The purpose of this brief is to provide a discussion related to amending or not amending model codes and standards when adopting them at the federal, state, or local level. It was considered necessary based on the significant amendment activity related to energy code adoption and the observation that in almost every case mistakes are made—some as significant as inadvertently excluding key building types from the code. In some cases, governing bodies will opt to amend with the goal of increasing energy savings; this is positive, and it is necessary to have states that are trendsetters with regard to efficiency. However, it is sometimes possible for amendment activities to yield the opposite result because of increased debate about the technical provisions and the “islanding” of jurisdictions with respect to the support infrastructure available for implementation and compliance with the model codes and standards.