BROWSE CAR REVIEWS BY:
MAKE
MODEL
Click on a car body type for search results.
 |
 |
| SUVs (two rows) | SUVs (three rows) |
 |
 |
| Crossover | Minivans |
 |
 |
| Sedan | Hybrids |
 |
 |
| Wagons/Hatchbacks | Just for Fun |
Even NHTSA Boss Can’t Get Her Car Seats Right
Oct 03 2007 by Sara Lacey
10/3/2007
Private Mistake, Public Acknowledgment Benefits Us All
As a parent, I feel like I often mess up on the job. What's more, I never really know when I've made a good decision. It gives me the willies to think that something I do — or don't do — today will affect my kids 15 years from now. I wonder if I'm too strict, if I'm not strict enough, if I really should have bribed them with a milkshake to calmly get through a throat culture — it's amazing we aren't all suffering from chronic heartburn, isn't it?
My one consolation is that, most of the time, no one else see my mistakes, but not everyone has that luxury. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration administrator Nicole Nason recently made a startling confession: She had been installing her children's car seats incorrectly. After taking a clinic this summer, she said she realized she "almost put it in right," but that she hadn't used one of the Latches on the car seat. Seems shocking, right? She's in charge of an agency that makes guidelines regarding the use of these seats, and she wasn't doing it right? Because this affects us — and you — so directly, we had an impromptu roundtable among the Mother Proof staff. Read on for our gut reactions, and a couple more well-thought-out ones, too.
Courtney: In her defense, more than 80 percent of Americans who use child-safety seats reportedly do so incorrectly, so she's certainly not an anomaly. That said, any responsible person in her position — someone who took their position seriously — would have made sure they became a certified car seat technician (or would at least have had someone quickly teach them how to do it) before becoming top dog at the government agency that oversees such things. This little lady at NHTSA better be careful, and she better start studying up!
Emily: I have two immediate thoughts about Ms. Nason: My first is that she is like most moms out there — she thought she was installing her seats in a safe manner, but she really wasn't. Now, not only does she feel bad for possibly endangering her kids, but she has a huge spotlight on her mistake. My second thought is a whole lot more catty: What was this woman thinking? I don't want to cut her too much slack, because, honestly, this is a big deal — this should be a basic qualification for any job at NHTSA, let alone the head of the agency. C'mon people.
What this really highlights for me is the ridiculously difficult nature of installing car seats. There has to be a better way. We don't want to screw this up, yet so many of us do. Maybe this will light a fire under Nicole Nason, who is in a position to be an advocate for changing things. Maybe.
Sara: Is this a freaking joke? I believe her "eureka moment" should have occurred when she observed there was a Latch she wasn't using, because there are just so many useless Latches they put on car seats these days. You have a eureka moment when you realize you've been wearing the wrong bra size for 10 years, not when you're the Boss of the Country's Car Safety and you're not using your car seat properly.
Colette: Here's NHTSA's mission, according to its website:
NHTSA's Mission: Save lives, prevent injuries and reduce economic costs due to road traffic crashes through education, research, safety standards and enforcement activity.
NHTSA's Vision: Global leader in motor vehicle and highway safety.
NHTSA's Core Values: NHTSA is dedicated to achieving the highest standards of excellence in motor vehicle and highway safety. The agency strives to exceed the expectations of its customers through its core values of integrity, service and leadership.
Instead of harping on this fellow mom, I'd like to point out that this is a perfect learning opportunity for all of us regarding car-seat installation. Make it a priority to visit the local fire station to ensure that all of your car seats have been properly installed (including those of child No. 2, No. 3, No. 4 and up). Bring your kids along to ensure a proper fit.
If Nicole Nason fails this test, then many of us are as well. Considering that the shoulder straps/harness on a car seat can only have a minimal amount of slack (one finger width between the strap and collarbone, to be exact) and that the actual restraint shouldn't have more than an inch of play on the seat bottom, there are many factors at work beyond basic hardware installation. I applaud Ms. Nason for admitting her mistake and hope it was to serve the greater good. I encourage her to make a point to educate the masses.
Sara: OK, so my first response was a little heated and off-the-cuff. I'm not trying to be snarky by replying again, it's just the more I think about this the more frustrated I become.
