 Good afternoon and thank you for joining me for another episode of Kondo Insider. My name is Jane Sugimura and I'm going to be your host for the show today. And I have as my guest battalion chief, Reed Yoshida. Hi, Reed. Hi. Nice to see you. Thank you, Jane. Thank you for joining us. And you know, we've got a very interesting program today. We're going to be updating the fires as safety ordinance of the city and county of Honolulu. And those of you, you know, who have been following this and I'm sure there are a lot of people who are on Kondo boards who know about this because the initial deadline for doing the life safety evaluation, which is part of this ordinance, was May 3rd, 2021. But that deadline got extended, but we'll get to that, you know, during the show, Reed, tell me, you know, what, what, what, why are, you know, with this, this ordinance that we're talking about the fire safety ordinance, why do we have it? It got passed in 2018. Can you give us some background on that? Yeah. So this ordinance came about primarily because in 2017, there was a significant fire on the Marco Polo fire that it went, I think internationally, it made the news. And it was a very tragic event resulting in a bunch of fatalities of personnel and occupants in a high-rise building. And from that, the building wasn't sprinkled at the time and, and there were a few others, other safety concerns, the firefighters were extremely hard as well as all the other first responders. And we were luckily able to put it out, but we, there was a lot of loss and a lot of lessons learned. So this ordinance came about to, in an, you know, in a huge effort to try to not have this happen ever again. And that's, that's the basis for what this sprinkler ordinance is all about. And, and so the fire department was, was, was tasked to lead a task force, right? It was the fire, the former fire chief, Manuel Nevis, who chaired the task force. And Hawaii council was a member, I think we had 17 people on the task force. Some people from the fire department and some from the, from the city and, and we had some consultants and, and I think we, what we were trying to do is brainstorm and, and, and like you said, lessons learned. And, you know, so why don't we talk about some of the issues that, you know, that you guys saw in trying to fight this fire at, I mean, it was a horrific fire at, at the Marco Polo. And, and like one of the things that I remember the chief talking about were these things called vertical openings. And I didn't know what vertical openings was until I was on the task force. And he, he mentioned that at the Marco Polo, the vertical openings were so large that a person could fit through them. Now, explaining to the listeners why that's so scary to have vertical openings, you know, at a place, you know, at the, at the Marco Polo. And how did that affect the fire? Yeah, so vertical, if we're going to talk specifically first about vertical openings is basically try to imagine if you're barbecuing and you have like a chimney type of thing, the fire often times wants to go up. The heat, the gas, the smoke wants to go up. So if you have a high rise where these units are stacked on top of each other, and it's basically any, any opening or hole that will extend from floor to floor from unit to unit. And, and that fire is looking and smoke is looking for a way to get up and out and continue to grow. So sometimes these holes can be small. Maybe, maybe an example might be a plumbing of where plumbing is at or electrical or sometimes a false ceiling where you have a very large opening. And it's very easy for fire. It's going to want to find more oxygen and fuel and it's going to go up and impact, negatively impact the next person or floor above. So that's a couple of examples of vertical opening and try to picture making a barbecue grill with a chimney and the ones that go from the coals now up the chimney. So it's doing that in a high rise building. There are also, go ahead. No, no, so one of the things that was, was being addressed by this task force was, was like the vertical openings because that's part of the matrix, right? Part of the life safety evaluation. And, and, and so when the licensed professional goes through a building, they're going to look for vertical openings and they're going to basically tell the building, you know, you got vertical openings, you got to close them. And the vertical openings, as I understand it, like when you make a building and you, like you said, you know, there are these pipes and they have to make an opening in the floor so that the pipes can go through the building and then they seal it. But over time, that seal breaks down and now you've got an opening, right, before it was sealed. And so basically now what you have to do when, when the licensed professional goes through your building and says, ah, you got to close your vertical openings, you got to now refill that seal, right? Correct, Gene. Yes. Correct. And sometimes it's sealed and sometimes it needs to be sealed. Yeah. And, and, and another thing with the Marco Polo, there were lots of doors that were opened and there were all these issues with the doors, right? The doors were left open, the