Could preschool story time be a thing of the past? With the new lead laws library books must be tested for lead or ban children from entering the library. This includes the libraries in schools.
Could the new law stop children from having books available to them?
Granted the stricter testing for lead is important but it seems the United States is carrying it a little too far. There are over 2 million library books just in Kansas City that now require a test so a child can look through it.
Kansas City.com reports:
“You’re talking about separating children from books, which has got to be the most ridiculous thing this commission has ever attempted,” said Emily Sheketoff, executive director of the American Library Association’s Washington office.
“Books are safe. They are not a dangerous product.”
On February 10 the new federal law goes into effect. If there are no quick rewrites your children will not be able to check out a book from their school library.
Although the 63-page act does not list books they are designed for ages under the age of 12. That makes them children's products affected by the law.
There were many thousands of calls to the Consumer Product Safety Commission telling them how crazy they were,” Kansas City Public Library CEO Crosby Kemper III said. “Librarians turn out to be a pretty feisty group. We’ve put a lot of pressure on the (commission), and they’ve started to back off.”
The library association is now petitioning the safety commission to get a ruling that takes books off the list.
Book printers no longer use inks that have lead. Raw materials in books do not include lead either.
The act follows the lead-tainted toys that flooded the market from China.
