Unlocking Tiny Living: The Code Change That Could Legalize Your Tiny House on Wheels

Are you a tiny house owner, aspiring DIY builder, or simply seeking affordable housing solutions? This episode of Less House, More Resilience is essential listening. Host Laura Lynch speaks with Macy Miller, a long-time tiny house advocate and architect, about the critical, and surprisingly simple, change needed to legalize tiny homes on wheels across the country.

Macy is fighting on the front lines of the International Residential Code (IRC) process, where language is currently being finalized that could provide a clear, legal pathway for owner-builders and jurisdictions alike. The key hurdle? The wheels and chassis. Historically excluded from the IRC's Appendix Q, this omission has forced many tiny homeowners into a legal "grey zone."

Learn why this code adjustment is so crucial, how it creates options for jurisdictions struggling with the housing crisis, and why the current momentum—with support from unlikely allies like the National Association of Home Builders—makes this the best chance to cement tiny houses on wheels into mainstream building code.

Key Takeaways:

• The Mobility Gap: Discover why the current IRC Appendix Q (for tiny homes) does not legally address the wheels and chassis, and how this prevents widespread legalization.
• A "Little Big Deal": Macy details the two streamlined proposals—performance-based and prescriptive—being pushed forward to fix this single, critical gap.
• The 2030 Deadline: Understand the urgency of the upcoming April code vote and why now is the time to act to avoid a multi-year delay.
• How You Can Help: Find out how to join the national email campaign targeting the 15,000 building officials whose votes will decide the future of tiny house legality.

Don't miss this deep dive into the regulatory world that determines where you can legally put your tiny home. Listen now and be part of the solution to housing affordability and resilient living!

The Links You Need

The Petition: https://www.change.org/p/tiny-house-appendix-act-2

Email Alerts: https://tinyurl.com/25mkenb9

GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-tiny-homes-in-building-code

Book a Call with Laura

Go to thetinyhouseadviser.com

Transcript

Less House More Resilience ... (00:45)
Well Macy Miller. Welcome to Less House, More Resilience podcast. Maybe you don't know that I've changed the name, yeah. Yes. Focusing on how we can be resilient in our tiny and alternative lifestyle. And you know, it is so real for you and I, right? Because we are living.

Macy Miller (00:52)
I do actually. I like your new name.

Mm-hmm.

Less House More Resilience ... (01:07)
in this life and you and I collided because you are sitting on this committee that's working on this building standard for well, I'll let you explain it because it's complicated. But I'm just sitting in as a casual observer trying to keep up with what's going on. And there's a lot going on. So I'm super excited for you to break it down for us today. But before we get started with all the nitty gritty of

tiny home legalization and what's going on with the code committee. Would you introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your tiny house journey and lifestyle?

Macy Miller (01:45)
Thank you for having me here. I love the name because it's so much more about resilience than Moola right? That is the name of the game here. My name is Macy Miller. I'm a long time tiny house dweller. I'm a mom ⁓ and a tiny house advocate. I designed and built my house. I started in 2011, so it's been some years. ⁓ And I did it mostly as a challenge and to learn about construction.

Less House More Resilience ... (01:51)
Yes.

Macy Miller (02:14)
My background is in architecture, but they teach you about how to make a pretty building, not necessarily how to put it actually together. So I wanted to learn, you know, the more of the details on how to put a building together, which led me to building my tiny house. ⁓ I have lived in it through, I was a single lady at first, then I got a dog, then I got a partner. Now I have two kids. I quit my job.

I've seen it all in this space ⁓ and it's a very adaptable, very resilient space to be in. ⁓ For the first nine years, I was not legal, just like many people. I wasn't necessarily under the radar. I was kind of out here doing this thing, you know, like, look at me, let's talk about this. And it took nine years for me to find a piece of property up in North Idaho where we live.

completely legally for the last five years, almost six years ⁓ off grid. So that's the arc of my journey, but very much a tiny house dweller and love it.

Less House More Resilience ... (03:21)
it's, ⁓ you know, such a unique and beneficial lifestyle. And you and I both are working in this space to try to help more people do this thing, because it has been kind of hard for folks in terms of finding somewhere to put their house and, navigating sort of the, the code and the zoning and whatever rules might be in place. And for those folks that are doing it rural like us, we maybe have a little bit of an easier path.

because maybe there are less rules. But for folks that are trying to keep their job in place and be in a more urban space, that's where the challenge has really lied, wouldn't you say?

