Procedures Writing Group (PWG) Call for Membership

Esteemed Members of the Z136 Community,

As the Chair of the new Procedures Writing Group (PWG), I am sending this request to a broad audience to request your involvement in review of any or all of the established Z136 Procedures. My desire when proposing the creation of the PWG was to assist the ADCOM in their responsibilities regarding the creation and maintenance of the Procedures and to promote transparency in that process.  

It was the opinion of several of my colleagues (and myself) that unnecessary conflict was occurring within the Consensus Body and the ADCOM and that the vast majority of this conflict was based on misunderstandings and a perception of a lack of transparency.  

It is my sincere hope that the PWG can aid in minimizing these issues while helping streamline improvements to the Procedures.  It is important that I make clear that the role of the PWG is to transparently provide recommendations for change to the Procedures.  The PWG has no authority to force any changes – nor (in my opinion) should it.

It is not by coincidence that I am now sending out this request for membership in the PWG.  In conjunction with the DOE LSO Conference, the SSC-6 had a meeting.  The last published year of issue of the ANSI Z136.6 was in 2015.  This means that if a new version is not approved by the Consensus Body by 2025, ANSI will require that the Z136.6 will be withdrawn as an active Standard.  It was agreed that it would not be possible for us to achieve a completed revision this within the remaining time.  

Fortunately, an alternative path is available that would allow the Z136 Consensus Body the ability to re-affirm the existing ANSI Z136.6 until the revision is mature enough for Consensus Body vote.  When it was suggested that a re-affirmation would be needed, I reviewed the existing Procedures to see what steps were required.  Unfortunately, it would seem that there are several changes and clarifications needed to efficiently re-affirm standards.

This led to the question of which path to take… Use the existing procedures to attempt to re-affirm the standard, or attempt to modify the Procedures first and then use the streamlined Procedural process to re-affirm the ANSI Z136.6.  It was the general consensus that changing the Procedures prior to initiating the re-affirmation of the ANSI Z136.6 would likely take longer than using the existing Procedures to re-affirm the standard while working to update the Procedures in parallel with that effort.

So please consider applying for membership to the PWG. I would like a broad and diverse group of members to produce quality suggestions to the ADCOM.

Very Respectfully,

Robert Aldrich, Chair, Procedures Writing Group