Seventh District Congressman Billy Long visited with HBA small business members at the Remodeling Expo on Friday, October 12. Long especially wanted to hear from HBA Remodelers regarding legislation he is co-sponsoring at the federal level to make much-needed improvements to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Lead: Repair, Renovation and Painting (LRRP) rule. H.R. 5911, the Lead Exposure Reduction Amendments Act of 2012, would help home owners and remodelers to better comply with the costly work practices and record keeping requirements of the rule without compromising safety standards. [slideshow id=43 w=300 h=200]
“We are very pleased Congressman Long took the time to visit with our small business members and contractors at the Expo,” said HBA CEO Matt Morrow. “He’s made a point of listening to our industry during his first term and has worked to free both housing contractors and homeowners of unnecessarily costly regulatory burdens. We believe this legislation gives families more flexibility about their own remodeling projects, while also keeping safeguards in place to protect against lead hazards.”
Specifically, the legislation would:
• Reinstate the opt-out provision to allow home owners without small children or pregnant women residing in them – not the government — to decide whether to require LRRP compliance.
• Suspend the LRRP if EPA does not approve a commercially available test kit that meets the regulation’s requirements. EPA has failed to approve a test kit that meets the “false positive” and “false negative” criteria stated in the regulation. When the EPA implemented the final LRRP rule, the agency failed to meet the requirements of its own directive when it was unable to approve a more accurate commercially viable lead test kit that would register no more than 10% false positives and 5% false negatives. Current test kits can produce up to 60% false positives, meaning that in many cases, consumers are needlessly paying additional costs for work practices that are not needed and provide no benefit, but must be employed because of false positive test results.
For a review of this issue, click title to download the HBA’s “Fast Facts About Legislation to Improve the LRRP and Reduce Regulatory Burden.”