Residential sprinklers may not be required

Bedford County Board of Commissioners' rules and legislative committee placed a proposal that the county adopt the 2009 International Building Code but exempt itself from residential sprinkler systems on the full commission's February agenda, but did not add its own recommendation.

The rules committee did, however, recommend a zoning change on U.S. 231 North, as well as changes to the county zoning resolution related to stand-alone accessory buildings and homeless shelters.

The county, which regulates construction outside city limits, currently follows the 2003 edition of the International Building Code, which is published every three years. If any city or county is using a version of the code more than seven years old, the State of Tennessee has the power to come in and impose its own minimum building codes, and its own inspection fees, county zoning enforcer Kay Demonbren said last month.

Bedford County Planning Commission recommended earlier this month that the county adopt the new 2009 edition of the code but exempt itself from a provision requiring fire protection sprinkler systems for one-family and two-family dwellings. Planners said some rural areas don't have sufficient water pressure to operate a fire sprinkler system, meaning that new homes would have to include not only the sprinkler system itself but a water storage tank and pump dedicated to supplying it. County building inspector Edward Antosh said that sprinkler systems could add as much as $6,000 to the price of a home once all costs are figured in.

The City of Shelbyville opted out of the sprinkler system requirements the last time it adopted the code.

Commissioner Mark Thomas, who is also chief of Bedford County Fire Department, defended the sprinkler requirement, saying that even if there's not sufficient water pressure at a location today there may be in the future.

"They'll eventually have that water pressure," he said. He said that given some of the large three-story and four-story homes, which have been built in the rural part of the county, the cost of a sprinkler system is a reasonable expense.

The rules committee voted to pass the 2009 code on to the full commission but without adding its own recommendation.

The state is talking about making sprinkler systems mandatory, said some planners last month.

Other changes in the 2009 edition of the code include requiring carbon monoxide alarms, locking caps for air conditioning refrigerant circuits (to prevent abuse of the refrigerant by inhaling it), expansion tanks on hot water heaters, and a permanent certificate showing a building's insulation value.

The code applies to new construction or expansion.

* The rules committee voted to recommend a rezoning request from Roger Smith that property at 3225 U.S. 231 North be rezoned from A-1 (agriculture) to C-2 (commercial). Smith currently operates Smith Equipment at the site under a special exception. But he would like to add additional product lines, such as farm trucks, to the existing business which might take it beyond the terms of the special exception. That, he told the committee, is why he is requesting a rezoning.

* The committee voted to recommend a change to the zoning resolution to allow accessory structures to be built on their own. Current zoning regulations define accessory structures exclusively in terms of the primary structure on a lot, which makes it impossible to put up an accessory structure on its own. But someone who owns undeveloped property might want an accessory structure such as a shed to house lawn equipment, even though there's no immediate plan to build a primary structure. The accessory structure would need to be placed in such a manner that a primary structure could eventually be built in front of it, as required by current regulations.

* The committee voted to recommend adding a provision for homeless shelters to the county zoning resolution. County zoning enforcer Kay Demonbren told the committee that the county must make some provision for any legal land use; the county can require that a use be restricted to a particular zone but can't simply exclude it outright. A recent inquiry about placing a homeless shelter in a rural area led planners to propose adding shelters as a special exception to the C-1 (commercial) zone. That means anyone who wanted to open a homeless shelter in a rural area would first have to ask for a rezoning (assuming the site wasn't already C-1; the rural part of the county has relatively few C-1 sites), and then, once the rezoning had been granted, would have to ask the Board of Zoning Appeals for a special exception within the zone. That would give neighbors of the site the opportunity to express any concerns they might have.