging oil company to top it off.
If that’s the case, scratch my comment, $10-12k easy.
I commute by car. I rather spend the 4,000-7000 a year to drive first class as opposed to saving that money and putting my life at risk driving a piece of crap. Those numbers are based on 10 years. I run my cars at the minimum of 10 years. So I don’t have a problem buying a nice new car. If I bought used, I would have to waste my time buying a car more often than 10-15 years and I rather avoid going through the hassle of wheeling and dealing to buy a car.
Also, d-fens is dead on. If you have a pretty wife, you better believe she is not driving the 99 civic. I have no choice, but to get the higher end cars. I have a high maintenance wife that enjoys the finer things in life. My wife also makes good money, so who am I to say that she can’t?
D-FENS says:
May 6, 2015 at 9:48 am
We buy them because our wives make us.
Wily Millenial says:
May 6, 2015 at 9:38 am
“$35K car”, yikes. I used to aim to spend two months’ rent on a car, now I use two months’ mortgage.
I’ll never understand why people buy nice cars. You can fly to Montana for a week, rent a hot rod and drive 140 every year and get it out of your system. All my neighbors take the train and have two Beemers getting rusty in the driveway, but at least they can work until they’re 72.
We guys are forgetting that we’re all wealthy here besides being insulated from the rest of the nation. It’s different here. Price is not the issue, it’s perceived status. I’m told it’s warranted so it must be true.
We’ve had a lot of sprinkler problems in our building. We’ve had some bacteria growing in the pipes which causing them to corrode and burst. $$$ to repair and clean out, as well as new equipment to measure bacteria levels. One apartment the pipes froze and burst last January, destroying the whole place. We did actually have a kitchen fire in one unit and maybe the sprinkler saved the buliding but also soaked 2 apartments under the fire.
10k to install is just the start.
Plenty of nice 2000 sedans out here. And I don’t feel like I’m driving a theme park ride.
I feel like the safety premium that another $20-30K buys is pretty minimal. I probably wouldn’t have had much luck marrying a woman who was “into cars” but it never seemed to be much of a factor in Brooklyn.
I could be wrong, the legislature is known to come up with contradictory and idiotic ideas in their own.
Where does mandatory sprinklers fit into the affordable housing agenda?
grim says:
May 6, 2015 at 11:04 am
If that’s the case, scratch my comment, $10-12k easy.
This will be a maintenance bonanza for the Fire System companies!
http://www.wsj.com/articles/almost-half-in-poll-say-new-york-city-headed-in-wrong-direction-1430862970
A majority of voters, or 57%, report that the overall quality of life in the city has either gotten worse or remained the same during the past year or so, which they characterized as a bad thing. Fewer than one in five voters say quality of life has improved.
I see this mandate much like I perceive Bloomberg’s quality of life mandates. It’s not that far a jump to overturning Roe v. Wade when you begin to accept letting the government mandate every aspect of your life.
But I cant get a good night sleep on that lumpy matress full of cash
Fast Eddie says:
May 6, 2015 at 11:09 am
We guys are forgetting that we’re all wealthy here besides being insulated from the rest of the nation. It’s different here. Price is not the issue, it’s perceived status. I’m told it’s warranted so it must be true.
I know which governor had the most mandates. McGreevy.
Since my clients are for it, and it costs me nothing, I’m for it.
Booyah!
Regulation creep.
First require just new homes come equipped with sprinkler systems, then require it for all homes.
[8] Richards
“We’ve had a lot of sprinkler problems in our building. We’ve had some bacteria growing in the pipes which causing them to corrode and burst. $$$ to repair and clean out, as well as new equipment to measure bacteria levels. ”
You say it like it’s a bad thing.
Then require yearly inspections, like for fire extinguishers. Heck, add it to thermostats, smoke detectors, all electronic appliances, etc. Hey, they call cause fires. It’s a matter of public safety. Also, everyone must drive Hummers. For safety of course.
I love that sprinklers in single family homes is getting mandated but the real issue of 5 story multi-unit dwellings are being constructed with toothpicks and paper mache, but that’s not the issue, nor is the unlicensed maintenance guy operating the torch. For our safety we need those sprinklers in our homes, that should fix everything!
Imo, the new cars are worth the extra money for the safety it provides. I’m prob getting this suv for my wife. My wife and daughter should be pretty safe when driving in it. We are going on thursday to check it out an event that is premiering the new vehicle. Think you have to wait till sept to get it. We saw the vehicle at the car show in nyc. Really like the way it looks. Now we have to test drive it.
“Volvo is currently elbow deep in its “Vision 2020” project, an enormously compelling pledge to the world hat there will be no road deaths in new Volvos from that year. Which is, of course, just five years hence. So it’s quite some thing and, in fairness, more an “intention” than a cast-iron guarantee – that would be foolish.
