The case for residential fire sprinklers has been debated in the United States for years. But today, model building codes require the installation of automatic fire sprinklers in all one- or two-family new home construction. California (statewide) and Maryland (county by county) have adopted the automatic fire sprinkler provisions of the model building code. Yet opponents continue to work, state by state, to ban residential fire sprinklers.
“Home builders in some states have been successful in getting state law amended to either delay the implementation of the building code or prohibit local jurisdictions from adopting those requirements,” says Steve Muncy, president of the American Fire Sprinkler Association. “And that’s the worst of all possible worlds, when a state government is telling local communities they can’t require home fire sprinklers.”