Meeting re: Establishment of a Public Consumer Product Safety Incident Database
The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) on September 10 2009 published plans to implement a publicly accessible, searchable database of consumer product incident reports (not just recalls). The database, required under the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA), is a part of a greater information technology effort that will increase public awareness and access to consumer product safety information. The database will be located on a government (.gov) website that will allow consumers to report product safety incidents (in some fashion similar to this) and search prior incidents and recalls on other products. The details of the database that have been published so far are located here
Clearly this is a very ambitious project and will likely take years to implement (correctly). We can also see this this will be a huge benefit not just to consumers but to plaintiff's attorneys. Our biggest fear of course is unverified erroneous information being pumped into the database with no way of knowing if it is accurate. To some extent this problem is already wide spread on the Internet generally (not in just one database) and this will only accelerate the trend. Hopefully the supply side will be well represented.
Although the notice below does not speak of written comments (aside from the text of oral presentations) the CPSC generally accepts written comments to proposals. Just make sure they arrive before Nov. 3, 2009. Also remember that anything you submit will be "publicly available" and likely posted on the CPSC website for some time. If you would like our office to send your comments along so that your company or individual information is removed from the communication we can do that for you. Please give us some advance notice.
Establishment of a Public Consumer Product Safety Incident Database
AGENCY: Consumer Product Safety Commission.
ACTION: Notice of public hearing.
SUMMARY: The Consumer Product Safety Commission (Commission) will conduct a public hearing to receive views from all interested parties on Section 212 of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008 (CPSIA), Establishment of a Public Consumer Product Safety Incident Database. Participation by members of the public is invited. Oral presentations concerning the Commission's implementation of Section 212 of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008 (CPSIA), Establishment of a Public Consumer Product Safety Incident Database, will become part of the public record.
DATES: The hearing will begin at 9:00 am on November 10, 2009. Requests to make oral presentations and the written text of any oral presentations must be received by the Office of the Secretary not later than 5 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST) on November 3, 2009.
ADDRESSES: The hearing will be in the Hearing Room, 4th Floor of the Bethesda Towers Building, 4330 East West Highway, Bethesda, Maryland 20814. Requests to make oral presentations can be made online at http://www.cpsc.gov/cgibin/dbmeeting.aspx or, send an email, call, or write Todd A. Stevenson, Office of the Secretary, Consumer Product Safety Commission, 4330 East West Highway, Bethesda, Maryland 20814; e-mail cpsc-os@cpsc.gov; telephone (301) 504-7923; facsimile (301) 504-0127 not later than 5 p.m. EST on November 3, 2009. Texts of oral presentations should be captioned "Establishment of a Public Consumer Product Safety Incident Database" and sent by electronic mail (e-mail) to cpsc-os@cpsc.gov, or mailed or delivered to the Office of the Secretary, Consumer Product Safety Commission, 4330 East West Highway, Bethesda, Maryland 20814, not later than 5 p.m. EST on November 3, 2009.
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