Macy Miller (04:02)
Absolutely, absolutely. I mean, it's still more affordable, but then you're kind of subsidizing your housing costs with gas if you still need to drive all the way into town. And it's, you know, that takes hours of your day too, the further out you are. So I think it's really important and it would be a very powerful tool for jurisdictions to be able to permit these in areas where we actually need affordable housing, not just on the outskirts.

Less House More Resilience ... (04:28)
And the housing, you know, the housing crisis and the unaffordability crisis and all those things are just so top of mind for jurisdictions for leaders, all the way around the country, it would seem that this would be something that everybody would be kind of moving towards or urgent for and yet we just haven't seen

adoption like we would like to see. And it seems like that part of that has been about just the rules being so varied everywhere that it's hard to find like a smooth path that works for all areas.

Macy Miller (05:05)
Yeah,

yeah, definitely. Like, yeah, you said it well.

Less House More Resilience ... (05:11)
And so part of that is about the current building code. And so you're involved in this current code committee effort. ⁓ Can you describe for us what that's been like to be part of this code writing process?

Macy Miller (05:27)
Absolutely. I can take you back a little further than that too. Back in 2016, I was a part of the effort that got the original Appendix Q tiny houses put into the IRC, which was a really big deal back then. But at that point, we were not permitted to discuss the wheels because some, building that has wheels is not a building, right? That's the general thought process there. That is something else. And so we did everything we could to get

all of the considerations we needed adopted in that appendix queue back then, everything but the wheels, ⁓ which was helpful thinking, you know, eventually the building industry will catch up and we'll be able to address the chassis, the wheels. ⁓ And so I had kind of checked out after 2016, I was raising my kids ⁓ and then I think it was 2023, you might know better than me when the tiny house industry association brought forward that.

You know, we're finally going to address the wheels. We're writing a standard. This will be great. And so I've joined, I've just been logging in and to the meetings and I actually have exactly the same seat that you do. I'm just an interested party sitting in on these meetings and I'm fairly vocal because I have a lot of opinions. ⁓ And I know the building industry pretty well. And so I feel like I can get in there and advocate for people like you and me who built our own houses. And so that's what I've been doing. ⁓

At a point, it became clear that this standard was not advancing at the rate that it needed in order to be useful this code cycle. ⁓ And so at that point, I had kind of a moment where it was like, shoot, the entire building industry seems ready for this. The NAHB is a big housing organization. They're advocating for tiny houses now. Historically, they've been our biggest hurdle. ⁓ And here they are pushing this forward too.

And so I got back with the original appendix Q authors, Martin Hammer, David Eisenberg, and Andrew Morrison. And I was like, you guys, it feels like the right time to get chassis addressed. I don't think this is going to be ready in this code cycle. Can we just propose what we were going to do in 2016? And then it's a faster streamline approach because it exists inside the appendix instead of in a separate standard. It's actually more accessible.

especially considering half of the country has already adopted that appendix, so it'd be ready to roll out immediately. And I got back with them and they were all kind of like, I don't know if I have the bandwidth for that. And I don't know how, but they all agreed. And so we've been taking forward this code proposal, which is a more streamlined version. ⁓ The standards will continue developing, ⁓ but it is primarily

going down a manufacturer-based pathway, which is not serving people like you and me. So if we, really there's room for both in codes as it goes forward, but this proposal we're bringing forward would just be direct inclusion into the IRC. It's been a very collaborative effort with many of the 1215 committee members, ⁓ building officials, code experts, engineers, advocates, dwellers, and...

That's fantastic because you get a really holistic approach to something that can actually work immediately. For me, it's been a lot of organizing, a lot of different hats, you know, putting on and translating the regulatory world to the public and the manufacturing world to the regulatory world to the public. And it's just been these circular conversations, but they're super important because that's how things get advanced.

Less House More Resilience ... (09:23)
We're going to zoom, we're going to take a step back for the listeners who don't have any idea what all of these acronyms are. We're, we're talking about a code committee writing international residential codes. IRC is the acronym that we mentioned earlier.

the IRC International Residential Code is published by the International Code Council, ICC, right? And so the International Residential Code Committee that is writing the standard attempting to get a building code written specifically for tiny homes.