unit door, the corridor doors. There were doors with louvers. Tell the listeners why these things are, you know, affect the fire. Thank you, Gene. So yeah, just like the vertical openings, doors that are left open or they don't have the closures where they can blow open from the fire, trying to get from one area to another, that fire is looking for oxygen and is looking for more fuel. So instead of vertically, now you open doors or doors that close or doors that have louvers, now it's horizontally trying to pull through the building and, and it's creating air to allow it to move, not only vertically, not horizontally, but now if the door works, it has a closure. It's rated correctly and it doesn't have louvers. It, it gives us the fire department and the occupants more time, more time to mitigate the fire. Now, ultimately, if there's a sprinkler in there, that's what we want to do is contain it into that one area. Okay. Yeah, talking about sprinklers, okay. And, and, and, you know, with this ordinance, I guess, you know, to, to stay in a nutshell and correct me if I'm wrong, the way the ordinance works is it says that all high rises in Oahu shall be sprinkled except if you are exempt and you're exempt if you are 10 stories or not over 75 feet, or if you have exterior corridors, or if you pass a life safety evaluation. That's basically what it is, right? The Trump is, you got to be sprinkled unless you do these, unless these things exist, right? Thank you, Jane. Yes, you, you are correct. There are a few exceptions in there. And basically it's just like you said. Okay. And, and so, and one of the things, you know, because I was, you know, what you call a novice. I mean, I, I, I don't pretend to know anything about fighting fires. But we were, we were told, the chief said that the whole purpose of us getting together and trying to come up with an ordinance was to protect the people who have to go into these burning buildings and to protect the people who are inside so that they can get out of the buildings, right? That was the whole goal of this, this exercise with all of us meeting together is to find a way to make it safer for the firefighters to fight the fire and to get the people out of the building. That's exactly correct, Jane. You're spot on on that. Okay. So I want to, I wanted to get that clear to the people who are missing because everybody grumbles with, geez, this is so hard. And how come we have to do this? It's going to cost us money. But there was a method to the madness. There was a reason why all of us spent all those hours because the chief said, we got to find a way to make it safer for our firefighters to go into a burning building. And we got to make it safer for the people who are inside to get out. And we got to buy the time. And so so that's why, you know, all these things come into play and like with the doors. And when I remember sitting there and I, you know, when people are talking about door closures and I'm thinking, I don't know what they are. And then they showed it to me and I went home and I really didn't know that I had a door closer on my door. I mean, I lived in my unit for 20 years. I just never looked at the door. And sure, when I open the door, it automatically makes it, it closes it. And it makes it close. I mean, sometimes, you know, it's kind of irritating because you've got to go out with your key because if you want to throw your rubbish away, you know, the door closes, you're locked out. Right. So it's kind of here. But then there's a method to that because of the door has to shut because otherwise it's a fire hazard. Right. Correct. You're correct. And some doors have what they call door stops because those are the people who want to go and throw the rubbish out. So they open the door and they put the door stop. Those are no notes. Those are supposed to be. That's another thing that came out. Right. The door stops have to come off. You've got to have metal door closures on the top. And that's so that the doors closed so that the fire cannot spread. Exactly. And, you know, it's it's it's strange because until I sat there, I didn't know these things. I went home and I said, oh, my God, I have a door closure, you know, and sure enough, it closes, you know, when you go out, it automatically closes the door. And then there are some and I guess in our building, when we did our life safety evaluation, when they checked the corridor doors and we have 23 floors and luckily out of the quarter doors, only six did not close all the way. Right. So now we have to either adjust the door door closures or replace them so that they close all the way so that they don't leave the door a little bit of jar, right? Because if it leaves, if it doesn't close all the way, that means the air can get through and the fire can get through. Correct. And the same thing with the doors, when when they were talking about raided doors, I went home, I went and asked my site manager, you know, I went to that task. First meeting, they told me, you know, fire raided doors. They have this little metal plate on it. He said, oh, yeah, sure. I said, show me. So he walked me out and sure enough, the plate is on the door. And, you know, so these are