Roofing Licensure Yes or No?

Well, I'm from Alabama but I don't fly by night. In fact I'm getting older by the minute and I'm usually asleep within a few hours after dark these days. Wish I could fly though, the traffic around here is getting ridiculous.

Last time I checked a State License is required for any job with a contract price of $10,000 and up but not for anything less. Other than that, a city and/or county license and permit is required to do any type work on a residential home including a simple roof repair.

Any homeowner can get a permit to roof his own home without needing a license but would need a license to roof someone else's unless he's just helping them out.

How much do I spend? I purchase the license in the county where I live and operate out of annually for around $220. Other than that, I go buy a license and permit when an inspector stops by a job I'm working on in another city or county about once every three years for roughly the same cost. :huh:

Anyone with cash can go buy a license and permit. That is the only requirement. There are no inspections by any government entity when it comes to residential roofing. The few times anyone comes around checking for a license and permit, they usually don't even get out of their vehicle. It is 100% about generating revenue for the government entities and absolutely NOTHING else at all.

But you make a huge leap when you equate small government-minded people with jacklegs. Not to pat myself on the back, but to make the point: yesterday we repaired a customer's spray foam roof that was guaranteed by a competitor because he won't stand behind his work. For free. We are the opposite of jackleg.

Although we are a quickly-dying breed, there are still those of us who believe that government is only there to fight wars, settle property disputes, and keep us from killing each other. State government, granted, is given more power, but it too should be kept under tight control. That's what I'm doing right now, voicing my displeasure at my state overstepping its bounds. I'm not suggesting that licensing should be ignored if it becomes law.

I was born & raised in Dodge City, Kansas, the original wild west town. From there I moved to Texas in 1980. We are fiercely independent, we make our own way, and if a competitor or crooked contractor steps out of line we deal with him ourselves in whatever creative way that seems appropriate to his misdeed. Just this week my roofer friends and I did just that on Facebook, when an Alabama fly-by-night moved into one of our little towns after hail and started throwing monkey poop. In fact, RCS member Robert Ford helped us pummel the guy into oblivion. Last I knew he was scooting his crooked little butt back to Alabama after we gang-raped him, letting him know that inspectors, OSHA, and the state comptroller would be conducting daily proctological exams on him until he got the point. That is how it should be, people/contractors taking out their own trash.

And yes, I realize that OSHA, the inspectors and the comptroller are government entities. But those entities are already in place and are a tool to use. Had they not been in place, the fly-by-night would have been dealt with differently, probably in an alley behind a roof he was working on.

Not equating freedom with laziness. Not calling you lazy either, Tim, and I'm sure not calling myself lazy. Jacklegs are lazy, though. Undisciplined lazy. Probably some of the hardest-working lazy people we'd ever meet. License or no license, you have to sell your product and yourself either way. Citizenship is a license. We're stirring around some kind of muddled up concept verbiage here in a not too productive way. Missing some connections for sure. But it's not about freedom. What takes away your freedom is 1. a tyrant, 2. a bulging mindless population too lazy to take responsibility for itself and devouring everything it can get its hands on, 3. an over-weaning bureaucracy that has more interest in obstructionism than in getting things done, 4. weak government, 5. private entities feasting on assets held in trust for the common good. We could go on, right? Not just any one thing. Licensure for roofing contractors is so far out on this horizon it's no more than a speck. I don't have any interest in moving to Texas so you have nothing to fear from me. And I don't care whether Texas adopts a license law either. Means nothing to me. All y'all can hannel it however you want. Where I do agree with you is that freedom is fragile and I share your frustration big-time. None of my frustration however is even remotely related to my roofing license. Wouldn't part with it for the world.

Too many people. Way too many people. Virtually unmanageable.

Oh the irony of it all!

Let freedom ring - open those gates - let everyone in to do as they please - let the "market" weed em' out - to heck with govt.....Oh wait! What's this? Wages stagnating - too many Jacklegs"? - country going in the toilet? Oh my.....

egg Said: There will always be jacklegs nibbling at the periphery, but when a state adopts licensure, any real player has no problem maintaining a license and any unlicensed company trying to do enough volume to be a real business is going to get its a$$ kicked in no time flat.

We dont use the regular police force except to make arrests. The sting ops are simple and cheap. You have to be pretty much a complete ignorant idiot to get yourself caught up in one so when they scoop up multiple flakes with one simple request for bids, the public gets its moneys worth big time. Strain them out I say. Like weeds: youll never get them all but thats no reason to throw away your hoe. Has nothing to do with freedom.

Take the illustration of drivers licenses. There will be a percentage of people driving, or occasionally driving, without one. Like the people who have had them suspended and think they can go ahead and sneak around without getting caught. Eventually you do get caught. Now make it legal to drive without a license and see what happens to the quality of driving. Where is the leverage against manslaughter-style driving then? That wont tie up the police a lot more than they are tied up now? People are lazy. Of course they/we want freedom. Throw millions of them together in one tiny space and you have to have some discipline or you get nothing but homicide. Discipline is achieved at the expense of (some sorts) of freedom. How did that song go? Freedoms just another word for nothing left to lose.

