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Thursday, February 12, 2009

Where is the Guidebook?

Ok, it's now NB-Day, plus 2. (NB standing for "National Bankruptcy".) And thus far, only a 16 page brief has been published by the CPSC to help the millions of businesses affected by the CPSIA to figure out how to navigate it.

Here is an excerpt of materials exempt from the new law:

Dyed or undyed textiles (cotton, wool, hemp, nylon, etc.), including children’s fabric products, such as baby blankets, and non‐metallic thread and trim. This does not include products that have rhinestones or other ornaments that may contain lead or that have fasteners with possible lead content (such as buttons, metal snaps, zippers or grommets).

So basically, a plain t-shirt or sweater or sweatpants are ok. Once you add a button, zipper, or grommet - maybe not ok.

I was fully intent on clearing my shelves of all known "banned hazardous substance" on Tuesday morning. I expected that my government would have their (phthalate free) ducks in a row and be able to tell me what (specifically) was bad and I would dutifully remove them from the store, contact the manufacturer for a full refund (as these banned substances would of course be recalled and so the manufacturer would be responsible to compensate me) and move on with life.

Unfortunately, there is no such master list. In fact, the CPSC has requested we tell them the results of the tests we pay for!

So while we have removed many items with the shiney bling (rhinestones are apparently notorious for having lead - it's what makes them shiney), we just can't toss out 99% of our clothing that has buttons, zippers, or grommets because there is a small chance that it may have lead. We also can't test (the lead tests in the store aren't accurate enough and the XRF gun costs about $1500 to rent or $35,000 to buy). To ask the manufacturer would be pointless as we wouldn't be able to provide batches or dates of manufacture assuming they kept such detailed records when it wasn't required of them in the first place.

So, while we have been assured by all the manufacturers of our new items, that they are in compliance, I haven't got a clue about our used items. I just can't believe it makes any sense to toss it all out as hazardous.

How is a zipper (leaded or unleaded) on my 8 year old daughter any more dangerous than having her run around naked in the cold because I can't afford new tested and certified clothing for her? Is she going to die of lead poisoning from the possible lead in her bike tire's valve stem? Are phthalates in her American Girl Doll (if they are present - I really have no idea) going to stunt her growth?

While there have been some studies with phthalates that indicate a cause for concern (see post below), there are many others that show no problem. Even the law itself says the ban is only permanent on 3 types of phthalates, for 3 other types the law calls for more testing to determine if the ban will be permanent.

I'm still hopeful that Senator Demint (now joined by my own Congressman Bartlett) will be able to fix this poor legislation quickly. If the CPSC or some antsy Attorney General decides to enforce the CPSIA before the fix, National Bankruptcy Day won't just be a rallying cry, it'll be reality.

Call your Congressmen (202-225-3121) and Senators (202-224-3121) today and tell them to support HR-968 (House version) S-347 (Senate version).

By the way, you'll be happy to know that Congress did act to delay the implementation of the Digital TV transition from February 17 till June 12. Apparently 4 years notice and $1.5 billion dollars wasn't enough. Yeah, it's estimated that law affects about 2% of Americans that are still unprepared for Digital TV. The CPSIA affects everyone with children 12 and younger. I'm not sure of the percentage, but I'm thinking it's more than 2%.

Jennifer Guenther
Enkore Kids
http://www.enkorekids.com/
http://www.enkorestuff.com/

Sunday, February 8, 2009

What's Next? Phthalates!

What with all our concerns being on the retroactive nature of the CPSIA with regards to lead, we haven't even paid attention to phthalates. According to the CPSC, the CPSIA wasn't going to apply retroactively, meaning that items already produced prior to 2/10/09 would still be legal to sell. Well, a court decided on Friday, 2/6/09 that the CPSIA phthalate ban IS retroactive!

So, we'll be busy on Monday trying to figure out just what we can and cannot sell.

Well, what the heck is a phthalate, and why should we care?

A phthalate is a substance used in plastics, vinyl, and personal care products for the last 50 years or so. There is debate on what effects it has on most humans, but in rodents, it appears to affect male development by messing with their testosterone. From what I've found, it looks like there is little evidence for ill effects on most humans because it is broken down quickly in the body. However, there is disturbing evidence that phthalates DO affect the development in utero of boys and that the presence of phthalates in mother's milk continues to affect boy's testosterone levels.

So it appears the biggest problem of phthalates is when they are ingested directly from MOM! How does mom get the phthalates? Apparently, through their use in personal care products such as shampoo, soap, perfume, etc. So far as I could find, there has been no federal legislation banning phthalates from these adult products.

Many baby personal care products also contain phthalates, but these also don't appear to be banned by the CPSIA which deals with durable goods.

So from what I've read in the last 48 hours, phthalates are definitely questionable when ingested by a developing and newborn baby and we will be closing monitoring the CPSC website for further guidance to ensure we are in compliance. We urge the CPSC to issue official recalls for these items (as well as items with dangerous levels of lead) so we can turn them into the manufacturers for credit.

We'll also be urging Congress to go the next logical step: Ban phthalates from all products that could result in ingestion by a pregnant or nursing woman (or at least provide a warning that the product contains phthalates) and ban it in children's personal care products as well (if the CPSIA doesn't, in fact, already ban it).

More news will be coming soon!

Jennifer Guenther
Enkore Kids
www.enkorekids.com
www.enkorestuff.com

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Call Senators to Tell Them to Support DeMint's CPSIA Reform

Tom Jones Comment from Heather Flottman's Blog_

Heather's full post- http://ping.fm/gR8Lq

First an introduction. I'm Senator DeMint's staffer that handles the CPSC issues for him. A couple quick things.

If your readers could:

1) Call their Senator Monday and let them know that the problems with the CPSIA still exist. There are still liabilities issues out there, its not clear yet what retailers reaction to the order will be (its great to not have to test for a year but if no one will sell your goods that a bit of a hollow victory), PIRG is going to sue to overturn the order and the order doesn’t do anything to deal with State AGs. And of course all the problems come back full-bore in a year. Please try to impress these things on your Senator’s office.

2) When you are on the phone with the office make a very specific ask. Let them know you want the Senator to co-sponsor the DeMint bill. Have their staff contact me. (I work on the Commerce Committee and my email is in the “Global Email Directory.” (they’ll know what that is) I can also be called through the DeMint front office phone line which is 4-6121.) Also let the person on the phone that you’d like a written response on whether the Senator will co-sponsor issue. Finally say thanks for talking to you. The person who answers the phone has the lowest job on the Congressional totem pole and when the phones get hot it can be very stressful. Throwing a little sunlight their way helps.

The main line for Congress is 202-224-3121. Tell the operator which state you are from and ask to speak to one of your Senators. Once you’re done with that, hang up and do it again with the other Senator.

Thanks again for all your help with this. If it wasn’t for you guys being so engaged on this issue, it wouldn’t be moving like it is.

Tom
 
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