White House sends Stratton's name to Capitol Hill.

President Bush on March 13, 2002 formally submitted the name of Harold D. Stratton, former Attorney General of New Mexico, to be Chairman of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC). The White House had announced the intent to nominate Stratton on October 30, 2001 [1].

Stratton's nomination must be considered by the Senate Commerce Committee, which has been busily investigating allegations of corruption at the Enron Corporation. Since Congress is currently in recess, there is no word on when the committee will hold hearings.

There is some urgency in the matter, since CPSC can only act minus a quorum (its current condition with only two sitting Commissioners) for up to six months. Former Chairman Ann Brown resigned Nov. 1, 2001, and thus the Commission's statutory six months will expire May 1, 2002.

Brown's Group Touts `SAFE Circle' Membership

When she resigned the CPSC chairmanship in November 2001, Ann Brown formed a non-profit, SAFE (Safer America for Everyone). She immediately got into hot water with CPSC by placing a story on her web site, www.Saferam.org featuring an initiative called `SAFE Circle." The project is a collection of companies who agree to abide by a set of safety principles and who are permitted to use the official "SAFE Circle" seal.

That initiative bore a remarkable resemblance to the "Safety Circle" she founded while at CPSC, and which still exists. In fact, the Brown website called the Safe Circle "the successor" to the CPSC Product Safety Circle. This statement provoked a response from CPSC's Acting General Counsel, who reminded Brown in an official letter that the Product Safety Circle and its ten safety principles were still the property of CPSC. [2]

SAFE responded to the reprimand by changing the wording on the website to say that Brown's project was "building on the project Ann started at CPSC," and removed the copyright from the 10 safety principles.

In her news conference on March 26, Brown said she was "launching" the group to "stop recalls and injuries at the source."

Few knew about her announcement, however, since there was little press coverage. The only story CPSC Monitor could find in the media was a brief story on the Reuters wire service.

Brown said her group "brings together companies that want to produce and sell the safest possible products and help reduce injuries to consumers."

At the news conference, Brown announced that her SAFE Circle (not CPSC's) already has 22 members and 9 supporting members. Charter members of the Brown group include McDonald's, Binney & Smith (makers of Crayola crayons), IKEA North America, Toys R Us, Staples, and Levi-Strauss.

Brown's news release says the SAFE Circle "will undertake activities that promote and publicize good product safety practices, educate business about safety, encourage companies to adopt forward-looking safety practices, and recognize outstanding corporate safety behavior." [3]

Perhaps the biggest story about the SAFE Circle announcement was that there was no story.

Injury to Former Chairman of Joint Chiefs Prompts CPSC Warning

CPSC's staff and Commissioners are continuing to review petitions and research regulatory issues. The compliance staff continues to issue product recalls. But there is little major activity currently at the agency.

For example, a lead news release on CPSC's website recently was a warning about the hazards of using ladders unsafely. All the standard safety tips were listed in the release. It had clearly been prompted by the recent trauma suffered by retired General Henry "Hugh" Shelton, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is recovering from serious injuries caused by a fall from a ladder at his home in Virginia.

Other standard warnings on the web site include advice to check batteries in smoke detectors on Sunday, April 7, the beginning of Daylight Savings Time.

Two Petitions Denied, Others Still Pending

As expected, Commissioners Gall and Moore recently voted to deny petitions for the regulation of playground equipment and non-wood bats. Both issues have been resolved. The playground equipment issue was settled when the ASTM Subcommittee for Home Playground Equipment revised its standard. The non-wood bat issue was addressed when manufacturers agreed to develop a performance standard to design non-wood bats that will function in a manner similar to traditional wooden bats. [4]

The Commissioners have not yet voted on a proposal to ban lead-cored candlewicks. The Commission voted in February 2001 to begin rulemaking leading to a ban on such candles on the grounds that the lead cores used to hold wicks upright in certain candles could present a lead poisoning hazard to young children. CPSC staff states that safer alternatives to lead wicks, including zinc, tin, synthetic fibers, cotton and paper are available. The proposal to ban the candlewicks is still pending.

Termination of the baby walker rulemaking still awaits Commission action. The regulatory action was begun in 1994. Since then, the injury hazard has been addressed by non-government consensus standards, and injuries have declined markedly.

Another regulatory change still pending is for the exemption of Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT) products from child-resistant packaging requirements. The Commission proposed to exempt the hormones from such requirements several months ago. Current exemption rules cover some HRT products but not others. CPSC is basing its proposal on a finding that the hormones have low acute toxicity. The exemption would allow manufacturers to use slightly less expensive packaging and thus reduce the cost of these products to consumers.

Two other major regulatory issues--upholstered furniture flammability and a potential mandatory rule for product registration have been on the back burner for some time [5]. They are not likely to be revisited until the new CPSC Chairman is confirmed.

Budget Heating Rescheduled

A House Appropriations Committee hearing on CPSC's proposed 2003 budget request scheduled for March 21st was canceled. The new hearing date is April 18.

CPSC Reports Slight Increase in Toy Injuries

Despite all the compliance and regulatory activities involving children's toys in the past several years, CPSC data show that toy-related injuries increased from an estimated 152,600 in 1999 to an estimated 191,000 in 2000, the latest year for which complete data are available.

Most of the increase in injuries was associated with riding toys, especially unpowered scooters. There were an estimated 26,100 injuries involving such products. Injuries on riding toys overall more than doubled from 1999 to 2000 because of the sharp increase in injuries related to unpowered scooters.

There was also a slight increase between 1999 and 2000 in injuries related to nursery products (from 65,400 to 69,199) but CPSC considers those increases to be statistically insignificant. The leading cause of all nursery product-related injuries for the year 2000 was falls. These data were provided in the latest issue of the Consumer Product Safety Review, Winter 2002.

Injury Estimates Available On-line

CPSC recently announced that its Directorate for Epidemiology would provide on-line data on injuries associated with discrete products and activities. According to CPSC, a new website will allow a user to generate estimates for the number of patients treated in U.S. hospital emergency departments with a set of categories--treatment date, type of product, age and gender of victim, diagnosis and body part injured. The estimates will reflect product-related injuries from the 99-hospital sample in the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS). The information can be accessed at www.cpsc.gov/neiss/default.html.

Another source of injury data is the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (www.cdc.gov/ncipc/wisqars/.) The Centers for Disease Control site provides data about trauma estimates from NEISS classified by type of injury, i.e., falls, poisonings, etc. The data reflect reports from a subsample of 65 NEISS hospitals. Arthur McDonald in CPSC's Directorate for Epidemiology welcomes comments or suggestions for improving the site. He can be contacted at [e-mail].

Source: Consumer Product Safety Review, U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, Winter, 2002, vol. 6, No. 3.

[1] See CPSC Monitor, Vol. 6, Issue 10, "Bush Announces `Intent to Nominate' Former New Mexico Attorney General Harold Stratton as CPSC Chairman," October 2001.

[2] See CPSC Monitor, Vol. 6, Issue, 10, "Brown Touts CPSC `Initiative' as Her Own on SAFE Website." November-December, 2001.

[3] "Safety Group Launches SAFE Circle to Reduce Injuries," news release from Safer America for Everyone, Washington, DC, March 26, 2002.

[4] See CPSC Monitor, Vol. 7, Issue 2, Briefly Noted-February 2002.

[5] See CPSC Monitor, Vol. 6, Issue 9, p. 3, September-October, 2001.

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