Macy Miller (09:53)
Correct.

Mm-hmm.

⁓ Correct. ⁓ Sort of. So it's not actually a building code. It's a building standard, ⁓ which I mean, there's variations in what that means. ⁓ Relatively close to the same thing and just add a layer of confusion because I know you're doing the opposite of that right now. ⁓ We're doing an appendix. They're doing a standard. And then there's the model code. And the standard and the appendix are both

Less House More Resilience ... (10:25)
Mm-hmm.

Macy Miller (10:40)
under the IRC code, but they're kind of separate paths pulled apart. So yes, they are doing a standard for tiny houses initially was the goal. At some point along the way, they wanted to build bigger houses under the same standard. And so they have up to 1200 square foot in their standard, which as you can imagine, adds a lot of complication when you're writing a standard for a building that's 400 square foot and one that's 1200 square foot.

they're very different animals structurally. And so that's kind of been why it's added a lot of time to the timeline of that standard. And so this goal, this proposal we're doing in the appendix is limited only to tiny houses, which makes it much more streamlined and easy to manage. Does that make sense?

Less House More Resilience ... (11:32)
And so

in the past, you talked about in 2016 that you worked on language for the appendix Q, which ⁓ brought tiny homes into residential building code at all, because they had never been there before. ⁓ For listeners, there's also a appendix for straw bale houses, right? So this is how we bring it.

Macy Miller (11:43)
Mm-hmm. Yep.

Thank

Less House More Resilience ... (11:55)
new and alternative, building forms, it may be into a broader ⁓ standard, building standard. ⁓ And so

Then you mentioned earlier that there's a time constraint and my understanding from, being married to Eric who has lived in the building code world for his whole life is that ⁓ different states and municipalities adopt this code that is set out by the larger governing organization.

Macy Miller (12:29)
Exactly.

Less House More Resilience ... (12:29)
And they

have the choice to adopt it or to not adopt it. And then they have years and years in which they may put off adopting it or what have you. And so what we have across the country is a dissimilar application of standards that get published. And then on top of that, there is this process whereby the International Code Council accepts the language that's put

forth by the committee, and then it gets applied to the larger standard that then each state gets or municipality if it's a smaller jurisdiction that makes their own codes, they may or may not adopt it over time. And so we're talking way years in the future in terms of even bringing more clarification on a universal way of allowing tiny homes.

Macy Miller (13:21)
Absolutely, you explained it really well. ⁓ The ICC works on a three-year code cycle and what they develop is they call it model code language. So this is stuff that the ICC, International Code Council, has vetted. ⁓ It's engineered, whatever, but they do it on a three-year cycle. And we're at the very end of one of those three-year cycles right now. ⁓ And then it will reset.

And if this doesn't pass, it will reset and it will need to be a brand new thing brought back next year with the first published date of 2030. So we could either get this done now or we could wait until 2030. you know, so that's kind of the timeline for me. I've lived in a tiny house for almost 15 years now. It's too late. We can't keep kicking the can on it. We need to provide some model code language so that jurisdictions have that tool.

that they can optionally ⁓ adopt. And because it's in an appendix, it's even more optional. So that's why I say only half of the country has adopted the appendix because nobody has to adopt the appendix. It's an optional tool for a jurisdiction to use. ⁓ I think it's pretty cool that half the country, they want tiny houses, right? They're adopting the tools. They just don't have any for something that sits on wheels. That's just not a part of the language anywhere.

Less House More Resilience ... (14:45)
glad you come back to that because that's even surprising even to me, right? I've even read, you know, good parts of appendix Q, it never occurred to me that the wheels or the chassis is not included in there. So why is it so important that the wheels and the chassis be included?

Macy Miller (14:50)
Right?

Well, most tiny houses have wheels and chassis that we know, right? And initially it was very much a part of the original proposal that we were bringing forward in 2016. That was the point of it, right? It did these couple other things. There's some deviations that like a kitchen height, if you have a loft above it, it'll have a lower ceiling. So we got approvals for lower ceilings, narrower stairways.

