Standards Ohio | Ohio 937 | OSU Extension
https://t.co/AEnw82iAnv
— Standards Michigan (@StandardsMich) October 17, 2026
Standards Ohio | Ohio 937 | OSU Extension
https://t.co/AEnw82iAnv
— Standards Michigan (@StandardsMich) October 17, 2026
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Today we break down the catalog for food safety in education communities; with primary attention to consultations from private standard developing organizations and federal agencies charged with food safety. We do so with sensitivity to animals and plants and sustainability of the global food supply chain. Many schools are the communal cafeterias for the communities that own and operate them and run at commercial scale.
We prepare responses to public consultations released by standards developing organizations which, in many cases, have significant conformance enterprises. Core titles are published by the ANSI accredited organizations listed below:
The ASHRAE catalog is the most cross-cutting and fastest moving catalog in the land. If you claim ownership of the United States energy domain you pretty much capture everything related campus safety and sustainability. Best to deal with it on a day-by-day basis as we usually do according to daily topics shown on our CALENDAR.
Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies
American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers
Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers
National Electrical Safety Code (Our particular interest lies in the safety and reliability of off-campus agricultural and research facilities that receive power from regulated utilities)
Rural Electric Power Conference
Kitchen Safety and Security System for Children
TupperwareEarth: Bringing Intelligent User Assistance to the “Internet of Kitchen Things”
Designing an IoT based Kitchen Monitoring and Automation System for Gas and Fire Detection
Re-Inventing the Food Supply Chain with IoT: A Data-Driven Solution to Reduce Food Loss
International Code Council
International Building Code Assembly Group A-2
International Building Code Group U Section 312 Agricultural Buildings
International Building Code Moderate Hazard Factory Industrial Group F-1 (Food Processing)
National Fire Protection Association
National Electrical Code Article 210 (Branch Circuits)
National Electrical Code Article 547 (Agricultural Buildings)
Standard for the Installation of Air-Conditioning and Ventilating Systems
Public Input Report for the 2024 Revision
Standard for Ventilation Control and Fire Protection of Commercial Cooking Operations
Public Input Report for the 2024 Revision
Food Equipment
Commercial Warewashing Equipment
Commercial Refrigerators and Freezers
Commercial Cooking, Rethermalization and Powered Hot Food Holding and Transport Equipment
Commercial Powered Food Preparation Equipment
Manufacturers are required to meet the NEC and CEC electrical codes to have their food equipment sold and used in the United States and Canada. Watch our video for more details. pic.twitter.com/d0vUf4zUl2
— NSF (@NSF_Intl) June 30, 2023
US Federal Government:
US Department of Agriculture
Food & Drug Administration (HACCP)
Emotional Overfeeding: Indulgent Feeding Style and Children’s Weight Status in Preschool
State Governments:
Lorem ipsum @StandardsState
Global:
International Organization for Standardization
International Electrotechnical Commission
Codex Alimentarius
Food safety and sustainability standards populate are of the largest domains we track so if we need a break0-out session, let’s do it. Use the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.
More
Standards supporting vertical farming
STANDARDS SUPPORT SOPHISTICATED FARMING METHODS THAT BRING PRODUCE TO YOUR TABLE
US Food & Drug Administration: Food Facility Registration Statistics (as of January 11, 2021)
National Grange of the Order of Patrons of Husbandry
The U.S. Land-Grant University System: An Overview
American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers Standards Development
The origin of the Land grant act of 1862
International Electrotechnical Commission: Keeping food safe from farm to plate
Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education: Dining Services Programs
Science and Our Food Supply: A Teacher’s Guide for High School Classrooms
Public Input on the 2029 Edition will be received until January 6, 2027
MSU’s relationship with @Pewabic dates back to the 1920s, when Pewabic tile began to appear throughout campus.
