WHAT DO WE NEED FOR CONTINUING EDUCATION?

This is the question I hear from inspectors from across the state. Here is where we currently stand.

In October the Home Inspector Advisory Council made their recommendation for 12 hours of continuing education per year (24 hours for your two-year renewal period) to the Department of State. Due to the extended delay in forming the Council they requested that the Department prorate the requirements for this first renewal period.

The Department accepted these recommendations and their lawyers are currently writing the regulations to put them into effect.

Normally, proposed regulations are posted in the State Register for public comment for months prior to final adoption. However, we expect that these regulations will be posted and take effect as "emergency regulations" as soon as the lawyers are done in order to avoid any additional delays. Inspectors will have an opportunity to comment on the regulations prior to final adoption.

Once the regulations are put through, the training providers can submit their courses for approval. The approval process normally takes up to 60 days, but the Department staff knows that we are under the gun and has promised to fast track the inspector courses.

So to recap, progress is being made but we are still at least a couple of months away from being able to start fulfilling our continuing ed. requirements. The inspectors who received their licenses last December or January will be in a time crunch to get their continuing education in. However, I have talked to several inspector organizations and private training providers who are gearing up to provide the education, so I doubt that course selection or availability will be a problem.

I hope that everyone is healthy and enjoying the holiday season. And as always please drop me a line if you hear of anything new that affects our profession.

Gregg Harwood, NYSAHI President 2006-07

We received this message from the Department of State this week:

This email is to inform you that the grandparenting provision for home inspectors will be expiring on 12/31/06. The Division is providing this information to organizations in the home inspection industry that may be affected by the change.

All candidates submitting an application for licensure under the grandparenting clause for a home inspector license must be received in our office on or before 12/31/06 - NO EXCEPTIONS - After that date, an applicant for a home inspector license must apply under the New Home Inspector Category(See category B on the application.) In addition, all additional information for pending grandparenting applications must be received within one year of the original date of application.

Please forward this information to any members of the public that you may know that will be affected by the above.

Thank you for your cooperation.
Amy Penzabene System Coordinator/Admininstrative Liaison Division of Licensing Services NYS Department of State apenzabe@dos.state.ny.us

The Professional Home Inspector Licensing Law provides for industry input to the Department of State via the Home Inspector Advisory Council. This council is charged with the duty to advise the DOS on the implementation of our licensing law.

The Council members are appointed by the Assembly, Senate and Governor and, given the pace at which state government works, it took more than a year for a quorum of members to be appointed. This forced the DOS to implement emergency regulations prior to December 31st of last year to establish the bare framework to be able to issue licenses. Without proper input from the profession some mistakes were made. However, that is past history. Our profession now has an Advisory Council up and running and trying to make up for lost time.

The first Council/DOS meeting was held in Albany in August. At that time the Council committed to meeting every couple of months until the the work of establishing the rules and regulations that will define our profession into the future is completed.

The first issue that the Council addressed was advising continuing education requirements. The Council is now reviewing the Standards of Practice and Code of Ethics of all national inspector professional societies in advance of formulating the standards for our state.

The Council member roster and contact information is available on line at the Department of State link on NYSAHI.com. The Council/DOS meetings are open to the public and include a public comment period. All home inspectors are encouraged to attend. The next meeting will be sometime in February, but the date has not yet been set. We will publish this information in a future issue of the NYSAHI NEWS. (The photo is of home inspectors, DOS staff and Advisory Council members in casual conversation after the October meeting.)