Sleeping lofts, stuff like that is all in appendix Q. That's critical for tiny houses as well. But the wheels are critical too. And so we were blocked from doing that at that point. Now there's been some, I mean, I've said I'm legal right now and there's ways around that. There's the alternative means and methods section of the code that you could use to justify, but you're.

you're depending on your building official to be a human at that point and make the same conclusions that you are. you know, it's very one-off and it's very iffy. And that's how some people have been allowed to live in their tiny houses. ⁓ But it's definitely not the norm at this point, which is why it's important to get the language for the wheels in there. And when you think about it, it's not, it's just a quirky foundation. It's not different than something on Piers or something.

You know, it's the goal of a foundation is to transfer wind loads and seismic loads and everything down into the soil below. You can do that. You can just like a mobile home is tied down to the ground without a standard foundation. But all of these things exist. They're just not existing in the IRC. They're existing in other code bodies. ⁓ So that's that's been the challenge is it seems obvious that these should have a path forward, but they just don't.

That's what we're trying to draft.

Less House More Resilience ... (16:57)
Right. And so for jurisdictions that have allowed, you know, tiny homes as ADUs or tiny homes, legalize them at all. They've had to specifically go outside of the code, it sounds like, and make allowance for the wheels, like of their own, which has maybe been a barrier.

Macy Miller (17:11)
Absolutely.

Well, it's a challenge because everybody does it a little bit different. ⁓ For instance, ⁓ the city of San Diego allows ⁓ tiny house ADUs, but in doing so, they opened up the realm to RVs as well, which there's nothing fundamentally wrong with that. But RVs do not meet the same construction level as a house. And then the problem is,

when you start integrating RVs into IRC zoned housing, and if there's a problem like a fire and it burns down neighbor houses, the city's liable, because they were the ones who didn't hold the level of safety, right? ⁓ And so there's no reason why these can't fit into IRC other than there is no code. Nobody has been able to adopt code that says

Tiny houses are okay. What they do is they reduce their safety standards. And there's problems with doing that. I would say we need to increase their tool belt and give them a tool to allow these because it's not that strange, you know, of construction.

Less House More Resilience ... (18:28)
Right. And so the overall standard that's under construction being written right now does not include the wheels or the chassis. And so it sounds like that you are working on, if I understand correctly, a new appendix that allows chassis, an appendix that addresses chassis. Tell me what you're working on.

Macy Miller (18:36)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, of course, of course. ⁓ So

there does include a chassis, but again, it's up to 1200 square foot. So you can build a 1200 square foot house on a chassis, ⁓ which is a different thing. It's a different animal. It's under construction and I have some doubts about what will actually come from that effort. Our standard or excuse me, our code proposal. ⁓ That's all it's doing. It's bringing in chassis. It's directly into appendix Q, which is now called appendix BB.

⁓ And it just brings in provisions for chassis that says if this is on chassis, that's okay too. It's about as simple as you can get. Like in the overall grand scheme of the codebook, we're talking about less than a page. All it does is give guidance to how to incorporate a chassis. ⁓ So we're actually doing two comments. ⁓ Strategically, we have comment one, which we're calling a performance based proposal that says if you could engineer

you know, the design engineer, the foundation engineer, the trailer, you're good to go. The reason that we're doing that is there's no questions. It's all engineered, which is all that official wants. They want somebody else to hold the liability on it. And so it should be a no brainer to say, yeah, engineer it and you're good to go. That's not feasible. That's kind of a concept of a solution. It's not feasible for most people to hire an engineer for all of these things.

So our second comment actually is the engineering portion that if you can, it's called prescriptive language. If you can meet these thresholds, this is how you can put it together and you can save all the engineering costs, right? So we have two questions or two proposals that we're bringing forward to be an actual solution to people like you and I. ⁓ Of course, it will help builders, it will help manufacturers and everything as well.

But the goal is to help the DIYer first. Because if you find something that works for DIY, it will work for everything else as well.

Less House More Resilience ... (20:55)
So if I understand you correctly, have ⁓ as part of this process where they are writing the standard, you are making some comments about things that you would like included in the standard that are making it so that people like you and me can have appropriate language in the appendix related to the wheels to make sure that the building code official can. ⁓

can feel confident that our tiny homes meet their requirements for safety and structural integrity in order to allow us to have allow us to self build or allow us to hire a builder. Is that right?