things. I mean, I learned more by being on this task force and, you know, walking around my building and and finding out that, yeah, we have fire raided doors and the fire raided doors means that if the door is shut, it will keep the fire in in in closed. Right. It won't for for what, 30 minutes, 40 minutes. And that gives the fire department time to fight the fire and the people in the building to get out. Correct. Right. That's why it's important. And that's why it makes a difference. And that's why, you know, you know, when we when the life safety people, when they did our life safety that and I, we did a memo to all of our unit owners saying we're going to the licensed professionals coming through the building. This is what he's going to be looking for. And this is why he's looking. He's going to check the each door unit to make sure it's fire raided, to make sure it's not a hollow door to make sure there's no louvers, because these things have to if it has louvers, it's not fire raided. It has to be replaced, you know. And so our owners were all informed as to what would happen when the license professional came through and why. And so I want you to explain to our listeners that, you know, that that this is not something that the city is making you do just because they're mean or they, you know, they, they're, they're, they, they, they're mad at the high rise people. It's like, why us? Why, you know, it's like, why are you doing it to us? I mean, we're not the victims and we don't want to be victims. And that's why everybody should be on board with this program. Yeah, thank you, Jane. You're absolutely correct. The fire department is all for protecting life, minimizing loss of property and minimizing damage to the environment. And really, we want, we don't want any more lives lost to fire. High rise is a very unique type of fire. You have houses, staffed on houses, and it makes, creates a huge challenge. And we really, like you said, we don't want you to become anybody to become another victim of a fire. Right. And, you know, I think what, what this ordinance has done, I mean, if nothing else, it's got people talking, you know, because now they have deadlines to comply with and they're talking, you know, in the life of the, the, when the life safety engineers, you know, go through and tell them what's, you know, they give them the report. I mean, then they start, you know, thinking, my God, you know, these are things that they, they didn't know about. And, you know, we've been my group as CAI, we've been trying to educate our, you know, a condo association, members and affiliates and trying to tell them that, you know, this is something that's not going to go away. You know, they cannot, you know, bury their heads in the sand and think it's going to go, it's not going to go away. And the clock is ticking, clock is ticking. And we have what, 360 buildings in Oahu that we got to get protected. And if they don't have sprinklers and I'm not a big advocate of sprinklers, but, you know, that's why I was on this task force because I wanted to make sure that condo owners had an alternative. And yes, I understand that the alternative is not going to be cheap, but it's cheaper than sprinklers. And, you know, this way the associations, they have a choice. I mean, if they want to do sprinklers, that's the trump card. You get the sprinklers and you're fine. But if you don't want to do sprinklers, you've got to, you know, you've got to do the other stuff. You've got to pass a life safety evaluation so that you and your building are going to be safe. Correct, Jane. Yeah, thank you, Jane, on that. Yeah. And then, like you said, you know, with the recent ordinances, there are some things to also help out. Some of it was related to COVID. Yeah. And, you know, I guess what, you know, what I'm hearing is that, you know, that, you know, they're talking about, well, you know, these things are are expensive to do and you have to get DPP, you know, the permits. And I guess what the concern is, and I've told them the way the ordinance is set up, you have what the deadline now to to do your LSE was this month, but that got extended one year. So you've got another year and there's more than half, right? More than half of the buildings in O'ahu have already completed their LSEs. As I understand from the last report that the chief sent to the city council. Yes, Jane, thank you, Jane. Yeah, you're correct. Actually, we just sent out a reminder cards to approximately 130 remaining buildings. Just to kind of let them know, hey, the clock, like you said, is ticking and you reach out to the fire department if you need, have questions, reach out to your design professional. But we're about 130 buildings left. So I think we're making good headway. And it's good that we have that extension now to 2022. Yeah. And, you know, the the concern at the beginning was the cost and my building was it was a 300 unit building. Our life safety evaluation costs is ten thousand dollars. So, you know, to me, I think that, you know, that's reasonable. You know, it's not something, you know, I mean, yeah, ten thousand is not chunk change, but, you know, in on the scale of things, the way we do things