They plan to do this with a raft of technology currently being implemented into their high end automobiles, with their handsome 2015 XC90 SUV literally bristling with sensors and leading the charge.
Stick your £45k down on an XC 90 and you can expect industry leading safety tech in their proprietary a run-off road protection system and auto brake at intersection capability.”
http://www.techradar.com/us/news/car-tech/hell-freezes-over-volvo-cars-could-be-about-to-get-exciting-1285144
Wily Millenial says:
May 6, 2015 at 11:31 am
Plenty of nice 2000 sedans out here. And I don’t feel like I’m driving a theme park ride.
I feel like the safety premium that another $20-30K buys is pretty minimal. I probably wouldn’t have had much luck marrying a woman who was “into cars” but it never seemed to be much of a factor in Brooklyn.
Which Governor was responsible for banning over easy and sunny side up eggs?
21, any moderately decent car from this millennium is going to be plenty safe. Lets call it what it is, I like you do not always have the newest cars, but they are luxury cars, once you get used to driving in a quiet and comfortable cabin you cannot go back to some econobox. Since you are spending time a car might as well be comfortable.
Yearly inspections, maybe that’s the ticket. New stealth tax.
With the car discussion, there is more to it that just Cheap and Frugal, you also have to factor in value.
Three people go to buy a car.
Value sees that the navigation package is 60% off at $1,500. “That’s Value”
Frugal, says “I can’t justify that when I can buy a Garmin for $100, that will do the same thing”
Cheap says ” I don’t need a Garmin when I can use my phone” but doesn’t factor the cost of the tickets for Texting and Cell phone use.
My next car may have a more comfortable cabin, I’ll give you that — 2006 Lexus ES300 shouldn’t run more than 6-8K, and I won’t even feel like I got out of my Corolla. Better yet maybe it’ll have some dents in it.
And in 10 years time you’ll being paying extra insurance for manually driving your car instead of letting HAL do it for you “safely and conveniently”. The extra hazard of being human… I mean prone to failure and misjudgments, will certainly be included in your insurance rate.
In the mean time, I’m sure the trucker’s union is panicked.
http://www.computerworld.com/article/2919094/telematics/the-first-self-driving-18-wheeler-hits-the-highways.html
And let’s not forget that new stadium or all those new student amenities . . .
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/05/opinion/sunday/the-real-reason-college-tuition-costs-so-much.html?WT.mc_id=2015-MAY-WCASeq-OPINION&WT.mc_ev=click&ad-keywords=WCARETARG&_r=0
27 – Well, there’s the pesky issue of liability, which is the crux of insurance, no?
If my self driving car runs over a toddler, why exactly am I responsible? Surely it’s the manufacturer that will bear the liability. What insurance is going to be required of a passenger? Why exactly should I as the owner warranty or guaranty the software and hardware that drives the car, which is exactly what I’d be doing by insuring it. There is no precedent there.
This is the single biggest hurdle to self-driving cars, not the technology, how to deal with the eventual financial liability.
@29, grim -good point regarding insurance, we can only preprogram the software with so many possibilities until the unexpected occurs. As for all the new safety features in the Volvo it comes at an additional cost of failing sensors, software upgrades, false reads and in the end -this is so annoying can I just turn it off. Remember the old saying “What’s the best preventative maintenance on a Volvo? Selling it.”
If you shut of the water supply to your mandated sprinkler system, will you be subject to criminal charges or civil penalties if there is a fire and the sprinkler system could have put it out? Will your home insurance not cover?
Incorporate, declare bankruptcy, re-incorporate…
grim says:
May 6, 2015 at 3:52 pm
27 – How to deal with the eventual financial liability.
Maybe we’ll need to carry umbrella insurance when we’re named co-defendants in the inevitable lawsuit.
Bereaved Parents of aforementioned Dead Toddler vs. Google and Grim?
I saw a talk by some NHTSA guy claiming that the aggregate liability would be lower with self-driving cars.
I assume that the manufacturer’s model will be to inflate the retail cost of the car up-front, then buy hedges from reinsurers. Also the manufacturers probably will force lawsuit limitations on you when you’re signing the papers. Of course, gotta have that ‘underinsured motorist’ coverage. And comp/coll for that $130,000 self-driving bmw.
Or the question of consumer insurance will be irrelevant, because in our macabre rent-seeking future all the cars are owned by a small oligopoly and we just rent them by the hour at whatever skewed price is produced by that demand curve.
34 – Let me know when I’ll see my rates go down from all the self-braking cars.
Or are the insurers just going to keep the rates as-is and capture the difference as margin?
Insurance go down, ha ha , Silly Millennial.
