Campus Fire Safety Right-to-Know

Requests about the status of the Campus Fire Safety Right-to-Know (RTK) trickle in from our UW System campuses. Campus-Firewatch.com has a comprehensive update that Ed Comeau does a great job with.

A podcast is also available, which goes a bit more into the public safety background of the Clery Act. It's actually two separate interviews, and I think is worth your listening time (over 30 minutes). Here are some of the things I noted:

• Campuses should be making a good faith effort now to put systems in place to collect the data, and begin collecting data.
• Expect that regulations will require formal reporting beginning October 2010.
• Suggests partnering with campus security offices that already have Clery Act reporting requirements.
• There is a lot of agreement to simply add the fire reporting regulatory compliance to the already existing Clery Act reporting system.
• Reporting requirements will only cover on-campus student housing facilities (definition to be determined). There was discussion about collecting all fire-related incidents, even though only the student housing items would be reported.
• Discussion on "popcorn in the microwave" alarms.

And those of you that want to see the progress of the draft rule drafting, the April 7 draft is available here. The first four pages incorporate the reporting into the existing public security sections already required by the Clery Act. The section that is specific to fire safety begins at the bottom of page four.


Links:
http://campus-firewatch.com/reprints/rtkreprint.html
http://www.radiofirehouse.com/broadcast/wp-content/2009/cfw_033009.mp3
http://www.campus-firewatch.com/resources/rtk/rtk%20regs%20040709.pdf

Entrapment risk in public swimming pools

On December 19, 2008, the Consumer Product Safety Commission rules for the elimination of suction and hair entrapment risk in public swimming pools will go into effect. State of Wisconsin plan review is necessary when modifying swimming pools and water attractions to comply with the December 2008 federal Virginia Graeme Baker suction regulation. [read more of the Wisconsin Department of Commerce bulletin]

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) staff has also prepared a guidance
document that spells out the technical requirements of the regulation.

There are many resources made available by the Association of Pool & Spa Professionals, including pages on:
Summary analysis of the legislation
Entrapment prevention in pools and spas

Additional notes--
December 10, 2008: Link to Wisconsin Department of Commerce S&B Public Swimming Pools Program
December 16, 2008: Link to CPSC news release (12/15/2008)

Links:
http://www.commerce.wi.gov/SB/SB-SwimmingPoolsWisGraemeBaker.html
http://www.cpsc.gov/BUSINFO/vgpsa.pdf
http://apsp.org/clientresources/documents/Siddiqui_EntrapmentPools,Spas_reprint.pdf
http://apsp.org/clientresources/documents/Summary_PSSafetyAct07-08.pdf
http://commerce.wi.gov/SB/SB-SwimmingPoolsProgram.html
http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml09/09065.html