State Appeal Court Upholds Publishers of Plumbing Code

The International Assn. of Plumbing and Mechanical Officials, publishers of the Uniform Plumbing Code, has won a unanimous decision upholding the manner in which the model code is compiled.

A three-judge panel for the California Court of Appeal for the Second District has ruled that there is no evidence to support the contention that IAPMO, in the uniform code, engages in false and misleading advertising.

The appeal, filed on behalf of the Friends of the Earth, the Consumer Federation of America and the AFL-CIO’s State Building and Construction Trades Council, grew out of IAPMO’s inclusion of plastic pipe in the 1982 uniform code while the issue of pipe toxicity was being studied by the California Department of Housing and Community Development.

The groups claimed that IAPMO engaged in false and misleading advertising by including plastic pipe in the uniform code as an acceptable means of drinking-water transport. They argued that IAPMO had failed to adequately test such pipe for health and safety hazards, specifically its purported toxic effects both on pipe installers and drinking water.