California regulators recently changed their approach to lead in older buildings by implementing rules with the lowest-permissible exposure limit introduced yet. That has enormous impact for roofers and other renovation and restoration contractors across the state, and possibly beyond, according to Trent Cotney, partner at Adams & Reese.

“Although this may be isolated to California now, my concern is that it’s picked up nationally,” Cotney warned in this brief episode. “The standard is so low that it’s pretty much a giant dragnet for anyone doing repairs on older structures.”