Years later, MSU absorbed Pewabic for a short period of time as they transitioned from a production pottery to an educational facility to help ensure their future. pic.twitter.com/SsebtJOjlx
— MSU (@michiganstateu) February 27, 2026
“Wir haben Kunst, damit wir nicht
an der Wahrheit zugrunde gehen”
Not every student is passionate about Graph Algorithms, Green Policy or coding the Internet of Things but wants to devote their energy and talent to making the world a better place by making the world a more beautiful place. Spaces for the “creatives” among them are elevated risk spaces. Today we examine the literature for designing, building and maintaining these occupancies in the safest and most sustainable way; among them the spaces for textile research and fashion design; usually co-mingled with drawing, painting, and textile creation space.
The garment industry is multi-disciplinary and is larger than the energy industry. It contributes to the standard for civilization; even though subtly so. For this reason, starting 2023, we will break down our coverage of the literature that supports the fashion industry from the fine arts domain in separate colloquia every quarter.
Fine Arts 200. Exploration of best practice for spaces used for various forms of creative expression that are appreciated for their artistic or aesthetic value, often involving skills and techniques that require specialized training and expertise.
Fashion 300. Best practice literature for the spaces needed for the creation of artworks using textiles and fibers, such as weaving, quilting, or embroidery. Research and teaching spaces in this domain; at the foundation of the garment industry — one of the largest sectors in the economy in any nation — present surprising challenges
See our CALENDAR for a schedule of those session.
US-based standards developers with a footprint in the fine arts domain:
Committee D13 on Textiles Celebrates a Century
2021 International Building Code: Section 305 Educational Group E
Underwriters Laboratories
Lorem ipsum (product testing: kiln heat specifications, fabric and paint flammability, wet and dry fire extinguishing systems, etc.)
National Fire Protection Association
Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers
Leveraging User-Provided Noisy Labels for Fashion Understanding
Institutional Guidelines
Federal Regulations & Recommendations
Environmental Health and Safety in the Arts Guide for K-12 School, Colleges and Artisans
Global standard developers: (partial list)
Open to everyone. Use the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.
🌤️🌺⛲🌳 pic.twitter.com/bRL7eIY4gg
— Cranbrook Academy of Art (@cranbrookart) July 3, 2023
2026 PUBLIC COMMENT AGENDA | Complete Monograph 2087 Pages
2025 GROUP B PROPOSED CHANGES TO THE I-CODES: Complete Monograph (2630 pages)
36 kitchen related proposals were reviewed during our precious sesssion
2024 GROUP A PROPOSED CHANGES TO THE I-CODES: Complete Monograph (2658 pages)
Commercial kitchens offer several benefits, such as efficient food preparation and large-scale production, allowing businesses to meet high demand. They provide professional-grade equipment and ample space, enabling chefs to explore culinary creativity. Commercial kitchens also promote hygiene and food safety standards, with dedicated cleaning protocols and inspections. However, hazards can arise from the high-temperature cooking equipment, sharp tools, and potentially hazardous substances. There is also a risk of burns, slips, and falls, emphasizing the importance of proper training and safety measures. Adequate ventilation and fire safety systems are vital to prevent accidents and maintain a healthy working environment.
The International Code Council is re-configuring its code development process in nearly every dimension. While that situation stabilizes let us review the back-and-forth on this topic during the previous revision cycle (linked below):
2021 International Building Code Section 306 Factory Group F Moderate Hazard
2021 International Fire Code Section 606 Commercial Cooking Equipment and Systems
The International Code Council has recently re-configured its code development calendar:
2024/2025/2026 ICC CODE DEVELOPMENT SCHEDULE
Public hearings on the proposed changes happen in Orlando, April 7-16.
This is a summary of the actions taken on the 2024 Comments on Proposed Changes to the ICC International Codes at the October 23-28, 2024 Committee Action Hearings #2 held at the Long Beach Convention Center, Long Beach, California. Balloting of local building code officials is now underway.
Welcome to the future: robot chef whips up tasty meals at FIU | FIU News – Florida International University https://t.co/IE4qDASlJv
— StandardsState (@StandardsState) July 7, 2026
Commercial kitchen electrical power wiring requirements are covered extensively in Article 210 through Article 215 of the National Electrical Code. Standards action in this domain is referred to IEEE Education & Healthcare Facility Committee.