Macy Miller (21:35)
Correct, kind of. You muddied it a little bit. So the standard is completely separate from this at this point. Because the standard is going forward, this opportunity presented itself to get some language directly into the appendix. And in doing that, what it does is uncomplicate the standard. They're trying to create this standard that applies to large scale manufacturers, and it's leaving out the DIY, the owner builders, the small builders. And so

If we can get this language directly into the appendix, which is a separate thing than the standard, then we'll be covered there and manufacturers can be covered with the standard. Does that make sense? And then continuing like everything they develop over there, like additional details and prescriptive pathways, those will be relevant to the appendix as well. But they're completely separate. The appendix and the standard are two different efforts. Does that make sense?

Less House More Resilience ... (22:29)
Gotcha.

And so the appendix, as you pointed out earlier, is completely optional, right? So, you know, yeah. ⁓ So a building official could decide to adopt the standard and not the appendix. Could they adopt the appendix and not the standard? They could. So it provides options to decision makers.

Macy Miller (22:35)
Right. So is the standard.

Absolutely. Yep.

Right. Well,

and it's kind of keyed up already because half the country has the appendix already, they would naturally incorporate the additions without there being this big process to incorporate these once it's ready, right? It's already there. So they just have to say yes or no.

Less House More Resilience ... (23:11)
Yeah, I understand. And so are there any other gaps that you see that you want to call out between what we have in place already, existing building codes, and what's going on with the developing of the standard and the realities of how it plays out for people like us?

Macy Miller (23:30)
⁓ you know, frankly, like this is so much easier than it seems like it should be, or it seems like it's being made. No, the mobility, that's the issue. Everything else is keyed up and ready to roll. ⁓ so we just need to be able to get the jurisdictions, a tool that allows them to approve a house on a chassis. And whether that happens in a standard or whether that happens in the appendix or whether that happens in the body of the code, it really doesn't matter.

You kind of target these things for certain reasons, like if we tried to put this in the body of code immediately, we would find a lot of resistance because there's still half the country that doesn't want the appendix, right? Sure, half have taken it, but half doesn't want it, ⁓ which is why we targeted an appendix because it's optional. So it's a useful tool if you want it. The standard is a bit of a different animal and it's adopted in a one-off situation. And a lot of times it's adopted.

as part of like a modular construction program which opens a whole new wormhole, right? But it's not really applicable to owner builders or, you know, the schools who like to build tiny houses for fundraisers. They couldn't use that or, you know, any... And what I think of as the heart of the tiny house community wouldn't be benefiting necessarily from a standard. So the appendix has always seemed like the right way to go. And this opportunity is great.

⁓ But both can still continue forward and both will be beneficial for different reasons in different places. And they might adopt both of them, frankly. Like the standard might become their modular pathway and the appendix will be their layman scenario. ⁓ But really the only gap we're trying to address is the mobility aspect.

Less House More Resilience ... (25:19)
I guess at the end of the day, like the more, ⁓

Crystal Clear Pathways that exists, right, provides more options for everybody who wants to get on on in on smaller housing. I mean, the the world that we live in is a world in which large homes have been getting bigger and bigger and bigger and families have been getting smaller and smaller and smaller. And it's become unaffordable except for for a certain small smaller percentage of the country to be able to afford the typical houses being built. And so

Macy Miller (25:26)
Right.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

Less House More Resilience ... (25:54)
there are lots and lots of people that are showing up to the party who want to take part in this important like movement forward of providing a product that's really needed in the marketplace. And so the more like pathways there are that municipalities can grab on to and that they can, you know, find a way to make smaller housing possible, probably the better.

Macy Miller (25:57)
Only.

Right.

Right. Well, I mean, something I keep finding myself saying is it's not a solution unless it solves the problem. So you can make this giant manufactured pathway, but I'm still going to build a house and I can't fit that one. So we need a solution for us to be able to live legally and soundly in our homes, right? Because it stinks wondering if somebody is going to knock on your door and tell you to roll on.

There's no reason you can't build them safe. That's the silliness of it. So let's just define that pathway and roll forward.

Less House More Resilience ... (26:51)
Yeah, awesome. So you mentioned that you've got some other folks that are working together with you on this proposal. So do you want to talk about that a little bit?

Macy Miller (27:02)
Yeah, can I just name those people and tell you who they are? I would love to, this has been such a community effort. ⁓ So Martin Hammer and David Eisenberg are the two brains behind this. You mentioned the straw bale appendix. They're the authors of the straw bale appendix. They've gotten Cobb into the building code. They've gotten, they're working on a hemp crate. They kind of do the impossible when it comes to building codes and they translate these really whimsical ideas into

Less House More Resilience ... (27:04)
Of course!

