COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION
MINUTES: April 24, 2006
LEGISLATION MEMBERS: Chair: Young; Legislators: Burrows, Rogowsky, Bronz, Abinanti, Myers, Oros, Maisano
IN ATTENDANCE: CEO: B. Randolph, A. Neuman; CA: L. Cipollo, M. Nicolas-Brewster, L. Trentacoste; C. CLERK: E. Brady; BOL: S. Bass, B. Bochow, M. Amodio, H. Corbin; GUESTS: M. Courtine, S. McGuire, P. Millur, M. Gaito, M. Reilly, J. Demaria, A. Binder, M. Bruni, M. Oxman, J. Royce, B. Philip, P. Ploger, A. DePaul, J. Debella, T. Ucci
With a quorum present, the Committee on Legislation was called to order at 1:41 p.m.
MINUTES
(Oros, Burrows) Move to approve the minutes of April 10, 2006
Motion approved 5-0.
PLUMBING LICENSING LAW
Chairman Young stated the purpose of today’s meeting is a fact finding session about the Westchester County Plumbing Licensing Board and its rules and regulations. We will begin a dialogue, so committee members will have an opportunity to better understand the workings of the Plumbing Board, the make up of the Board and have time to ask questions.
Mark Courtine, Chairman of the Westchester County Plumbing Licensing Board gave a summary of the issues surrounding Rule 10 which is the requirement for plumbers to have a ratio of one Apprentice to one Journeyman on all jobs. Anybody who didn’t have a Journeyman license or a Master Plumbers license would be considered an apprentice. There were complaints from code enforcers about the quality of work and the stuff that was going on at the job. The ratio was to create control and more oversight of the situation. The Licensing Board feels strongly that the rule is critical. They were challenged in court and won. It was appealed and the higher court upheld it. Rule ten was suppose to be enforced on the first of April but at the request of Chairman Young, they have held off to discuss it with Legislators.
Legislator Oros stated the intention of the law was to take the licensing and testing away from local municipalities so the parochialism that was going on would be eliminated. He believes it is a conflict of interest for a contractor to judge the work. The code enforcement person should be the one to make sure a job is done correctly. They work for the town or the city and are in the best position to say whether a job should go forward.
Mr. Courtine said code enforcement officers from Mt. Vernon, New Rochelle, Greenburgh and White Plains have come to the Board to support Rule Ten.
Legislator Rogowsky stated the code enforcement community would support the rule because it may make a job come out better. However that is not the basis on how we should approach this. The code enforcement officers should be doing their job. The law was not to interfere with the codes. It was to deal with the administrative, licensing and insurance requirements, so the plumbing community would not be overburdened obtaining 40 separate licenses and insurance policies. Rogowsky believed the committee doesn’t need to focus on the validity of Rule 10 but rather on the scope of the authority of the licensing board.
Legislator Abinanti believed the Plumbing Board has the right to license but not to control work. There is a distinction between interfering with the work of the plumber and setting the standards of the licensing of an apprentice. The law was an attempt to do away with the inequities of licensing. The purpose was to set a level playing field for all plumbers in the county, not what the standards of work were or how things were going to get done. That was to be left to local building departments. We did not give the Plumbing Board the power to regulate; we gave them the power to license.
Legislator Bronz stated if code enforcers find this is an essential part of verification of the quality of the job then this committee probably needs to look into that.
Marc Oxman, attorney for the Independent Master Plumbers of Westchester, believes the Plumbing Licensing Board has expanded its own original purpose and believes the statute is not clear. He believes the law should be amended to be specific about what the intention of the legislature was when it set up the licensing Board and there also needs to be a discussion about enforcement.
Legislator Burrows said it seems as if the licensing board wasn’t authorized to be doing a lot of the things that it is doing now, it clearly was the licensing and testing. If there is something that needs to be changed and that this committee should be looking at, then we should do it.
Pat Ploger, representative of the Plumbing and Mechanical Contractors Association doesn’t think it is the intent of Rule 10 to mandate business practice. Its intent is not to set up an apprentice ratio. The problem is we have noncertified Journeymen performing plumbing work in Westchester in violation of county law. The Plumbing Licensing Board was trying to find an enforcement vehicle or some method where the county inspectors, not the localities code enforcement officers, could ascertain whether people who were working as Journeymen had their licenses and were under the proper supervision. People who have gone past their apprenticeship time have not been going out and getting their Journey level certification. Some people are working for some companies without supervision and training.
This is a disservice to the public and violation of the law. Ms. Ploger suggested to register and card every apprentice. After a period of time that person would take the Journey level test. Failing that test one would remain an apprentice for a finite amount of time.
Mary Nicolas-Brewster from the County Attorney’s office said the court recently stated that the Board of Plumbing examiners has the authority to define what direct supervision means and the law gave them the authority to regulate licensing and that the law specifically said no person could work as an apprentice unless they were directly supervised. The court also said the Board was not in violation of industry practice. Some practice was even more stringent then what the Westchester Plumbing Board was doing. New York State requires a ratio of three plumbers to one apprentice. Some places require as many as five plumbers to one apprentice.
Legislator Maisano said we shouldn’t be debating Rule 10. We need to figure out if the law currently reflects the original intent. If the law was not intended to allow the adoption of Rule 10 then the burden is on us to redraft the legislation.
Mr. Courtine stated that the Plumbing Board has stuck closely to the intent of the law.
Chairman Young said we would revisit this issue soon and work towards coming to a solution.
(Abinanti, Rogowsky) move to adjourn The Committee on Legislation. Motion passed 8-0. Committee on Legislation adjourned at 2:45 p.m.
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