- Duane Bozarth -
There are only two board members of NFPA that are full-time NFPA
employees. While I don't have renumeration figures, I seriously doubt
the Directors are gettin obscenely wealthy from their compensation
from
NFPA.

- Nehmo -
Since you concede not having figures, your "seriously doubt" doesn’t
carry any weight unless you give some basis aside from the absence of
figures for your opinion. Elaborate if you can.

“Non-profit” is just an IRS distinction, 501(c)(3). The term doesn’t
really mean the company, or “organization” if you insist, doesn’t make
any money. Furthermore, the situation isn’t simple because there are
sister and sub organizations involved with the NFPA.

And please explain what the status of "full-time employee" has to do
with anything? What are you saying? That only employees make money from
an organization?

--
)|||(__ Nehmo __)|||(

Nehmo wrote:

- Duane Bozarth -
There are only two board members of NFPA that are full-time NFPA
employees. While I don't have renumeration figures, I seriously doubt
the Directors are gettin obscenely wealthy from their compensation
from
NFPA.

- Nehmo -
Since you concede not having figures, your "seriously doubt" doesn’t
carry any weight unless you give some basis aside from the absence of
figures for your opinion. Elaborate if you can.

That there isn't a set of stockholders or other partners or private
ownership mechanism. The Directors serve as do Directors of other
corporations as a board of experienced business professionals that,
undoubtedly, sit on multiple Boards in almost every case. In general
BofD salaries are not exceedingly lucrative in the perjorative sense to
which you and others here seem to have as a mindset.

“Non-profit” is just an IRS distinction, 501(c)(3). The term doesn’t
really mean the company, or “organization” if you insist, doesn’t make
any money. Furthermore, the situation isn’t simple because there are
sister and sub organizations involved with the NFPA.

True, but in general the focus of nonprofits is not _primarily_ one of
making profits. But, if they perform a useful service and meet the
rules of the IRS, what's wrong with that?

And please explain what the status of "full-time employee" has to do
with anything? What are you saying? That only employees make money from
an organization?

That, except for two, their primary compensation comes from their "day
job", not from serving on the BofD of NFPA. Those two, of course, are
primary officers on the Board by virtue of the position within the
organization.

There is an annual filing w/ the IRS for all 501(c)(3)'s which can be
looked at to determine a significant amount of the information. I don't
have the inclination nor time at present to go look for it.

Just out of curiousity, what would you think an appropriate level of
comensation for such a position? And why?

BTW, I noticed there's a VP position open that would probably pay pretty
well if you want to get in on the gravy train!

And a couple of EE positions, as well if you'd like to actually
contribute to the Standards themselves...

Nehmo wrote:

- Duane Bozarth -
There are only two board members of NFPA that are full-time NFPA
employees. While I don't have renumeration figures, I seriously doubt
the Directors are gettin obscenely wealthy from their compensation
from
NFPA.

- Nehmo -
Since you concede not having figures, your "seriously doubt" doesn’t
carry any weight unless you give some basis aside from the absence of
figures for your opinion. Elaborate if you can.

OK, I went and found the IRS Form 990 from 2003 (last one online at the
location I used).

Total salary of the top five officers was just over $1M. All Board of
Directors members (other than the two previously mentioned who are
fulltime employees) serve _without_ compensation.

Nice living, but certainly not outrageous imo for the officers of an
orgainzation of roughly $65M revenues, and something otoo 250 employees
it would seem estimating from the list of 110 w/ salaries of $50k or
greater (the ones specifically listed were all top officers, the other
higher paid appear to be the professionals on staff). BTW, they ended
the year w/ a net operating gain after cost of programs, materials and
other expenses of roughly $3M. That's about 5%.

The link I used is one to which I am registered as a board member of a
nonprofit here that we use for research for grant writing, etc., and
unfortunately protects the pdf file from cut 'n paste so I can't pick
out specific data easily, but these are freely available if you want to
go look on you own.

- Nehmo –
Assuming the copyright was valid and that such things can be
copyrighted…

- Duane Bozarth -
Any written work has an inherent copyright whether it is enforced by
the
holder or not is another issue...

- Nehmo –
The concept of “inherent copyright” vs. explicit is another issue too.
But it’s good to know everybody can stop littering the web with those
annoying little C’s. :-)

Copyright, in the legal sense, is about the right to control
reproduction. Copyright in the abstract sense is about citing and
plagiarism. Inherent copyrights don’t have much value in the legal
sense.

I made those preliminary affirmative assumptions to my previous post to
simplify the discussion. I preemptively, in effect, *yielded* on those
issues. I didn't and don’t see the constructiveness in branching off on
those elements.

