Item Number: 4
City Council / Board of Directors
Public Hearing(s)
Meeting of: November 4, 2025
Submitted By:
Joe Slegers, Building Official
Subject:
An Amendment to the Victorville Municipal Code with an environmental exemption, repealing and amending various chapters and sections of Title 8 (Fire) of the Victorville Municipal Code to adopt the 2025 edition of the California Fire Code as mandated by the State of California
Recommendation:
That the Honorable City Council:
(1) Open and conduct a Public Hearing;
(2) Close the Public Hearing;
(3) Find the adoption of Ordinance No. 2460 exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”) pursuant to CEQA Guidelines section 15061(b)(3); (4) Introduce Ordinance No. 2460 for first reading by title only; (5) Waive further reading in full of proposed Ordinance No. 2460; and (6) Set a second Public Hearing for December 2, 2025, to consider adoption and passage of Ordinance 2460 and direct the City Clerk to publish notice in accordance with Government Code Section 50022.3
Fiscal Impact:
There is no fiscal impact associated with this action.
Strategic Plan Goal:
The City of Victorville Strategic Plan 2023–2026 identifies multi-year strategic goals and corresponding strategies to guide the City’s efforts toward achieving its long-term objectives. Goal B, Public Safety, focuses on implementing public safety strategies to support a thriving and growing community. The codes being presented as part of this item are consistent with the intent of this goal, as they contribute to enhancing public safety and the overall growth of the community.
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Background:
The State of California triennially adopts updated versions of all parts of Title 24 of the California Code of Regulations. California Health and Safety Code section 17960 requires cities and other local jurisdictions to enforce the provisions of the California Building Code Standards published by the California Buildings Standards Commission in Title 24 of the California Code of Regulations. Part 9 of Title 24 of the California Code of Regulations is the California Fire Code (“CFC”). Ordinance 2460, currently before the Council for consideration, includes amendments related to the adoption of the 2025 edition of the CFC and Title 8 of the Victorville Municipal Code (“VMC”).
Discussion:
The State of California triennially adopts updated editions of all parts of Title 24 of the California Code of Regulations, including CFC. The majority of the proposed amendments reflect updates to the 2025 editions of codes that the State of California requires the Fire Department to enforce. The proposal also includes revisions to several sections of the VMC.
Adoption of the following updated codes will bring the City of Victorville into compliance with State-mandated regulations, thereby ensuring consistency with the 2025 California Building Standards Code. As required by the State of California, the 2025 State-mandated codes will replace the 2022 editions currently adopted in the VMC, prior to their effective date of January 1, 2026.
Proposed Ordinance No. 2460 (Attachment A) revises Chapter 8.08 of Title 8 in the VMC to adopt by reference the 2025 edition of the CFC, including Appendices B, BB, C, CC, D, and H, along with other local amendments permitted under State law. The majority of the revisions are simply updates to the 2022 version of the code already enforced by the Fire Prevention Division as required by the State. The additional updates are clarifying and/or clean-up changes, including the renumbering of several administrative sections of Chapter 1 of the CFC due to model code changes and injections. Adoption of the 2025 CFC will bring Victorville into compliance with the State mandated Fire Code; therefore, providing an increased overall level of code compliance within the City. The State mandates that all California Building Standards Codes, including the CFC, be adopted by local agencies prior to their effective date of January 1, 2026.
As the 2025 CFC exceeds 800 pages of text, the entirety of Part 9 of Title 24 cannot feasibly be included in this Staff Report. However, the full text of the California Fire Code is available at https://www.dgs.ca.gov/BSC/Codes and also available for review in the City Clerk’s Office during the time period pending final adoption of the CFC.
The 2025 CFC revisions align with and reference the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) Standards and the 2024 International Fire Code, enhancing fire and life safety protection levels within the community.
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Additional Revisions to Title 8
In February 2019, Ordinance No. 2382 was adopted as part of the re-establishment of the City’s Fire Department. Ordinance No. 2382 established Title 8 of the VMC as “Fire” and added new chapters to memorialize the establishment of the City of Victorville Fire Department. Although several revisions to Title 8 were made in 2022 through Ordinance No. 2433 during the last triennial Fire Code adoption, additional updates are now being recommended to better reflect the Victorville Fire Department’s current and planned operations after more than seven years of service.
