I should amend my above post, cause this last spring Portland added strawbale (infill and compressed load bearing) to the building code. Guess really I just gotta convince the wife to tear this house down (haha---that'll never happen she loves this dump).
<edit> You might find it helpful in dealing with the local authorities to arm yourself with this:
http://www.strawbale.com/pdf/oregon_building_code.pdf
It's a copy of our strawbale addition to the state code.
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