Carbon monoxide detectors are required effective July 1, 2009
Homeowners and homebuilders in Colorado will be required to install carbon monoxide detectors in new, rented, remodeled and offered for sale single family homes and multi-family residences under a new bill signed by Governor Bill Ritter on Tuesday afternoon, March 24, 2009, at Denver Fire Station No. 10. The detectors shall be installed within fifteen feet of the entry to each room used for sleeping or in locations specified by any applicable building code.
Carbon monoxide is a poisonous gas that one cannot see or smell. It can be fatal within a few minutes of exposure. Most tragedies happen in the winter and connected with the increased use of fuel-burning appliances, working on gas, wood, kerosene, coal or fuel, all of which emit carbon monoxide.
House Bill 09-1091 “The Lofgren and Johnson Family Carbon Monoxide Safety Act.” will take effect on July 1, 2009.
The law was introduced, approved and signed into effect after the deaths of Denver investment banker Parker Lofgren and his family and Lauren Johnson.
Parker Lofgren, 39; his wife Caroline Lofgren, 42; and their children, Sophie, 8, and Owen, 10, were found dead in a multimillion-dollar house in Aspen on November 27, 2008, when that house filled with carbon monoxide. The Denver family won a holiday stay in the home as part of a fundraising auction. Parker Lofgren was a managing director of St. Charles Capital, a Denver-based investment bank that he co-founded in 2005.
In January, 23-year-old Lauren Johnson – a graduate student of University of Denver – died in her apartment of carbon monoxide poisoning.
Neither the home rented by the Lofgrens family nor Lauren Johnson’s apartment had carbon monoxide detectors.
You can buy carbon monoxide detectors either in the local building stores or Home Depot in Denver Metro area.
If you are interested, here is a Colorado
concerning carbon monoxide detectors.