- Nehmo –
True, it is irresponsible for a state to adopt a law without
providing
for the public to have access to it. But the deed is done. And since
NFPA allowed this adoption, indeed, encouraged it, NFPA can’t
complain
now.

- Duane Bozarth -
I don't know that NFPA can prevent the reference of their material,
only
the redistribution thereof in violation of copyright law...

- Nehmo –
Are you saying that NFPA is an sans-interest bystander in the process of
governments adopting codes? NFPA is a full-standing principle in the
process. That’s it’s business model. It managed to fashion itself into a
monopoly on the access of certain laws.

- Duane Bozarth -
Actually, NFPA is a nonprofit organization, not a "company" in the
sense
of being a for profit enterprise. It isn't "intertwined" w/
government
at all. See
http://www.nfpa.org/categoryList.asp... kie%5Ftest=1

- Nehmo –
That's just the “About” from NFPA’s own site. I assume you are
referencing the “international nonprofit” line. Do you believe that
means they don’t make any money?

--
)|||(__ Nehmo __)|||(

Nehmo wrote:

....

Are you saying that NFPA is an sans-interest bystander in the process of
governments adopting codes? NFPA is a full-standing principle in the
process. That’s it’s business model. It managed to fashion itself into a
monopoly on the access of certain laws.
....

That would be "principal" operator whose business model might be based
on a "principle"...

I'm saying that entities have chosen to reference the NFPA (or NEC or
any other Standard) is their choice in lieu of developing a separate
code on their own. It was the proliferation of such varying standards
that was a major impetus for the founding of the NFPA 100+ years ago.
That it has been successful is, imo, more a testament to the efficacy of
the codes and standards they developed than vice versa as you would seem
to want to assert.

financials, I posted data there in another response already--your
newserver may not have updated yet...

I believe you may have chosen a rather bad analogy. AFCI's were made code
for the same reason that GFCI's were; for safety. Many fires are attributed
to loose connections. An AFCI may be able to detect this and kill the
circuit before it sits there, day-after-day, week-after-week, lowering the
kindling temperature of the surrounding construction and eventually causing
a fire. BTW, bedrooms are just a start. In a future NEC edition, we may
see ALL the receptacles requiring AFCI protection.

Consider all the costs associated with developing a standard. Travel
vouchers, luncheons, mailings, etc. I chair a consensus committee for a
standard (ANSI, not NFPA) and there's a tremendous amount of work that goes
into creating one of these. BTW, the cost of the standard when placed on
sale is set by the association underwriting the standard, and not by ANSI.

You (or if may have someone else, hard to keep track) are right about how
much it costs to maintain a set of standards. We spend hundreds each year on
standards, and not just the standards, there are state amendments, testing,
courses for certification and maintaining licenses and certifications,
travel and lodging, etc. All of this gets passed along to the client of
course. But that's the cost of doing business.

Well, duh... kickbacks from electrical equipment manufacturers,
of course. Why do you think AFCIs are now required for bedrooms?

wrote:

On Wed, 02 Nov 2005 11:34:02 -0600, Duane Bozarth
wrote:

And how would you propose to have a Standards organization work and
support itself and its work?

Perhaps my problem with the whole idea of too many standards. At a
certain point we are overcome with standard overload. The original
idea was to make the code easier to enforce. We ended up making it
more complicated. Florida has codified everything but the NFPA
electric code and some parts of the fire code, adopting NFPA standards
as written. I suspect Florida end up rewriting the whole thing into
the FBC ... as soon as THEY figure out what the NFPA standard
acttually says.
My main beef with NFPA is the way they will reference another
standard, without quoting the text they reference.
In my smoke detector quest I actually followed the references and in
no case was the reference more than a few dozen words ... but without
another $100 book, you couldn't read them. It was clear they were just
selling books.
I have lived intimately with the NEC for over a decade as an
inspector. I understand how it is developed.
The mob rule process they have to "improve" this document has simply
made it a Fibber McGees closet of contradictory rules that get
reshuffled every 3 years, fixing one problem and creating two more.
Why should every stupid thing someone MIGHT do be in the law anyway?

Now there's some in there I _can_ agree with...

- Nehmo -
Are you saying that NFPA is an sans-interest bystander in the
process of
governments adopting codes? NFPA is a full-standing principle in the
process. That’s it’s business model. It managed to fashion itself
into a
monopoly on the access of certain laws.

- Duane Bozarth -
That would be "principal" operator whose business model might be based
on a "principle"...

- Nehmo -
But you missed the other error, so you only get %50 on my subtle test.
It's in there.