ASHRAE International: Calculating Airflow Rates, Cooking Loads in Commercial Kitchens
Related
International Mechanical Code: Chapter 10 Boilers, Water Heaters and Pressure Vessels
AGA Response to The Atlantic Article about Natural Gas Cooking
Thomas Edison State University: Undergraduate Certificate in Gas Distribution
Public Input on the 2029 Edition will be received until January 6, 2027
Books cannot be killed by fire. People die, but books never die
No man and no force can put thought in a concentration camp forever
— Franklin Roosevelt
Many education communities build and maintain cultural resource properties whose safety and sustainability objectives are informed by local adaptations of consensus products developed by the International Code Council (ICC) and the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA). We need to understand the ICC and NFPA product suites as a pair. For most real assets in the education industry they move “roughly” in tandem even though they are produced by different organizations for a different set of customers. Sometimes the out-of-step condition between NFPA and ICC permits subject matter experts on technical committees to make the best possible decisions regarding the safety and sustainability agenda of the interest group they represent; but not always.
Occupancy classification is always a first consideration and both the NFPA and the ICC have a claim to some part of this occupancy concept*. In the ICC suite we find code requirements for many “cultural places of worship” tracking in the following sections of the International Building Code (IBC):
Section 303 Assembly Group A-3
Section 305 Educational Group E
Section 308 Institutional Group I
Note that Sections 305 and 308 recognize the accessory and multi-functional nature of occupancy types in the education industry – i.e child care and adult care function can marge and be an accessory to a place of worship. The general rule in the IBC is that accessory religious educational rooms and religious auditoriums with occupant loads of less than 100 per room or space are not considered separate occupancies. Other standards developers are guided by this rule.







Close coupled to the IBC for this occupancy class is NFPA 909 Code for the Protection of Cultural Resource Properties – Museums, Libraries, and Places of Worship. From the document prospectus:
• This code describes principles and practices of protection for cultural resource properties (including, but not limited to, museums, libraries, and places of worship), their contents, and collections, against conditions or physical situations with the potential to cause damage or loss.
• This code covers ongoing operations and rehabilitation and acknowledges the need to preserve culturally significant and character-defining building features and sensitive, often irreplaceable, collections and to provide continuity of operations.
• Principles and practices for life safety in cultural resource properties are outside the scope of this code. Where this code includes provisions for maintaining means of egress and controlling occupant load, it is to facilitate the evacuation of items of cultural significance, allow access for damage limitation teams in an emergency, and prevent damage to collections through overcrowding or as an unintended consequence of an emergency evacuation.
• Library and museum collections that are privately owned and not open to the public shall not be required to meet the requirements of this code.







Since we are hard upon release of the 2021 Edition of NFPA 909 let us take a backward look at the current (2017) version of NFPA 909 Code for the Protection of Cultural Resource Properties – Museums, Libraries, and Places of Worship. Chapter 14 covers “Museums, Libraries and their Collections”. Chapter 15 covers “Places of Worship”
The 2025 Edition is now open for public input. Let us pick through proposals for the 2021 Edition to inform our approach to its improvement by referencing the technical committee transcripts linked below:
Public Input Report: January 12, 2023
N.B. We find committee response (accepted in principle) to Standards Michigan proposal to articulate conditions in which places of worship and libraries are used as community disaster relief support facilities. We consider this a modest “code win”.
Circling back to the ICC suite we find elevated interest in hardening community owned facilities to tornadoes, hurricane and floods and other storm related risk in the structural engineering chapters of the International Building Code.















Leadership and facility managers for enterprises of this type are encouraged to contribute obtain their own (free) NFPA public participation account in order to directly participate in the 2025 revision of NFPA 909 by logging in here: https://www.nfpa.org/login.
Public consultation on the First Draft of the 2025 Edition closes January 4, 2024.