The attached Ordinance No. 2460, includes numerous minor revisions to Title 8 have to correct defined terms, capitalization, and similar items. More substantive changes have been made to the following sections:
Section 8.08.010 has been updated to more accurately reflect current and anticipated local climate, topographical, and geological target hazards, as well as specific risks such as industrial mining processes, limited water availability in isolated areas, and the transport of hazardous materials via interstates, highways, railways, and pipelines.
Overall, these updates to Title 8 aim to better represent the Fire Department’s existing operations and to clarify existing language and procedures.
Section 8.08.040 has been updated to reflect the current composition, titles, staffing of the department, and legal requirements based upon case law regarding violations, penalties, and convening a Board of Appeals per CFC chapter 1. CFC chapter 5 has been revised to provide increased public safety with respect to Security Gates, which allow First Responders rapid access to commercial and multi-family gated locations, which has been of great concern to our Police Department. Existing non-compliant gated locations will have 12 months to come into compliance.
Fire Sprinklers are integral to the safety of the community and the protection of life and property due to the historically high volume of fires that occur within the community and the limitation of available fire resources. CFC Chapter 9 has been amended with respect to Fire Sprinkler requirements for any building/structure over 5,000 sq. ft., which had been in continual force for the duration that County Fire had been providing fire services to the City. During the transition back to City-provided fire services, this requirement was erroneously omitted during a previous municipal code update. This update corrects that omission.
Carbon Dioxide (Co2) is used in many commercial operations as a refrigerant and most commonly in restaurant beverage dispensing. Co2 displaces oxygen and is classified as an asphyxiant, causing a suffocation danger to employees and the general public and requires leak detection for all installations. CFC Chapter 57 has been amended to require Carbon Dioxide (Co2) leak detection for existing non-compliant operations within 12 months of discovery.
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CFC Appendix B has been amended from a 75% reduction to a 50% reduction of required fire flow with the installation of fire sprinklers, which provides reliable firefighting water resources. This also re-establishes a requirement that was enforced during County Fire's tenure.
CFC Appendix D has been amended to provide safer Fire Department access to newly constructed buildings/structures for the purposes of rescue access, firefighting, and to protect firefighters and fire apparatus from radiant heat and structural collapses.
Adoption by Reference - Second Noticed Public Hearing
As the City’s Fire Code is not contained in VMC Title 16, under the City’s customary ordinance procedures, the CFC amendments would not receive two noticed Public Hearings prior to final adoption as is the case with the City’s adoption of the other State- mandated 2025 Building Standards Codes. Therefore, as do many other public agencies, the City utilizes the specific adoption by reference procedures in Government Code Section 50022.1 et seq. to adopt the CFC. Government Code Section 50022.3 requires that the City set and notice a second Public Hearing following the introduction of proposed Ordinance No. 2460, which must comply with Government Code Section 6066. Staff therefore requests that the City Council set the second Public Hearing to occur at the regularly scheduled City Council meeting to be held on December 2, 2025, and direct the City Clerk to publish notice thereof on November 14th and November 21st.
A blackline comparison version (Attachment B) shows the changes to be made to the various provisions of Title 8 by Ordinance No. 2460. Staff recommends that the Honorable City Council introduce Ordinance No. 2460 for first reading as discussed herein.
Environmental Assessment
The adoption of this Ordinance is not subject to the provisions of the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”) pursuant to Section 15061(b)(3) of the CEQA Guidelines, as the proposed code amendments, which deal primarily with text updates and relocations, as well as administration of Title 8 of the Victorville Municipal Code, do not have the potential to cause a significant effect on the environment since they do not increase land use allowances or modify existing standards in a manner that will cause negative effects on the environment. Therefore, it can be seen with certainty that the proposed adoption of the 2025 State-mandated CFC with local amendments will not have a significant effect on the environment. Moreover, projects subject to the standards contained in the 2025 CFC or any local amendment thereto will be reviewed for consistency with CEQA on an individual basis.
Staff remains available for any questions or comments.
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Prepared By:
Jeremy Kosick, Deputy Fire Marshal
Attachments: A. Ordinance No. 2460
B. Blackline Version Showing Revisions to Title 8