Posted on 01/25/2009 4:09:18 PM PST by incredulous joe
Melissa Boulch of Bremerton has been perusing the racks of consignment shops more these days to outfit her daughters, 3-year-old Audrey and 9-month-old Brianna.
Along with getting some good deals, she earns a little money by selling clothes her daughters no longer wear.
But just as Boulch and others turn increasingly to consignment and thrift shops to get more for their dollar, a new law is forcing the industry to become more vigilant about the items it accepts.
A new federal product safety law that goes into effect on Feb. 10 requires manufacturers of new children's products to meet tighter standards for lead levels, prohibiting the sale of used children's products with more than 600 parts per million of lead. The law also says that retailers who sell ued children's products in violation of the new limits could face civil and criminal penalties.
Ingesting or breathing lead can cause a number of health issues, including learning or behavioral problems, anemia, kidney problems and worse. Children are especially susceptible to lead poisoning.
The law is forcing the owners of one local children's consignment store, Perfect Circle in Bremerton, to go out of business.
Others, including thrift shops, are taking a closer look at how they select children's clothing and toys for resale.
Perfect Circle owners Laura Nesby and Jenna Matthews wrote in an e-mail to customers that shops are not required to conduct tests themselves, but that they could be fined up to $100,000 per offense if they sell items that contain illegal levels of lead.
"Essentially, stores are being directed to operate at their own risk. If they sell an item that is believed to be safe and it actually exceeds the legal limit ... they are at risk of being fined by the (Consumer Product Safety Commission) or sued by a customer," the owners said in the e-mail.
"We will not run our business knowing we could get fined or sued at anytime."
The Clothes Line in Silverdale and Rumple New Skins in Poulsbo say they plan to continue operating as usual, paying close attention to the lists and e-mails sent by the CPSC detailing recalls of children's products. The shops don't accept products on the CPSC recall list.
"The new law is 122 pages and very complicated," said Denise Rahman, owner of Rumple New Skins. "We'll be fine. We check the recalls every day, and the manufacturers of our new items are certifying they're in compliance, too."
"There's a lot of concern about the law," said Alan Smith of The Clothes Line. "We'll stay in business, check the recall lists, and not knowingly sell anything with lead.
"Especially with this economy, people need to be able to continue buying used affordable children's clothing."
Thrift stores like St. Vincent de Paul and Goodwill must also be in compliance with the new law.
"We check the recall lists and don't accept cribs or toys with paint on them because of the possibility of lead in the paint," said Roger English, general manager of St. Vincent on Callow Avenue in West Bremerton.
Is lead poisoning still a big issue in the US or is this just more Federal meddling with small business courtesy of the local retailers associations??
I might also point out that our local secondhand stores are much favored by homeschoolers and the like. Coincidence or conspiracy minded FReeper??
Every election there seem to be more and more Democrats and that’s clearly a sign of brain damage from some source ~ could be lead ~ could be dope.
Is that “dope” as in drugs or “dope” as in stupid?
Probably both eh!
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How can it be proved or disproved that a particular item was purchased at a particular thrift store.
I suspect that much of the brain damage attributed to lesd is genetic.
I was in our local consignment shop yesterday to find out what their policies were for becoming a consignee and they had a whole long list of items they will not accept b/c of this law.
I wouldn't call that an exemption.
Whatever happened to mold and radon? Remember those oldies but goodies?
OTOH, I got a stupid form letter back from a Republican Congressman whose name I will not mention; he basically said we need to prevent dangerous lead-contaminated toys from getting into the hands of American children (with which we all agree) but failed to address the used clothes issue at all.
That’s why I stopped writing my congresscritters because I only got back form letters that didn’t address the issue I was asking about in the first place.
They think we are all too stupid to be serious about what concerns us so they answer us with form letters.
It affect us, as we make tie dye to sell at fairs and what not. There is o lead in cotton t-shirts and there s no lead in procion dye. In fact, members of the Apparel Association held a seminar with folks of the CPSC to show that even if the ancient formulas for dye were used that did contain lead, that lead literally came out in the wash.
Given that there does not seem to be a reliable method for measuring lead content, is this really a problem or has this just been fabricated by retailer associations and big government.
Lead concerns in household paint was a hot button issue when I was a kid, but that was 40 years ago.
How would lead contamination get into a child’s cloths? Isn’t mercury, present in CFLs a greater risk to children??
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