This document is also a standing item on our periodic Prometheus, Lively and Fine Arts teleconference. See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.![]()
Issue: [15-258]
Category: Fire Safety, Public Safety
Colleagues: Mike Anthony, Josh Elvove, Joe DeRosier
*See NFPA 101 Life Safety Code
LEARN MORE:
Guidelines for the Security of Rare Books, Manuscripts, and Other Special Collections, Association of College & Research Libraries, American Library Association, 50 East Huron Street, Chicago, IL 60611-2795.
“A Legal Primer on Managing Museum Collections,” Malaro, Marie, second edition 1998
“Risk and Insurance Management Manual for Libraries,” Mary Breighner and William Payton, edited by Jeanne Drewes, ALA 2005 ISBN 0-8389-8325-1.
Wisconsin Historic Building Code, Madison, WI:Wisconsin Administrative Code.
Law & Crime Network: Bizarre Details of Louvre Heist That Shocked the World
Several universities host federal enterprises (laboratories, wildlands, Presidential libraries*, etc.) that must conform to Title 40 United States Code, Public Buildings, Property, and Works Paragraph 486(c) provides statutory authority for the head of each executive agency to issue orders and directives necessary to manage the Government’s property.
Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) 41 Federal Property Management Regulations Part 101, Subpart 20.5 “Physical Protection”, prescribes policies and methods for physically protecting buildings and grounds operated by GSA and other Federal Executive agencies. The Department of the Interior’s property management regulations are in Part 114 of CFR 41.
Museum Management Chapter 14: Museum Collections Security
36 CFR 79: Curation of Federally-Owned and Administered Archeological Collections
Standard Methods of Fire Tests for Flame Propagation of Textiles and Films
* There are only a few education communities that host Presidential Libraries:
Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum – West Branch, Iowa (Hoover Institution, Stanford University)
Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library and Museum – Austin, Texas (The University of Texas at Austin)
Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library and Museum – Ann Arbor, Michigan (The University of Michigan)
George H. W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum – College Station, Texas (Texas A&M University)
The first elevator in the United States was installed at Harvard University in 1874. It was not a passenger elevator as we typically think of today, but rather a freight elevator used to move heavy items within a building. The installation of this elevator marked an important development in building technology and transportation within multi-story structures. It was based on the design of Elisha Otis, who is famous for inventing the safety elevator with a safety brake system that prevents the elevator from falling if the hoisting cable fails. Otis’ innovation played a pivotal role in making elevators safe and practical for everyday use, leading to their widespread adoption in buildings around the world.
International Building Code Chapter 30: Elevators and Conveying Systems
Education communities are stewards of 100’s of lifts, elevators and moving walks. At the University of Michigan, there are the better part of 1000 of them; with 19 of them in Michigan Stadium alone. The cost of building them — on the order of $50,000 to $150,000 per floor depending upon architectural styling — and the highly trained staff needed to operate, maintain and program interoperability software is another cost that requires attention. All building design and construction disciplines — architectural, mechanical and electrical have a hand in making this technology safe and sustainabile.
We start with international and nationally developed best practice literature and work our way to state level adaptations. Labor for this technology is heavily regulated.
Its a rarefied and crazy domain for the user-interest. Expertise is passionate about safety and idiosyncratic but needs to be given the life safety hazard. Today we review o pull together public consultation notices on relevant codes, standards and regulations today 11 AM/EDT.
More
NFPA 70 Article 620 Elevators, etc.
NEC Article 620 | David Herres
International Building Code Chapter 30: Elevators and Conveying Systems
Inside Higher Ed: Tragedy in an Elevator
University of Michigan Elevator Recall Control Wiring Schematic
University of Michigan Elevator Shaft Lighting Schematic
BOMA International sets the standard for measuring buildings. In 1915, BOMA published its first office standard, Standard Method of Floor Measurement. Throughout the years, the standard has been revised to reflect the changing needs of the real estate market and the evolution of office building design.
