Everyone enjoys a good BBQ, and making sure they are safe should be a priority for any board in a community association. In the mid 2000’s, community associations throughout New Jersey saw a flurry of rule adoptions to comply with the New Jersey Fire Code at the time, which generally prohibited portable propane BBQ grills within 5 feet of a combustible material. Many boards addressed those code requirements by adopting rules and resolutions within their communities memorializing the required code restrictions. Since that time, most communities have assumed that their previously adopted rules and resolutions were compliant with state law. However, in 2018, New Jersey adopted the 2015 International Fire Code, New Jersey Edition, which contained modifications to the sections of the code that address portable grills and cooking devices. This newly adopted code has created a great deal of confusion within the community association industry, including within the Department of Community Affairs, Division of Codes and Standards, Bureau of Housing Inspection, whose inspectors during the DCA 5-year inspections have interpreted the modified code section in various ways. Some have followed the pre-2018 requirement of prohibiting portable propane grills within 5 feet of combustible construction and other inspectors are imposing a much more restrictive requirement, increasing the distance from combustible construction to 10 feet. The confusion flows from the wording of the 2018 modification to the code.