--
)|||(__ Nehmo __)|||(

Dennis wrote:

Well, duh... kickbacks from electrical equipment manufacturers,
of course. Why do you think AFCIs are now required for bedrooms?

I believe you may have chosen a rather bad analogy. AFCI's were made code
for the same reason that GFCI's were; for safety. Many fires are attributed
to loose connections. An AFCI may be able to detect this and kill the
circuit before it sits there, day-after-day, week-after-week, lowering the
kindling temperature of the surrounding construction and eventually causing
a fire. BTW, bedrooms are just a start. In a future NEC edition, we may
see ALL the receptacles requiring AFCI protection.


The idea for AFCIs actually came from work at UL that was sponsored by
the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The CPSC was interested how to
reduce residential electrical fires. AFCIs did not exist at that point.

Current AFCIs only detect "parallel" faults (and 30 ma ground faults).
They do not currently detect "series" faults, like loose connections,
but will be required to starting 2008. I think series faults are harder
to distinguish from normal usage.

bud--

On Thu, 03 Nov 2005 09:39:23 -0600, Bud--
wrote:

Dennis wrote:

Well, duh... kickbacks from electrical equipment manufacturers,
of course. Why do you think AFCIs are now required for bedrooms?

I believe you may have chosen a rather bad analogy. AFCI's were made code
for the same reason that GFCI's were; for safety. Many fires are attributed
to loose connections. An AFCI may be able to detect this and kill the
circuit before it sits there, day-after-day, week-after-week, lowering the
kindling temperature of the surrounding construction and eventually causing
a fire. BTW, bedrooms are just a start. In a future NEC edition, we may
see ALL the receptacles requiring AFCI protection.

As near as I can tell from the information easily available on the
net, the number of lives that will be saved yearly by requiring AFCIs
everywhere in the universe is in the low double-digits. They
are a defense against a trivial-to-nonexistant threat.

As near as I can tell from the information easily available on the
net, the number of lives that will be saved yearly by requiring AFCIs
everywhere in the universe is in the low double-digits. They
are a defense against a trivial-to-nonexistant threat.

Is we used that logic we could abandon all of the building codes and
still not have the death toll we have from people not wearing seat
belts.

That'd be fine by me.

Thanks for the information, Bud. I hadn't done ant real research into these
(to any great extent) and picked up that we will be seeing them on more
branch circuits (possibly) from the 1003 IRC commentary. Interesting info
about the series/parallel detection.

I was just looking over the UL website concerning arc-faults, and it appears
(to me at least) that they were placed into code primarily to detect
flexible cord sets (lamp cords). (Of course they will detect all arcing
faults and shorts as well.) But that makes sense as a lot of fires can be
traced directly to defective cordsets and extension cords. The discuss
series/parallel arcing, but don't specifically state that it is parallel
only (although I'm have no doubt you are correct.)

Thanks again,
Dennis

The idea for AFCIs actually came from work at UL that was sponsored by the
Consumer Product Safety Commission. The CPSC was interested how to reduce
residential electrical fires. AFCIs did not exist at that point.

Current AFCIs only detect "parallel" faults (and 30 ma ground faults).
They do not currently detect "series" faults, like loose connections, but
will be required to starting 2008. I think series faults are harder to
distinguish from normal usage.

"Dennis" wrote in message
news:uAyaf.31684$W%2.24001@trnddc06...
I was just looking over the UL website concerning arc-faults, and it
appears (to me at least) that they were placed into code primarily to
detect flexible cord sets (lamp cords). (Of course they will detect all
arcing faults and shorts as well.)

That is why they started with bedroom circuits. More prevalent use of
extension cords (lamps, alarm clocks, electric blankets, etc.) and the
higher probability of damage resulting from beds rolling over the cords.

Ben Miller

--
Benjamin D. Miller, PE
B. MILLER ENGINEERING
www.bmillerengineering.com

"Ben Miller" wrote in message
...
That is why they started with bedroom circuits. More prevalent use of
extension cords (lamps, alarm clocks, electric blankets, etc.) and the
higher probability of damage resulting from beds rolling over the cords.

Add to that the fact that people are sleeping in close proximity to the
fault.

Ben Miller

--
Benjamin D. Miller, PE
B. MILLER ENGINEERING
www.bmillerengineering.com

Well your just a fountain of wisdom, Ben.
(I mean that in a good way, I learned a lot reading your posting.)

Thanks,
Dennis

"Ben Miller" wrote in message
...
That is why they started with bedroom circuits. More prevalent use of
extension cords (lamps, alarm clocks, electric blankets, etc.) and the
higher probability of damage resulting from beds rolling over the cords.