BOMA International is the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) secretariat for a suite of area measurement standards.
The BOMA catalog remains active, with recent revisions reflecting changes in building use, energy accounting and increasingly complicated mixed-use occupancies.
Inspired by Lord Kelvin’s “If you can not measure it, you can not improve it” and Peter Drucker’s adage “If you can’t measure it, You can’t improve it” and W. Edwards Deming’s counter-argument — “It is wrong to suppose that if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it – a costly myth.” we present the standards catalog of the Building Owner’s Management Association:
BOMA Area Measurement Standards Timeline 1915-2021
At the moment all titles in this catalog seem to be stabilized. Largely because a sizeable portion of square footage in every school district, college, university and university-affiliated healthcare research and clinical delivery system derives at least part of its funding from governments at all levels there are workgroups devoted to measuring square footage and documenting its use. For example:
Space Management: University of Oklahoma
Space Management: Texas A&M University-San Antonio
Space Management Policy: University at Buffalo
Getting square-footage right is essential for securing an organization’s sustainability and “green” claims for example. The links in previous posts provide for information about future public consultations.
We maintain the BOMA catalog on the agenda of our Space Planning, Hammurabi and Architectural colloquia, hosted 6 to 8 times annually. See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting, open to everyone.
Posted March 20, 2021
We drill into the specifics commonly found in education communities: sub-lease of space to private industry in publicly-owned facilities. The Building Owners and Managers Association International is an ANSI-accredited consensus standard developer and revised its standard — BOMA Z65.5 Retail Properties: Standard Method of Measurement. Measuring the area of a retail building can quickly become complex when variables must be considered such as ancillary space, mezzanines and storefront lease lines. Many large research universities have long since leased space within many of their building envelopes for private industry to service their communities — student unions, hospitals, dormitories and athletic venues, for example. From the project prospectus:
Z65.5 is intended exclusively for retail properties and their associated structures and may be applied to single-tenant, multi-tenant or multi-building configurations. It features a single method of measurement, with two levels of measurement data, known as Partial Measurement and Overall Measurement for retail properties. It does not measure sidewalks, surface parking, drainage structures, or other ancillary site improvements. This standard is chiefly designed to generate Gross Leasable Area figures, a key metric in retail leasing; however, it also produces area figures which may be of interest to those examining space utilization, valuation, benchmarking, and the allocation of building expenses to various cost centers. The scope of this standard is not intended to be submitted for consideration as an ISO, IEC, or ISO/IEC JTC-1 standard.
Public consultation is open until February 8th.
You may obtain an electronic copy from: floorstandards@boma.org. Send comments (with optional copy to psa@ansi.org) to: floorstandards@boma.org. We encourage user-interest subject matter experts in education facility management to participate directly in the BOMA standards development process by communicating directly with Tanner Johnson at BOMA (tjohnston@boma.org) or 202-326-6357 for more information.
We keep the BOMA catalog on the standing agenda of our colloquia devoted to building construction best practice. See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.
Issue: [14-117]
Category: Architectural, Facility Asset Management
Colleagues: Jack Janveja, Richard Robben
More
Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education
Posted February, 20 2020
The Building Owners and Managers Association International (BOMA) is an ANSI-accredited consensus standard developer. BOMA has initiated the process of revising its real property measurement standard — BOMA Z65.2 For Industrial Buildings: Standard Methods of Measurement. The primary objectives of this standard are:
– To promote an unambiguous framework for determining the areas of Industrial Buildings with a strong focus on Rentable Area calculations;
– To facilitate transparency and clear communication of building measurement concepts among all participants in the commercial real estate
industry;
– To allow a comparison of values on the basis of a clearly understood and generally agreed upon method of measurement; and
– To align concepts and measurement methodologies with the International Property Measurement Standards: Industrial Buildings (January 2018)
document.