Why must it take her failure to bring change? If you're the head of an organization whose mission statement includes dedication "to achieving the highest standards of excellence in motor vehicle and highway safety," you do not get off easy when you drop the ball. She's not just like us. Her job — the one she gets paid to do, and which she is trusted to do well — is to not be just like us. Her job is to be better than us at this one thing. Just because we can relate to her mistake — and who among us doesn't shudder at the thought of some of our mistakes going public? — doesn't mean she shouldn't be taken to task. She's not my neighbor, or just another mom out there.
I don't think she should lose her job, but the fact that she stepped into it knowing less than I do about car seats freaks me out.
Kristin: I recently went through a five-day child-passenger-safety technician training myself, so I can see both sides of the argument. If the five of us are sitting here harping on Ms. Nason and not claiming to be a part of her rank (meaning the rank of moms who have made errors with child-safety seats), then we're either too proud to admit our errors or we're not educated enough to know that we too have made those mistakes (which is why we'll all be going through the course next year).
I say we blame it on the system. Every car seat is installed differently, and the way you access the system to install a car seat is different in every car. Combine that with all the new models coming out and the constant stream of recalls, and it's a full-time job just to keep on top of it all. The system needs to be Mother Proofed!
(Oh, and Sara, I'm proud to say I just had a bra fitting and I was in fact wearing the right size. At least I have control of my boobs, even if I can't figure out how to get my kids' booster seats in the back of a Jaguar XK coupe.)
User Comments
So, I may have never cut her much slack, but now it’s even less. While we all know the stats (a vast majority of people are using their car seats incorrectly), I maintain that it is deplorable that the head of our nation’s traffic safety agency, the very agency in charge of these things, was not using her car seat correctly. She should have taken a certification course prior to being instated or at least made it one of her first moves in office. From Mr. Arnold’s citings, it does appear that there are a litany of complaints we could have against her and her agency though, so it’s not surprising.
It is also valid though, that the MotherProof team should take this as an entree to step up and start spreading the word about sar seat safety and how to use it correctly or how to find out how to use it correctly!
——-Original Message——-
From: Bruce Arnold [mailto:Bruce@LdrLongDistanceRider.com]
Sent: Sunday, September 23, 2007 10:41 AM
To: ‘NHTSA.custservice@dot.gov’
Subject: Open Letter to NHTSA Administrator Nicole R. Nason (“That’s My Money You Are Misusing, Ms. Nason.”)
Nicole R. Nason
Administrator
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
NHTSA Headquarters
1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
West Building
Washington, DC 20590
Telephone: 1-888-327-4236
Email: Submitted via et al
Ms. Nason:
CBS News has quoted you as saying that, in your role as NHTSA Administrator, “I love knowing that at the end of the day, what we are try[ing] to do—what I am trying to do—is make a vehicle safer for my children…”
http://tinyurl.com/2csv5g
...and one need only glance at the “Quick Clicks” section of the new “NHTSA.dot.gov” web pages for evidence of your pursuit of that personal agenda.
If your mission in life is to make automobiles “safer for your children”, Ms. Nason, that is admirable. But if that has skewed your focus as to what you are supposed to be doing as the administrator of a 750-employee federal bureacracy spending millions of taxpayer dollars annually, that is unacceptable. Here is what your commitment SHOULD be:
“NHTSA is committed to providing the most accurate and complete information available to its customers, the American traveling public, in a helpful and courteous fashion.”
http://tinyurl.com/25bumo
YOU ARE NOT HONORING THAT COMMITMENT, MS. NASON. Since you assumed the position of NHTSA Administrator in May 2006, you have effectively closed off all agency communications with the public or press except through you. As Christopher Jensen of the New York Times reported in “What’s Off the Record at N.H.T.S.A.? Almost Everything”:
“The agency’s new policy effectively means that some of the world’s top safety researchers are no longer allowed to talk to reporters or to be freely quoted about automotive safety issues that affect pretty much everybody…. ‘My God,’ said Joan Claybrook, who was N.H.T.S.A. administrator from 1977 to 1981 and is now president of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group. Given that N.H.T.S.A. is the leading source of automotive safety information in the United States, its researchers are public officials and people are entitled to ‘know what information they have, whether it is on paper or in their heads,’ Ms. Claybrook said.”
