Senator Brown’s statement is as follows:
I do rise to speak to Senate Resolution No. 31 and, with your permission, the next item, Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 10. These resolutions urge Congress to enact a waiver or exclusion for youth motorcycles, all-terrain vehicles, and snowmobiles from the lead requirements of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act and to encourage the Consumer Product Safety Commission to exclude those products under their regulatory authority.
While the federal CPSIA law was written with good intentions, many unintended consequences are now affecting manufacturers of products that are not stored in a “shared toy box” and are not engaged in any manner that would promote ingestion by young children. The Consumer Product Safety Commission, charged with administering this law, has acknowledged that power sports products pose low risk to kids. In a letter to Congressman John Dingell they state, “The possibility that children will suffer significant lead exposure from these classes of vehicles appears to be remote at best.”
However, because of this law, many dealers and small businesses across the country are embroiled in uncertainty and facing enormous added costs. For example, I have heard from Cobra Moto in Hillsdale, Michigan. They will face $2 million in costs in the first year alone because of this law. Testing costs per youth motorcycle will exceed $1,800 per item. This high cost will cause them to close down, despite the fact that their power sports products do not even pose health risks to children 12 and under, as their parts are not placed in children’s mouths. The loss of Cobra Moto would take 35 full-time jobs and 4 part-time jobs from Hillsdale County, which cannot afford to lose more jobs due to burdensome and excessive regulation. There are more than 500 power sports dealers who will be negatively affected by this law in Michigan only.
The National Association of Manufacturers and the Michigan Manufacturers Association support these resolutions. NAM President, former Governor John Engler, recently commented, and I quote, “The law’s overly broad approach applies to products that should not be evaluated using the same safety criteria as products that do pose a risk. It is critical that the CPSC focus on improving safety. This misguided law has triggered the destruction of millions of safe products, costing businesses billions of dollars during one of the worst economic crises in U.S. history.”
There is an urgency for Congress to act on this issue, as the effective date for the law was February 10, 2009. I ask you all to vote in favor of helping businesses in Michigan by asking Congress to make changes to the CPSIA.