My mental model is that you aren’t going to see the cars in states that don’t create an appropriate regulatory environment. I agree, who’s going to buy and insure a car that they can’t control?
I thought this III report was pretty good
http://www.iii.org/issue-update/self-driving-cars-and-insurance
“Liability: As cars are become increasingly automated the onus might be on the manufacturer to prove it was not responsible for what happened in the event of a crash. The liability issue may evolve so that lawsuit concerns do not drive manufacturers and their suppliers out of business.
RAND has suggested some kind of no-fault auto insurance system. Others foresee something akin to the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act, a no-fault compensation program for vaccine recipients who suffer a serious adverse reaction when vaccinated. The legislation was passed in 1986 in response to the threat that life-saving vaccines might become scarce or even unavailable if manufacturers, overwhelmed by claims of injury, scaled back or terminated production.”
Red Barchetta?
High School Abstinence (JJ Edition):
An abstinence-only high school in a tiny Texas town is battling a colossal chlamydia epidemic.
District officials are rethinking their approach to sex education after 20 of Crane High School’s 300 students tested positive for the sexually transmitted disease.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention called the outbreak a health issue at “epidemic proportions,” KFOR reported.
Crane Independent School District officials met Monday to discuss possible updates to the high school’s conservative sex education program.
“We do have an abstinence curriculum, and that evidently ain’t working,” superintendent Jim Rumage told the TV station. “We need to do all we can, although it’s the parents’ responsibility to educate their kids on sexual education.”
Twenty of the 300 students at Crane High School in Crane, Texas, were diagnosed with chlamydia, health officials said.
However, Rumage defended the current teachings to the San Antonio Express-News.
“If kids are not having any sexual activity, they can’t get this disease,” he said. “That’s not a bad program.”
Any changes must be approved by the school board at a May 19 meeting.
The 20-teen outbreak, significant in the west Texas town of 3,000 people, prompted the district to send letters home to parents last week.
The school district did not immediately return the Daily News’ request for comment Wednesday.
With News Wire Services
Bingo!!! Everything I have read states they are going this way. 10 years from now, if you want to buy a new self driving car…..you will have to be extremely wealthy. Uber started this movement. With self driverless technology, the costs will dramatically come down (the whole community is sharing it) to the point that only rich could afford their own car. The whole community housing movement is a push for the majority of Americans to rent. It’s no coincidence that the home ownership rate has been dropping off a cliff since 2008. This is what I was saying the other day about the housing market. You are going to have a class of owners and a class of renters. Middle class is dead and it’s going back to the old days ( which is actually the median…this past century was an anomaly with almost a 70% home ownership rate at peak). It’s becoming much easier for the wealthy to buy more real estate with such lucrative rental returns(esp with low rate loans but only for people with good credit aka rich) and at the time it’s becoming impossible for the bottom 50% to purchase. The writing is on the wall. Buy as much as you can right now in valuable locations because guess what, it’s not going to get any cheaper. Too much money at the top looking for places to invest their money will prevent real estate from going down as long as rents remain lucrative. Just my two cents.
“Or the question of consumer insurance will be irrelevant, because in our macabre rent-seeking future all the cars are owned by a small oligopoly and we just rent them by the hour at whatever skewed price is produced by that demand curve.”
Yes, but aren’t we at the point where almost all cars are carrying this kind of technology? Meaning every car now uses sensors and run off a computer.
Walking Bye says:
May 6, 2015 at 4:07 pm
@29, grim -good point regarding insurance, we can only preprogram the software with so many possibilities until the unexpected occurs. As for all the new safety features in the Volvo it comes at an additional cost of failing sensors, software upgrades, false reads and in the end -this is so annoying can I just turn it off. Remember the old saying “What’s the best preventative maintenance on a Volvo? Selling it.”
The End Is Nigh (Gourmet Burger Bubble Edition):
http://www.cnbc.com/id/102654138
The autonomous car borrowership society does have a nice nihilistic ring to it.
Just think, in about 5 years you will be able to use an app to call for a ride that will arrive in one minute. It’s a driverless car, so the charges will be dirt cheap. Why would anyone besides rich people own a car?
Grim says:
May 6, 2015 at 6:47 pm
The autonomous car borrowership society does have a nice nihilistic ring to it.
Because there won’t be enough cars at rush hour for car sharing to expand beyond a certain %. And cars are status symbols and some people enjoy spending time in their own personal car space. Why does anyone buy a watch anymore? Virtually everyone has better ways to tell time.
41 Try Garbos Grill in Key West on Caroline St. Best burgers in town for only 8.50. It’s a food truck parked next to a bar with plenty of outdoor tablesWas featured last year on DDD.
Will self driving cars provide for more efficient driving which would lead to a reduction in traffic congestion? On accidents alone, it should reduce time.