http://tinyurl.com/2xysdz
Given your attempt to avoid public scrutiny by restricting agency-to-media communications, access to information through your NHTSA website becomes all the more crucial. And what has happened there since you took over? A major “upgrade” ... one unnecessary casualty of which was many resource references which are now “broken links” like this one:
http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30/ncsa/tsf2005/motorcyclestsf05.pdf
SO MUCH FOR “HELPFUL AND COURTEOUS”, MS. NASON. Let’s now take a look at how you’re doing in the “accurate and complete information” department, specifically with respect to this recent report:
DOT HS 810 834 September 2007
Fatal Two-Vehicle Motorcycle Crashes
http://tinyurl.com/273y2f
The stated purpose of this report is to ”...analyze fatal two-vehicle motorcycle crashes for trends and crash characteristics using FARS (Fatality Analysis Reporting System) data [and to] identify possible factors relating to the drivers/operators in these crashes [so as to] understand possible causes for these crashes.” And what were the findings?
Many of your “findings” in this report are obvious to anyone with a basic knowledge of motorcycling and a little common sense. Of course, “the role of the motorcycle was recorded as the striking vehicle” in most cases! That is what happens when a negligent, care-less, distracted or cellphone conversation-impaired motorist turns left or pulls out in front of a motorcyclist! And of course, “more than 90 percent of the two-vehicle motorcycle crashes involving passenger vehicles occurred on non-interstate roadways”! Roads without median barriers make it easier for irresponsible drivers to violate a motorcyclist’s right-of-way!
What wasn’t so obvious was the implication of this conclusion on page 7:
“For the passenger vehicle drivers involved in [fatal] two-vehicle motorcycle crashes, 35 percent of the driver-related factor was failure to yield right-of-way compared to only 4 percent for motorcycle operators.”
Any cub reporter (wait and see) will interpret that to mean that the automobile driver was at fault in these accidents only 35 percent of the time, which would conversely mean that “it was the biker’s fault” 65 percent of the time. Is that what this conclusion was intended to convey, Ms. Nason? Well, you and I know that is neither accurate nor complete information, is it?
The truth can be found, well obfuscated, in Table 22 on page 30. The obfuscation begins with your selection of a data presentation format in which the ”...sums of the numbers and percents are greater than the total drivers as each driver may be coded with more than one factor.” The obfuscation is perfected by using a doubletalk category breakdown in which driver offenses like making improper turns, failure to keep in proper lane, failure to obey traffic signs or signals, and even driving on the wrong side of road are reported separately and thereby partially or entirely EXCLUDED FROM THE 35 PERCENT RIGHT-OF-WAY VIOLATION STATISTIC. The truth can be found, Ms. Nason, by applying this formula:
1 - ((711 + 26) / 1792) = 0.588727679
Logic precludes any double counting in the “None reported” or “Unknown” categories, and for all other categories, the automobile driver either caused or contributed to the death of the motorcyclist. So the truth is, Ms. Nason, that AUTOMOBILE DRIVERS WERE RESPONSIBLE FOR EITHER CAUSING OR CONTRIBUTING TO THE DEATHS OF AT LEAST 58.87% OF ALL BIKERS KILLED IN TW0-VEHICLE CRASHES IN 2005.
THAT is “accurate and complete information”, Ms. Nason. So why isn’t THAT statistic included in your report? And how much other “accurate and complete information” that conflicts with your misguided, Haddonistic view of the world…
http://tinyurl.com/2ttq9v
...are you spinning, obfuscating or just outright excluding from all the other “traffic safety information” reports you are fabricating at the taxpayers’ expense?
That’s MY money you are misusing, Ms. Nason.
Speaking strictly for myself and no other entities or organizations,
Bruce Arnold
Author and Publisher, LdrLongDistanceRider.com
Co-Moderator, Bruce-n-Ray’s Biker Forum
Premier Member, Iron Butt Association
Sustaining Member, Motorcycle Riders Foundation
2007 Chairman’s Circle, American Motorcyclist Association