DALTON, Mass. — The town is considering updating its original 18-year municipal code to 2026 standards. 

 

During a recent Select Board meeting, General Code New England account manager Zach Dumont outlined the 18- to-24 month process. 

 

General Code New England is a division of the International Code Council, which writes all the statewide building codes across the United States. For the last 18 years, the organization has been the codifier for municipalities. 

 

"We work with communities to build, maintain, and update your local municipal code. That is your collection of bylaws, ordinances, regulations, and any other legislation you've ever adopted," Dumont said. 

 

Once the project is complete, the town would have a fully updated set of books and an improved eCode360 site, he said. 

 

"The way the process would work is we would put together a scope of work, a timeline, a price point, and everything that we would want to touch or do as a part of the code project," Dumont said. 

 

When a municipal code is built, it has a general lifespan of about 15 to 20 years, and although that is a long time, it goes by very quickly, he said.