Macy Miller (27:29)
regulatory context, right? It's a challenging thing, but they just, have such beautiful brains for it. And I love that. I don't think there's any two people in the world who could do this as well as they're doing it. And they were the original folks along with they have, call, they, call him the third leg of the tripod, which is Anthony Dente, who's a structural engineer who's working on all of that stuff with us. And of course, Andrew Morrison, the original proponent of appendix Q has joined.

in support. And then my four gurus that I call my core group is Vera Struck Jewel Pearson, Vina Lustado and Mike Spooner, who have been the main advocacy crew trying to get word out and gathering support. And then Rich Crowley and Alan Plummer are two building officials, ⁓ one from Boston, one from Maine, who both just think these should be legit. And so they have

lent their reputations, which is no small thing when you're coming from the regulatory world to this kind of abstract idea. And then we have Brad Wiseman, who is the co-chair of the standard committee, along with Zach Giffin, who have joined forces with this. Aside from that, we have so many people that have helped us with technical information. Janet Thome is one. ⁓ We have Kelly Cobeen who's a structural engineer in San Francisco. She's awesome.

has done so much work. have ⁓ the National Association of Home Builders. I mentioned they have been our major stopping block. They've got some advocates who have been rallying behind this, as well as ICC staff, which is huge. And then we have you out here with many other influencers who are helping us spread the word and get the word out. It could not be a more of a group effort. have members of like several hundred members of the public now have committed.

to sending emails in support of this. It's just been this giant group effort, which is what needs to happen to make this happen, right? We need to put pressure on the powers that be and move this forward. So I think that it's all aligned ⁓ and a large part because these people have come together in a really profound way to move this forward because it's more important now than ever to address affordability. And this is a

It's a great way to do it. not the only, it's not a silver bullet for sure, but it is a pretty significant way.

Less House More Resilience ... (30:02)
And you know what's so interesting is that so much energy has to go into making something so simple.

Macy Miller (30:09)
⁓ So much. So much. It's less than

a page in this book. It's silly, but yes, so much energy. It's crazy.

Less House More Resilience ... (30:15)
Yeah. So much energy

and so many people, putting this forward. Nobody's getting paid, right? Everybody's just out there out of the good of their heart saying, Hey, can we finally just put, can we just put the wheels on the tiny house?

Macy Miller (30:22)
No, right? No?

Can we please just do this?

Right? Doesn't

it seem ridiculous? Like, I get it. Yeah. Yeah.

Less House More Resilience ... (30:39)
Amazing. So obviously you need help, You need ⁓ more. Tell us what the hurdle is to get this passed.

Macy Miller (30:47)
Yes, so the hurdle. ⁓ So this point in the process is actually the hardest point to pass code language, obviously. It's the last hurdle in it. We need a two-thirds majority vote from the entire voting body. Previous rounds, we had to commit, you know, convince a majority of 10 people, you know, to pass this or whatever. This time we have about 15,000 people all across the US who are going to be voting on this. And we don't just need a majority, we need a super majority. ⁓

The good news is this is exactly the phase we passed appendix Q at, and it actually works in our benefit because the voting body for this is building officials and they're the ones who are facing the pressure from all of the public wanting to live in a tiny house. So of all the people who could be voting, this is the right committee. But what we need to do is put it on their radar. ⁓ If they go to the hearing is this April and if they go and this is the first time they've heard of it, ⁓

It might not be received. Well, I don't know. ⁓ So what we're trying to do is just a giant outreach effort where we have people all across the country. I'm trying to find 10 people from every state who are willing to send out an email when the time comes. The time's going to come near the end of March, the beginning of April. And at that point, I will send this group of people a template email that they can use, as well as some instructions for how to find their official.

and then they need to push send because the emails have to come from the state, right, that they're in. I can't email the entire country and say, is really important. We really need to show a group effort. ⁓ And so if there's people listening to this and you're willing to send out an email come the end of March, beginning of April, ⁓ there's a little signup link circulating ⁓ where you can sign up and I will make sure that you get those notifications.