If I owned a taxi cab company right now, I would sell. Apple and the big boys are coming to town, get out while you still can.
Ragnar says:
May 6, 2015 at 8:08 pm
Because there won’t be enough cars at rush hour for car sharing to expand beyond a certain %. And cars are status symbols and some people enjoy spending time in their own personal car space. Why does anyone buy a watch anymore? Virtually everyone has better ways to tell time.
@maggieNYT: AP headline: Prosecutor tied to chokehold case wins NY special election
I assume that congestion will only get worse as the marginal cost of “taxi” travel decreases, despite efficiency gains from the new s-d fleet.
I am a skeptic. Proponents I know have claimed that the cars will be the “last mile” to bring people to their transit stations, that sounds pretty unlikely to me. However I’m still long s-d cars because their domination seems inevitable.
Being poor in NJ: better for your kids than being poor elsewhere?
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2015/05/04/403575638/where-poor-kids-grow-up-makes-a-huge-difference?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20150504
On my 84 Civic I put $5K down, took out a 1 year loan, and since AC was dealer-installed (about $700), I waited a few months and came back and payed cash to buy the AC rather than finance it.
Speaking of cost of ownership, I wonder what my 95 Civic ended up costing me after 19 years of driving it into the ground. Was $13,100 all in. Yes, I sprung for AC.
It just occurred to me what my 1 year loan monthly payment was for my ’84 CRX, my first new car. $273.81 x 12 payments and I was done. I never had another car loan until 1999, another 1 year loan, on my ’99 Miata.
^^^^ I put $15K down on maybe a $21K purchase? I don’t remember my payments, but again, paid off in one year. Haven’t had a third car loan yet.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-irs-goes-to-court-1430953480
May 6, 2015 7:04 p.m. ET
75 COMMENTS
It isn’t every day that judges on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals declare themselves “shocked.” But that happened on Monday when an animated three-judge panel eviscerated the IRS and Justice Department during oral argument in a case alleging the agency delayed the tax-exempt application of a pro-Israel group due to its policy views.
In December 2009, Pennsylvania-based Z Street applied for 501(c)(3) status to pursue its pro-Israel educational mission. In July 2010, when the group called to check on what was taking so long, an IRS agent said that auditors had been instructed to give special attention to groups connected with Israel, and that they had sent some of those applications to a special IRS unit for additional review.
Z Street sued the IRS for viewpoint discrimination (Z Street v. Koskinen), and in May 2014 a federal district judge rejected the IRS’s motion to dismiss. The IRS appealed, a maneuver that halted discovery that could prove to be highly embarrassing. Justice says Z Street’s case should be dismissed because the Anti-Injunction Act bars litigation about “the assessment or collection of tax.” Problem is, Z Street isn’t suing for its tax-exempt status. It’s suing on grounds that the IRS can’t discriminate based on point of view.
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The three judges—Chief Judge Merrick Garland,David Tatel and David Sentelle—were incredulous. You say they want a tax exemption, but that’s not the complaint, Judge Sentelle admonished government lawyer Teresa McLaughlin: “They are not in court seeking to restrain the assessment or collection of a tax, they are in court seeking a constitutionally fair process.”
The suit should also be foreclosed, the government argued, because under Section 7428(b)(2) of the Internal Revenue Code groups may sue to obtain their tax-exempt status if no action has been taken for 270 days, and that should be an alternative to Z Street’s approach.
“You don’t really mean that, right? Because the next couple words would be the IRS is free to discriminate on the basis of viewpoint, religion, race [for 270 days]. You don’t actually think that?” Judge Garland said. “Imagine the IRS announces today a policy that says as follows: No application by a Jewish group or an African-American group will be considered until one day short of the period under the statute . . . Is it your view that that cannot be challenged?”
The judges also asked why the government had buried the key precedent in a footnote in its brief. In Direct Marketing Association v. Brohl, the Supreme Court decided that the language of the Anti-Injunction Act did not preclude cases like Z Street’s. In a previous case before the D.C. Circuit, Judge Garland noted, the court also “rejected” the exact arguments the government was making, “so in a way we have already decided every issue before us today, against you.”
Poor Ms. McLaughlin was sent to argue the indefensible so the IRS can delay discovery until the waning days of the Obama Administration. “If I were you, I would go back and ask your superiors whether they want us to represent that the government’s position in this case is that the government is free to unconstitutionally discriminate against its citizens for 270 days,” said Judge Garland.
Ms. McLaughlin replied, “Well, I will take that back.” The Beltway media may be bored, but the IRS scandal is a long way from over.
grim: please comment for accuracy….
http://matadornetwork.com/life/20-signs-definitely-raised-polish-parents/