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Senate Bill 625 would limit the time that officials from the Oregon Fire Marshal’s Office have to review construction projects. But a lot of people didn’t like the way it was worded originally.

So in what state Sen. Alan Olsen, R-Canby, called a “gut and stuff,” the entire bill was thrown out.

A group consisting of stakeholders from the construction industry and the firefighting community assembled last week and hammered out a completely new bill.

Olson told members of the Senate Business and Transportation Committee on Monday that he likes the result.

“This is the way cooperation is supposed to work,” he said, “with all the stakeholders working together.”

The bill would create deadlines for state fire officials to review construction, reconstruction, alteration and repair projects. It also would limit the scope of those reviews.

It would prohibit state fire officials from imposing requirements that contradict state building code and allow local building inspectors or officials from the Department of Consumer and Business Services to perform inspections during construction.

“The original bill was poorly drafted,” Ryan Tribbett, a representative of the National Electrical Contractors Association, told committee members. “There was a lack of clarity.”

The rewritten bill clears up the ambiguities, he said.

Albany Fire Marshal Mike Trabue, who serves on the board of the Oregon Fire Marshals Association, said his organization had “great concerns” with the original draft as well. It seemed unduly harsh on the role of fire officials, he added.

“It was a great time for us to come together and work on this bill,” he said. “I think we will have a better working relationship with the construction industry going forward.”

BILL STATUS: After closing the public hearing on Senate Bill 625, committee members took no further action. However, they will have to vote on it by the end of the week or the bill will die in committee.