in an in a condominium, it's not, you know, it's not that expensive if you have less than 300 units, it's going to be cheaper. And and and we've been flashing the fire department website. Why don't you talk about the fire department website? Because that's got everything in it. I said so many people to the fire department website. You know, when I can't answer questions to go to the website, the matrix is there, the the 17 items that they're going to be checking is there, and you will see that a lot of the stuff you can do yourself. You can get your maintenance people. You can do letters to your owners to start telling them to do these things so that when the license professional comes to the building, you're going to get past his scores. Yeah, thank you, Jane. And I'm really glad that you pointed out the website of the fire department just recently upgraded it. And it's a beautiful website now. It should be pretty easy navigation and really good information. And that website link that is flashing on the screen, it that link will take you straight to the sprinkler area. And we have ordinances up as well as the life safety evaluation and the list like Jane, like you said, the current list, I believe it was just updated in April. That's all on the website. And the website also has all kinds of other information that you know, people can look at as far as what the department does. And more specifically, the Fire Prevention Bureau, what we do. So please, please, I highly encourage all the listeners to take a look at this new website and go to the link and really talk about a lot of things on the sprinkler. The ordinances as well as the list. OK, and you know, one of the one of the deadlines is to do the life safety evaluation. Now that life safety evaluation, the deadline is next year. OK. And so once you get that, once you hit that benchmark and everybody's got their life safety evaluation, then you have, you know, another six years to comply, which means the life safety evaluation. And I don't know of anybody who passed the first time. But, you know, they will tell you things that you have to do. And like I say, when we got our report back, I mean, we've had things like six corridor doors don't close. You know, they don't close all the way so that the closures have to be adjusted. And there are some and we have vertical openings that we have to all address. And we we have, you know, there are some units that didn't have smoke detectors. So we're going to have and we did. We were on a campaign, but like I said, the licensed professional goes and picks random buildings. He happened to pick one of the units that didn't have the smoke detectors. So we got dinged on that. And, you know, so, you know, so there are things that we can do that, you know, our in-house people are going to do like, you know, fixing the door closures and fixing our screens on and, you know, and we're working on a campaign. In fact, you know, the smoke detectors are so cheap. Somebody told me we could go to Costco and get them for under ten dollars. And so the association has approved, you know, buying the smoke detectors and just making a list of handyman people. If you can't install it yourself, here's a list. Call them, pay them and the association will pay for your smoke detector. You know, but you got to install them. And once we get them all done, then we can have our licensed professional go through and at least check them off. You know, oh, and one of the things that that that we did. And I don't know if the other buildings are aware of it. There is a list of vulnerable people that that the fire department first responders need. And and so and and, you know, it's it's it was like pulling teeth, you know, people are ashamed. They don't want to say it because we posted these notices. I can remember when we first did it several years ago and said, you know, if you're going to need help, you know, exiting the building in case of an emergency, let us know. And and I guess because we didn't explain why we needed it, you know, you didn't get a whole lot of answers. And so then I went around and said, look, if you know somebody who might have trouble getting out of the building, can you give us their contact information because people are not volunteering it? I know there's I know we have people in this building who are going to need assistance. And the reason why you need to make this list is because there's a box in every condominium. Isn't that true? There should be a box in every condominium, or at least the building manager should have an office with a box in it. And first responders will go there if it's not the fire department, it might be the police. It might be the ambulance, but somebody is going to go to that box. They know to go to that box and they will. And that list has got the names, the contact information of the people who might have trouble getting out of the building. That means they have a hearing problem. They have mobility issues. They can't walk or, you know, or for some reason, they just, you know, are unable to quickly move. And so that's where the focus is going to be, right? The first responders will try to help those people. That's why that's why we have