Denver-Based Program Seeks to Improve Home Safety
A new program launched by two Denver construction and home safety experts hopes to educate construction workers, architects, and occupational therapists on how to make homes safer for all ages and demographics.
The Denver Business Journal reports that Erik Listou and Louie Delaware, two Denver-based home safety professionals, developed the Living in Place Institute, LLC in order to better educate homeowners and home builders on ways to make living at home safer. Listou and Delaware, currently writing a book containing their tips entitled “How to Live in Place,” have decades’ worth of experience in the home safety field.
Though the program is geared toward older homeowners, Listou says that the program is open to people of all ages. The Living in Place Professional certification program has two objectives: how to make an existing home safer, and how to build a new home with those features in mind.
Listou and Delaware want their tips to extend beyond the program. They hope that their work will lead local and state governments to adopt new building codes to ensure safety. Many of these codes are already required in public buildings, as mandated by the Americans with Disabilities Act. However, these requirements are not applicable to private buildings.
As such, Listou and Delaware want to see personal safety requirements amended to current building codes.
“Codes don’t go far enough,” Delaware said.
The program will also have a mobile app (currently in development) that can help home inspectors, home builders, and residents to effectively evaluate the safety features of a home. The app will also confidentially gather data that the Living in Place Institute, LLC will then use to educate the building industry, Medicare, Medicaid, and other organizations on how to make homes safer.
In addition to home safety, energy efficiency is a priority for new homes. Recently built energy efficient homes consume, on average, 21% less energy for space heating than older homes without such features.