Comments due March 15th
Click here to view these changes in full (Page 2)
Send comments (with optional copy to psa@ansi.org) to: tjohnston@boma.org













Standards Michigan follows, but d0es not advocate in most of the BOMA standards suite for the following reasons:
We encourage user-interest subject matter experts in education facility management to participate directly in the BOMA standards development process by communicating directly with Tanner Johnson at BOMA (tjohnston@boma.org) or 202-326-6357 for more information.
We maintain the entire BOMA suite on our periodic Model Building Code colloquia. See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.
Issue: [15-200]
Category: Architectural, Space Plaaning, Facility Asset Management
Colleagues: Jack Janveja, Richard Robben
LEARN MORE:
Facilities Information Management
Guideline for Square Footage Requirements for Educational Facilities
Guide to School Site Analysis and Development
5.18.20
The federal manual has gone approximately 20 years without a comprehensive revision. Some settlements have gone ahead and made modifications of their own. Today at 3:00 4:00 PM EDT the Campus FM Technology Association is hosting a “Water Cooler” discussion about organizing an update. MORE
Western Michigan University maintains a locally updated FICM classification resource dated 2024.
WMU Facilities Management — FICM
Ohio Department of Higher Education maintains area classification codes adapted from the 2006 federal manual. Its documentation explicitly acknowledges differences between its classifications and the updated FICM definitions.
Ohio Higher Education — Area Type Codes
Washington State University continues to identify the 2006 FICM as its official campus space-classification reference.
Washington State University — FICM
Today, special attention to managing elevator passengers trapped in elevators during power outages. Incident management involves the following:
These redundancies, required by ASME A17.1 codes in most jurisdictions, have made prolonged entrapments extremely rare and almost never dangerous.
CMP-12 Public Input Transcript | CMP-12 Public Comment Transcript
Elevator, escalator and moving walk systems are among the most complicated systems in any urban environment, no less so than on the #WiseCampus in which many large research universities have 100 to 1000 elevators to safely and economically operate, service and continuously commission. These systems are regulated heavily at state and local levels of government and have oversight from volunteers that are passionate about their work.
These “movement systems” are absorbed into the Internet of Things transformation. Lately we have tried to keep pace with the expansion of requirements to include software integration professionals to coordinate the interoperability of elevators, lifts and escalators with building automation systems for fire safety, indoor air quality and disaster management. Much of work requires understanding of the local adaptations of national building codes.
Some university elevator O&M units use a combination of in-house, manufacturer and standing order contractors to accomplish their safety and sustainability objectives.
In the United States the American Society of Mechanical Engineers is the dominant standards developer of elevator and escalator system best practice titles; its breakdown of technical committees listed in the link below:
C&S Connect: ASME Proposals Available for Public Review
Public consultation on a new standard for electrical inspector qualifications closes May 27th.
ASME A17.7/CSA B44.7 – 20XX, Performance-based code for elevators and escalators (280 pages)
Safety Code for Existing Elevators and Escalators
Guide for Inspection of Elevators, Escalators, and Moving Walks
Guide for Elevator Seismic Design
As always, we encourage facility managers, elevator shop personnel to participate directly in the ASME Codes & Standards development process. For example, it would be relatively easy for our colleagues in the Phoenix, Arizona region to attend one or more of the technical committee meetings; ideally with operating data and a solid proposal for improving the A17 suite.
All ASME standards are on the agenda of our Mechanical, Pathway and Elevator & Lift colloquia. See our CALENDAR for the next online teleconferences; open to everyone. Use the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.
Issue: [11-50]
Category: Electrical, Elevators, #WiseCampus
Colleagues: Mike Anthony, Jim Harvey, Richard Robben, Larry Spielvogel
More:
Bibliography: Elevators, Lifts and Moving Walks
ISO/TC 178 Lifts, escalators and moving walks
New update alert! The 2022 update to the Trademark Assignment Dataset is now available online. Find 1.29 million trademark assignments, involving 2.28 million unique trademark properties issued by the USPTO between March 1952 and January 2023: https://t.co/njrDAbSpwB pic.twitter.com/GkAXrHoQ9T
— USPTO (@uspto) July 13, 2023
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