Safety Agency Faces Scrutiny Amid Changes

WASHINGTON, Sept. 1 - In March 2005, the Consumer Product Safety Commission called together the nation's top safety experts to confront an alarming statistic: 44,000 children riding all terrain vehicles were injured the previous year, nearly 150 of them fatally.

Skip to next paragraph Enlarge This Image Damon Winter/The New York Times

Scant Resources for Safety Tests Robert L. Hundemer, right, the sole full-time tester for toys on the market in the United States, conducts an impact test in a one-room lab while Andrew G. Stadnik, the lab director, watches. Former employees of the Consumer Product Safety Commission say products from China frequently violate standards.

The Testing Lab A Mission Refocused

Other articles examining changes at federal agencies looked at the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

Times Topics: Consumer Product Safety Multimedia Graphic Cuts at a Consumer Protection Agency Related Loosening the Rules: OSHA Leaves Worker Safety in Hands of Industry (April 25, 2007) Loosening the Rules: As Trucking Rules Are Eased, a Debate on Safety Intensifies (December 3, 2006)

National associations of pediatricians, consumer advocates and emergency room doctors were urging the commission to ban sales of adult-size A.T.V.'s for use by children under 16 because the machines were too big and fast for young drivers to control. But when it came time to consider such a step, a staff member whose name did not appear on the meeting agenda unexpectedly weighed in.

"My own view is the situation is not necessarily deteriorating," said John Gibson Mullan, the agency's director of compliance and a former lawyer for the A.T.V. industry, according to a recording. The current system of warning labels and other voluntary safety standards was working, he said. "We would need to be very careful about making any changes."

Robin L. Ingle, then the agency's hazard statistician and A.T.V. injury expert, was dumbfounded. Her months of research did not support Mr. Mullan's analysis. Yet she would not get to offer a rebuttal.

"He had hijacked the presentation," Ms. Ingle said in an interview. "He was distorting the numbers in order to benefit industry and defeat the petition. It was almost like he still worked for them, not us."

Under the Bush administration, which promised to ease what it viewed as costly rules that placed unnecessary burdens on businesses, industry-friendly officials have been installed at agencies that oversee the nation's workplaces, food suppliers, environment and consumer goods.

Top officials at the Consumer Product Safety Commission say they have enhanced protections for the American public in recent years. But they have also blocked enforcement actions, weakened industry oversight rules and promoted voluntary compliance over safety mandates, according to interviews with current and former senior agency officials and consumer groups and a review of commission documents.

At a time when imports from China and other Asian countries surged, creating an ever greater oversight challenge, the Bush-appointed commissioners voiced few objections as the already tiny agency - now just 420 workers - was pared almost to the bone.

At the nation's ports, the handful of agency inspectors are hard pressed to find dangerous cargo before it enters the country; instead, they rely on other federal agents, who mostly act as trademark enforcers, looking for counterfeit Nike sneakers or Duracell batteries.

At the agency's cramped laboratory, a lone employee is charged with testing suspected defective toys from across the nation. At the nearby headquarters, safety initiatives have been stalled or dropped after dozens of jobs were eliminated in budget cutbacks.

Other workers quit in frustration. The head of the poison prevention unit, for example, resigned when efforts to require inexpensive child-resistant caps on hair care products that had burned toddlers were delayed so industry costs could be weighed against the potential benefit to children.

"Buyer beware - that is all I have to say," Suzanne Barone, the poison prevention expert, who left in 2005, said.

Like a number of longtime former and current officials at the agency, she said she believes that it is failing to fulfill its mission. "There is only so much that the few people there can do," she said. "So much damage has been done."

Agency officials defend their record. "The commission is currently doing more to protect consumers than it has at any prior time in its history," said Nancy A. Nord, the acting chairwoman. "Even more could be done with greater resources, but the media's portrayal of a crippled and impotent agency, unable to deal with basic problems, is reckless and just plain wrong."

Congress intended the agency to protect the public by working with the industry and others to establish voluntary standards. Ms. Nord and industry executives say that system is largely effective, in no small measure because it is in companies' self-interest to avoid turning out products that cause harm. When hazards arise, Ms. Nord says, she is confident that the agency acts to deal with them appropriately.

For the first time in years, the commission has drawn sustained attention because of the headlines generated in recent months by the seemingly endless recalls of Chinese-made products: Thomas & Friends toy trains, Mattel Sesame Street toys, propane grills, high chairs, computer batteries, lawn trimmers, children's jewelry and tool kits.

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