City to form new building trades board

Newton City Council agreed on the creation of a new five-member building trades board on Monday evening.
The new board will replace the building board of appeals, the electrical board and the plumbers examining board with a single entity to handle licensing and permitting issues and make recommendations on construction regulations.
Members of the board will be people with expertise in the building trades who either reside in Newton or who work for a building trades business with a Newton mailing address. The goal will be to have at least two men and two women on the board and at least one board member who has professional expertise in building, electrical work, plumbing work and mechanical work.
Initially, there was some disagreement between council members about the make-up of the board.
Council member Mike Hansen favored a board that was limited to building trades workers who live or work in Newton.
“I have a difficult time appointing somebody in Jasper County to serve in the City of Newton board if they do not reside in the city, or they do not work for a business that has a Newton city address,” he said. “I think we send a seriously flawed message to the people who have those qualifications in saying ‘of the list of those who are available, you people aren’t qualified. So we have to go out in the county to find somebody that is.’”
Marvin Morris preferred allowing anyone living or working in Jasper County to serve on the board, he said, simply to allow for a larger pool of candidates
“I just thought we could include those with in county addresses just added to the pool of resources. Certainly we have a large number of good contractors in Newton,” he said.
Ultimately, council opted to approve the board’s creation unanimously with the requirement reading, in part:
“The board shall consist of representatives with general expertise and familiarity  with building trades in the City of Newton. Each representative shall work in and be familiar with construction in the City of Newton, and either be a resident of the City of Newton or the business which employes them shall have a mailing address of Newton, Iowa.”
Board members will serve three year terms with the appointments staggered so one member would be appointed for one year, two for two years and two for three.