New Children's Product Safety Law Creates Confusion and Concern

A new consumer product safety law limiting the content of lead in children's products, the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA), which will go into effect on February 10, has become a source of major concern for booksellers, publishers, and toy manufacturers, as well as for a number of other businesses that manufacture or sell children's products.

CPSIA -- which was signed into law on August 14, 2008, in response to last year's recalls of products containing lead -- limits the amount of lead in children's products to 600 parts-per-million (ppm) as of February 10, and 300 ppm as of August 2009. In August 2011, the limit will drop to 100 ppm if it is considered technologically feasible for a given product or product category. The law requires manufacturers of children's products for children up to age 12, including books, to make accessible to retailers a Certificate of Conformity (COC) stating that their products have been tested by an independent third party and comply with lead limits stipulated in CPSIA.

The law has some booksellers worried that they will be forced to return or dump inventory currently on their shelves because it does not have the required COC.

However, Julie Vallese, director of information and public affairs for the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), told BTW that this is not exactly the case. "The Certificate of Conformity is necessary for those [children's] products [for children up to age 12] manufactured after February 10," she said. "For those products currently in inventory, a retailer must have a level of confidence that these products are not in violation of the lead law.... If you don't know if they comply and are not confident, then you shouldn't sell it."

Vallese stressed that COCs will have to accompany children's books that are manufactured on or after February 10, but not books that were manufactured before that date -- even if the bookseller is ordering them after February 10. But booksellers must have a level of confidence that the children's products they are selling comply with the law.

As for a retailer's liability under CPSIA, if, by chance, a product contains too much lead, "at minimum there will be a recall," Vallese noted. "There could be possible criminal and civil penalties [leveled at the retailer] based on the severity. The [CPSC] has enforcement discretion on whether this was done maliciously."

While the goal of CPSIA -- to require manufacturers of children's products to ensure that their products do not contain harmful amounts of lead or phthalates (a chemical used to soften plastic) - may seem simple, unfortunately, the legislation has created many more questions than answers. Compounding the issue is CPSIA's imminent deadlines, which are leaving little time for publishers and manufacturers to grapple with the law, seek legislative changes, or even implement testing plans that satisfy the law.

"We're wrestling with the vagaries of this new law," said Kathleen McHugh of the American Specialty Toy Retailing Association (ASTRA). "We're all trying to find a reliable source who can decipher its many complexities for us." To help retailers and manufacturers alike sort through the law's many facets, ASTRA has created a page on its website that provides information on CPSIA, and McHugh said that the site will be updated as questions regarding the law are answered.

ABA will continue to monitor the situation, working with ASTRA and other organizations, in order to provide more information about complying with CPSIA. (Watch BTW for more coverage in the coming weeks.)

Meryl Wolfe, director of manufacturing for Scholastic, told BTW via e-mail, "While we share the law's ultimate goal of insuring children's safety, the details and potential consequences of the law's implementation create numerous issues for our entire industry, as well as other industries providing children's products. We obviously remain committed to insuring our products are safe and, together with other publishers through the [Association of American Publishers], we are working to address the challenges of this new law and compliance."

At present, Scholastic is "working with our suppliers on complying with the COC requirements," Wolfe said. "We are continuing to evaluate our options for making COCs available, including making a COC available to our vendors via our website."

As for current inventory, Wolfe reported: "We have always complied with current safety standards and regulations and believe our products have always been safe. For example, our practices with respect to books-plus lines, such as Klutz and Chicken Socks or our books with value added components, have always included safety testing to comply with the strictest current standards. As we get closer to the February 10 deadline, we will assess any further developments and clarifications in connection with the CPSIA and determine the most appropriate actions regarding other stock at that time."

For its part, the Association of American Publishing wants CPSC to strictly limit what kinds of books are covered under CPSIA. In early December, Allan Adler, vice president for legal and government affairs for AAP, wrote CPSC seeking an advisory opinion limiting the coverage of books and other non-book, paper-based printed materials under CPSIA, as well as clarification regarding stock presently on retailers' shelves.

In the letter, Adler noted that AAP consulted with "a broad coalition of companies, associations, and organizations in the book manufacturing, paper, printing, binding, laminate, ink, and adhesives industries" on the issue. The consultation, he wrote, resulted in a "compilation of critical information" providing evidentiary support that books and other non-book, paper-based printed materials (both in terms of their individual components and the assembly process that integrates those components into finished products) should not be subject to the lead, phthalate (a chemical used to soften plastics) and applicable ASTM standards requirements referenced in the CPSIA "because they do not present any of the health or safety risks to children that those requirements are intended to address." The letter did specify that any non-paper-based elements that provide play value and are part of such books may be subject to all relevant requirements.

In its letter, AAP provided CPSC with a link to a "portal website established by RR Donnelley," which provides an overview of the assembly process that produces books and most other paper-based materials, as well as test results for some finished books that are "popular in the children's market, and test results for CDs and DVDs that supplement or accompany books" to prove there was no lead issue.

However, in its response, CPSC noted that the test results on the portal website were not sufficient to provide "blanket exemptions for paper, paperboard, linerboard, printing inks, laminates, adhesives, and binding materials used in books," though "it appears that the levels of lead in the test data you provided are well below the lead limits established in Section 101 of CPSIA." The commission noted it "needs total lead test data to support the determination that those materials do not contain lead at levels that exceed the CPSIA lead content limits."

Adler noted to BTW that, barring an exemption, at the very least, publishers need clarification on various aspects of the law from the CPSC. "We're trying to make it clear to the people on the Hill that, if books are an issue, they have to be explicit on how the law applies to books," he explained. "How do you test books? What parts? At what point in the assembly process? We need a straightforward statement to the book publishing industry about what testing is required of books." --David Grogan