ANSI Z535's 2011 Meeting
Posted by Clarion Safety Systems | 17th Feb 2011
The ANSI Z533 Committee for Safety Signs and Colors meets once a year. According to the American National Standards Institute's policy, the committees that write ANSI's consensus standards must annually meet for the purpose of reviewing their standards. Every five years the ANSI accredited standards committee must choose to either revise, reaffirm or withdraw their standards. The goal is to keep our nation's standards current and relevant and useful for industry and the people they serve. Revising standards is a process that, for the ANSI Z535 committee, is on a strict five year cycle. This is the last year in a five-year cycle and thus, March's meeting is incredibly important as we will be reviewing how the proposed draft revised standards faired in the committee and public review voting process and we will address all comments and any negative ballots. There are six standards in the ANSI Z535 family and if the particular standard had enough votes to pass, the end result of March's meeting will be directions to each subcommittee chairman to make any minor editorial changes needed to ready their subcommittee's document for publication.
As Chairman of the ANSI Z535.2 Standard for Environmental and Facility Safety Signs, Clarion's president, Geoffrey Peckham, oversaw this standard's first major rewriting since it was first published in 1991. The new 2011 version of this standard was completely rewritten to clarify the scope and purpose of the standard, as well as more refined terminology, design considerations, illustrations and sign categories to thoroughly define the full range of safety sign design criteria to be used by facilities in the United States. The goal is to effectively communicate safety so less accidents happen, lives are preserved, and injuries are lessened in the American workplace. Clarion stands for these goals – reducing risk, protecting people, its what were all about.