Alberta government

Aside from the obvious responsibility of the home builder to produce a quality product, much of the responsibility for issues with leaky homes rests with the Alberta government, since the Alberta Building Code should ensure that homes are built to a reasonable standard.

At the recommendation of our "friends of friends", we wrote a letter to Ivan Moore, the Assistant Deputy Minister for Public Safety.  We got basically a form letter response, here it is:

Thank you for your June 28, 2011 email regarding problems with your home’s building envelope installation.  A home is the largest investment most of us will make and it should be built to the quality Albertans expect and deserve. I am able to provide you with the following information regarding the approach we are taking to mitigate similar issues in the future.

On June 7, 2011, the Government of Alberta announced the development of a regulatory framework for mandatory home warranty to address issues associated with residential construction practices.  A framework proposal is being developed for consideration by government later this year.  The standards for warranty will be more robust than current programs in Alberta, including longer coverage terms, while balancing the needs of industry and consumers.  Government will also consider increasing the fines and limitation period for violations under the Safety Codes Act, which would improve accountability in the construction industry.

In addition to these initiatives, work is underway in other areas that will further address these issues.  A building envelope training course has been developed that will be required for all building safety codes officers (inspectors) to maintain their certification.  This training will help ensure that safety codes officers are well equipped to identify issues with the building envelope at the time of inspection.  Further to this initiative, the Safety Codes Council is also conducting a review of the inspection regime to improve the inspection system throughout the province.

I am confident that these changes will help protect Albertans and improve residential construction practices in the future.  We will take your experience into consideration as we move forward on development of these initiatives.

Thank you again for writing. 

Sincerely,

Ivan Moore

Assistant Deputy Minister

Public Safety Division

This doesn't help us at all, although it *may* help some people in the future.  I am not sure that the government is doing enough or doing it quickly enough.  We have heard about a lot of people with similar issues to us, but I am not sure that the government realizes how widespread the problem is.

If anyone out there has a similar issue, please also send an email to Ivan Moore:

ivan.moore@gov.ab.ca

In future posts, I'll be making some other suggestions about people to contact.