that list. And every condominium is supposed to have that list. And there's a special place in the building where that list is kept. And the first responders know where it is. And so that's one of the items that's on the matrix. And and so. And what was new was that we had to send a letter to the fire department, I guess, to say that we would continue to do it. I mean, we had the list. We have had the list for years, you know, and we updated annually and we updated annually as a matter of force. And if people come to us and say, you know, I, you know, I'm going to need some help if I, if there's an emergency, is there, you know, and so we put them on the list and, you know, and it's when we do our newsletters, we always add that. If you need assistance in getting out of the building in the case of emergency, you've got to tell the management, you know, so that we can make sure that, you know, that information gets to the first responders to so somebody can come and help you. And in and and, you know, we at one time had a fire safety committee and we have, you know, two stairwells and one is open to the air. And so in fact, we checked with one of our local fire guys and it's open to the air. And we said, you know, if we can't get people out of the building because they have mobility, can we at least get them outside through that stairwell that's open to the air? And is that until somebody can come and get them? Is that an accept, you know, like a safe place to move them to? And and and so, you know. But, you know, that's the reason, you know, why, you know, these questions have to be asked and and board members, you know, need to start being proactive in trying to find these people, right? Because it's by the time an emergency hits, it's to figure out, oh, my God, you know, those the next door neighbor, can she make it out? Or what about the guy down the hall? I mean, you can't wait until an emergency happens. You have to have this information before an emergency happens. Yeah. Thank you, Jean. Yeah, that is very helpful information. And the key is that it's updated. So, you know, the building manager, the property manager that has it on site that is without is really updated. And when we arrive, we will know where it is. And, you know, every fire is dynamic. So if the doors close better yet, if there's a sprinkler or or smoke detectors, all those things you talked about, you know, contain the fire, extinguish the fire in a safe way to get out and a safe way for us to get in. And, you know, the ordinance talks about an entity called AJH. That's you guys, right? That is us. Yeah. It's the thank you, Jane. That's the authority having jurisdiction and it is often seen in the fire code. You can see it in the city and calling upon a new fire code. And that that that's us. That is us. So that means that if if anybody has a problem, they need to contact you if they have, if they want an extension or any kind of modification or, you know, some leeway in trying to comply with this ordinance, they have to contact your department, right? That's yeah, thank you, Jane. That is correct. You know, if they are showing good fee and, you know, for example, if they have the building permit and the deadline is coming to a really close and they're showing good fee, they send, they either can contact me, send the letter to the fire chief and we'll respond. And case by case, we'll look at it and we understand if they have the building permit pulled and is something is out of their control and they're showing progress, you know, we're going to look at it on a case by case basis. And look at the extension. OK, well, you know, let me get to the new changes. The new changes, like I said, they extended the deadline. So now there's everything's been extended one year. So that means the life safety evaluation you have until next year, May 3, 2022, to complete a life safety evaluation. And then the the six years to comply with the LSE, that's been extended from 2024 to 2025. And then to actually implement the changes. We have 12 years. So that's been extended one year to 20 to 2031, right? Thank you, Jane. So yes, so the submitting the LSE has been extended to May 3, 2022. Passing the LSE, if that is the route chosen, you have to May 3, 2025. And if you choose to sprinkler, that that year went from 12 years to now 13 years, which takes you to 2031. So when and and there also is some another extension. If you choose to sprinkler with, you know, if you're showing good faith again, I believe in the ordinance, it has an additional three years. And that that's specific if you choose to sprinkler. OK, and the new bills to the new changes also requires a licensed professional to submit the LSE report to the fire department, why they weren't allowed, you know, required to do that earlier. But now they have to submit it to you, right? Thank you, Jane. Yes, you are correct. And since this ordinance 21 dash three came out, it's been phenomenal. We've received a whole bunch. So thank you to all anybody listening out there that submitted. Thank you. We've we've been receiving it and we appreciate it. OK, and the final change that we're going to be talking about with changes is that the opt out