Kinda chaps my hide actually. Young soldier is told to give his shabby winter coat to an officer who doesnt have one. He refuses. Commanding general orders him shot for insubordination. That would be Andrew Jackson, author of the Trail of Tears. Big-hearted freedom lover of the first rank.

Whatever.

Lazy = freedom? Interesting observation.

Of course everyone benefitting off the government machine is going to defend said machine. Doesn't make it right or reasonable.

I haven't been called lazy in a long time. Nobody who knows me calls me that. Been humping it 60-80 hour weeks for 37 years, not including those years of lugging shingles after school. Damn sure don't know any 1-legged roofers with a bum arm who do what I do every day. Lazy?

In Texas we still understand freedom and how fragile it is. For now. We have so damn many Mexicans and Californians coming here, wanting to model Texas after their own failed states.

The numbers are stacked against me and my old fashioned kind. Mexicans are reproducing far faster than are caucasians - the writing is on the wall. At some point in the not too distant future I'll buy enough land that I'm insulated from the great huddled masses. I'll sit on the porch and bitch to my grandkids about those who threw this country down the toilet while greedily protecting their rice bowls because they lacked enough creativity to explain to their customers why they should use them, rather than having a government entity hold their hand.

We don't need licensure, we need The Purge!

Thanks egg - agreed

There will always be jacklegs nibbling at the periphery, but when a state adopts licensure, any real player has no problem maintaining a license and any unlicensed company trying to do enough volume to be a real business is going to get its a$$ kicked in no time flat.

We don't use the regular police force except to make arrests. The sting ops are simple and cheap. You have to be pretty much a complete ignorant idiot to get yourself caught up in one so when they scoop up multiple flakes with one simple request for bids, the public gets its money's worth big time. Strain them out I say. Like weeds: you'll never get them all but that's no reason to throw away your hoe. Has nothing to do with freedom.

Take the illustration of drivers licenses. There will be a percentage of people driving, or occasionally driving, without one. Like the people who have had them suspended and think they can go ahead and sneak around without getting caught. Eventually you do get caught. Now make it legal to drive without a license and see what happens to the quality of driving. Where is the leverage against manslaughter-style driving then? That won't tie up the police a lot more than they are tied up now? People are lazy. Of course they/we want freedom. Throw millions of them together in one tiny space and you have to have some discipline or you get nothing but homicide. Discipline is achieved at the expense of (some sorts) of freedom. How did that song go? Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.

Kinda chaps my hide actually. Young soldier is told to give his shabby winter coat to an officer who doesn't have one. He refuses. Commanding general orders him shot for insubordination. That would be Andrew Jackson, author of the Trail of Tears. Big-hearted freedom lover of the first rank.

Whatever.

Michigan

Can he? yes . . . May he? . . . no

Yes, yes he can and yes he may.

$150 every 3 years and $100 for 3 Continuing Education courses (legal, safety, trade)

It has not. As low skill jobs disappear, low skill workers seem to gravitate to our trade for beer money . . . or less.

Not particularly . . CE can be done on line

It is not. The state tries to get the local prosecutor to enforce, but there is no money in it, and the prosecutors have bigger fish to fry. (knifing, shooting, assault, drunk/drugged driving, etc)

Wow! Thanks Roofguy - For clearing that up!

CA No Yes $200 Huge as compared to CO. where charlatans out-number legit. State of CA. consumer affairs through local law enforcement

and what egg said.

CO Yes Yes Thousands $ through local municipalities that have no teeth - waste of $ - No benefit to contractor nor consumer. Yes - Waaayyy complicated as each municipality, (counties/cities),have their own notions. Incredible waste of resources. Nothing's really enforced

LOL Wow! And that seems reasonable to people???????????

This nation has been void of true freedom for so long that they don't even know when it's no longer there.

I seriously think I should put in another year or 2 and call it a day! I am literally weary of watching us circle the toilet bowl while fighting going under.

All of those items listed come at a great cost to implement and enforce - no doubt it is supplemented by taxes as there is no way that $200 and permit fees covers it.

Unbelievably cheap.

$200/year for license, regardless of volume. Approx 15k license bond which you can post yourself or purchase (with an excellent credit rating, about $100/year) Bond is settled against if you fail to honor your contract, or go BK with outstanding creditors. If the bond is settled against your license is revoked.

You have to purchase a Workmans' Comp policy and send license board a certificate. If the policy lapses, your license is suspended.

No CGL is required for license.

You have to be licensed to solicit work within your license classification. You cannot solicit work in a different classification but you can do or subcontract work in a different classification if it is incidental to your contract.

You can work anywhere in the state but you usually have to have a city business license to take out permits from municipal entities. Most if not all municipal entities require that you already have a state license in force.

You can take out Owner/Builder permits for your own home only, not your neighbor's or anybody else's and owner/builders have to sign a statement that they are responsible for workmans comp on anybody they hire by the hour. The "fireman" or anybody else who is unlicensed is forbidden from bidding work and would receive fines/jail time if they did.

The state acts on all complaints and the state regularly sets up sting operations to trap unlicensed people into giving out bids. An agreement to install shingles for someone for $20/hour is not a bid. An agreement to shingle a house for $600 is a bid. You cannot assign away your right to workmans compensation insurance.