We also have a public petition that we're circulating. We have a little bit over 12,000 people signed up right now, which is fantastic for in the room because what's going to happen is that a large group of us is going to fly to Hartford, Connecticut, where this hearing is, and each individual gets just two minutes to make a case. And so we have to get this really aligned testimony that we are building on each other as we go forward. We have

about 10 people that are coming. So we'll get 20 minutes to make a compelling case. ⁓ And being able to say, you know what, we have 15,000 members of the public who are here with us. And I literally print off the book and I bring it and I show it in the room that there's 15,000 names on this. ⁓ That's a really solid piece of evidence for the voting body. ⁓ Another solid piece is

them being like, yeah, somebody in my jurisdiction emailed this to me like a month ago. ⁓ This matters to somebody in my, represented area. ⁓ So those are both really important steps. ⁓ And then, yeah, those are the two big ones. ⁓ We do, it's expensive. We have a fundraiser as well. If anyone can chip in otherwise, I don't know where the money's coming from. Yeah, I haven't got that far in the process, but. ⁓

really it's public support, it's being willing to show up when the time comes to make a really powerful impact is going to make a really big difference in the success of this.

Less House More Resilience ... (34:17)
Okay, so just let me make sure that I have this straight because it has taken us two conversations for me to figure this all out. What is happening is that there is ⁓ a group of 15 or 20,000 people that work in our building official offices all around the country. And in April, they're gonna have to vote yes or no to allow the existing ⁓ appendix about

tiny homes to include the wheels. And so you need us to send an email, not make a phone call, but just send an email to our local building department to say, Hey, this vote is coming up. Could you please vote? Yes. Because tiny homes should be allowed on wheels because that's the entire point of the thing.

Macy Miller (34:49)
Yes, exactly right.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Exactly. You nailed it.

I know there's so many moving parts to this.

Less House More Resilience ... (35:16)
Perfect.

So listeners, if you

want to be on this list so that you can be reminded and get the template that you need to send an email to your local building department. Look in the show notes because we'll include the links so that you can sign up and so that Macy will send you an email and say now is the time for you to send an email.

Macy Miller (35:38)
Beautiful.

Perfect. Exactly. That would be extremely helpful.

Less House More Resilience ... (35:43)
Awesome. Well, good. Well, thank you so much for coming to talk about this because obviously without your many, many, many, many, many, many hours of volunteer work on this issue, then we would continue to be in this abyss of tiny homes not being able to be transported by their owners or by some builder, you know, to a place. Yeah, right. And, as

Macy Miller (35:52)
you

Yeah, hoping that it works out someday, you know.

Less House More Resilience ... (36:10)
listeners may recall or may not recall, like I dragged my tiny home across the country on wheels and put it in its place and put it on, you know, some some piers But at the time that I did that, they wanted me to have engineering stamps in order to legalize it. And, to hire an engineer to

⁓ sign off on the building of your tiny home when it was built in a different state is definitely not a feasible thing. And so I just flew under the radar until my local building or my local tax folks assessed our home as a mobile home and they are taxing us like it's a mobile home and everything's good, right? Presumably. But that is, that's a rural experience.

Macy Miller (36:54)
That's interesting.

Less House More Resilience ... (36:59)
⁓ whereas people all over the country want to be able to put an ADU of a tiny home in their backyard and the things going to come on wheels. So we got to figure out how we get the wheels in there to allow people like us to, you know, hire a builder or build our own or what have you and be able to bring it into somebody's backyard or on a piece of land on wheels.

Macy Miller (37:22)
Absolutely, you know and it's not just affordable for the tiny home-dweller like in that scenario You can offset somebody else's mortgage and make their house more affordable as well So it's a two-for-one deal if you if you can move this forward. It's good

Less House More Resilience ... (37:38)
Yeah.

And we need families to be able to join together on single pieces of property so that they can provide mutual caregiving and support and resource sharing in this time when things are more difficult. Right. So we just need this to be a pathway. So if you're interested in being part of the passage of this little detail that is so critical, then make sure that you

Macy Miller (37:44)
Mm-hmm.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

This little big deal.

Less House More Resilience ... (38:04)
Yes,

this little big deal. Make sure that you grab the link and you sign up for Macy's List and she'll send you an email to say send an email and then passage will be hopefully successful.

Macy Miller (38:13)
Yes.

Thank you so much, Laura Thank you to all of your audience for paying attention and helping with this.

Less House More Resilience ... (38:22)
Well, thanks for being here.

Macy Miller (38:23)
Thank you.