if they wanted to do the opt out the way it was done before was, you know, you could have an annual meeting and people could vote. But with the pandemic, you can't have annual meetings. And so so the language was changed. So now you could in lieu of a vote, you can do a written consent, which is a ballot, basically, and you can and that means that the association can send a ballot to all the homeowners and they can sign. And so you don't actually have to have an annual meeting and a vote. And that was directly caused by the pandemic and the fact that associations couldn't have their annual meetings. And so we were getting these calls about what do we want to opt out of? We can't do an annual meeting. How do we do this? OK, so now, you know, the city has amended the ordinance so that now they can do a written consent instead of a vote. Thank you, Jane, you're absolutely correct. And that pandemic, in terms of that particular item you're talking about, is a is a really good thing because, like you said, the time is ticking. And if you're required to submit a vote or make a decision on majority, the sooner, the better, so that you can figure out how how you're going to either pass the LSE or do the sprinkler. So yes, you're correct on that. OK, one question that keeps coming up. And, you know, and it has to do with the building department because, you know, the building department and they're having they have their own troubles, you know, right now and then there's a new director. And, you know, the people have always grumbled, you know, you put in a permit, it takes a long time to get approval. You know, so so how do you comply with these deadlines? And what if you submitted your application and you don't have approval and your deadline is coming up? I mean, what I mean, and if they if the building comes to you and say, hey, hey, Chief, you know, we applied for a permit, but it's taking what? Well, I mean, it's taking 16 months. We don't have our permit yet. So what what are we going to do? Thank you, Jane. Thank you for bringing that up. There is there first of all, there is something in the ordinance that does the that does address the permits. It's a 90 refers to 90 days and anything beyond that is an extended period of time on top of that. If buildings are showing good faith like we talked about and it's out of their control, you know, just contact the fire department and case by case with a good faith, you know, we'll look at the potential extension to that. So we understand we understand the situation. And as long as they're showing good faith case by case, that will be considered. Well, that's good to hear, you know, and and, you know, Chief Sox, when we were testifying at the city council and he said those words about, you know, that if, you know, they show good faith, the fire department's going to, you know, give them the extension. And I said, you know, with all due respect, if it's nice that Chief Sox is saying this, but someday he's going to retire and maybe his replacement, you know, won't, won't remember what Chief Sox told us and told you the city council. And, you know, we're going to have this hard time. And everybody laughed, you know, and then I found out Chief Masuda retired. And I think, oh, God, everybody's, you know, but, you know, so, so that was our concern that people who were involved, you know, in the in the task force from the fire department are all going to retire and we're going to be stuck with new people who who who weren't involved in making those assurances to us about if you do it in good faith, we'll give you the extra time. And I guess I need for you to emphasize that, you know, to the people who are listening. But thank you, Jane. Yes, Chief Potopoulos, Chief Masuda, they did an outstanding job ensuring that there was continuity in this process. I was involved in it from the from the very beginning with them. I was a captain at the time, but I saw the progress. I met with you back then, as well as all the other stakeholders. And and the public has that can be reassured that it will continue with the continuity was passed down and and the knowledge and the goal moving forward for fire safety in terms of these ordinances will be continued. OK, well, you know, we've run out of time and I'm sure, you know, that, you know, the I'm going to ask the fire department to come back if we have further changes and if there are any other issues. Because, you know, the next deadline is is maybe five or six years away. And I'm sure some will pick up some glitches in the interim and and hopefully you will be around to to come back and answer more questions. I'm definitely will, Jane. And really, thank you for this opportunity to share. And I appreciate you coming and being my guest and answering all of our questions and giving us the information about this new fantastic website, which everybody should go and and try out. And thank you very much for being on the show today and to our listeners. Thank you for tuning in and please check in next week, next Thursday at three o'clock for another episode of Condo and Cider. And that's the YouTube show for people who live and work in condos. Thank you and Mahalo. Thank you. Thanks, Jane.