Local technicians provide car seat safety checks

When you have kids, there are always enough things to worry about -- so fears over the actual protection children get from safety gear shouldn't be one of them. But to ensure a safer car ride, parents must pay careful attention and comply with recommendations on use for items such as car seats for infants and booster seats for older children.

Parents can start with knowing Missouri's law on child passenger safety.

State law requires children to meet one of three benchmarks before they can stop being secured in a safety or booster seat. The child can be 8 years old, weigh 80 pounds or be at least 4 feet 9 inches tall.

Safe Communities, a local safety initiative based at the Cape Girardeau Police Department, also lists several additional safety recommendations for child passengers, including that babies should ride in rear-facing seats until at least 1 year old and 20 pounds and that children should not be placed in booster seats until the fit is correct -- meaning the booster seat should lift the child up so that the lap portion of the seat belt fits low and snug across the hips, and the shoulder portion of the seat belt fits across the middle of the chest and shoulder.

The correct fit of the seat to the child, along with correct installation of the seat in a vehicle, will provide optimal safety, says Rachel Penny, a child passenger safety technician who works with the Safe Communities initiative.

"The best thing parents can do is to look at and get to know what is in the manual that comes with a seat, and follow the instructions," Penny says.

Penny performs car seat checks upon request of parents and caregivers as part of the initiative's child passenger safety program, and trains other technicians to provide safety checks.

One potential car seat-related hazard she advises on is the origin of the seat. There are also rules, she says, about how long a car seat or booster seat should be used -- five years from the date of original manufacture is the cutoff, so, for example, a seat being used in 2014 shouldn't have been made before 2009. Most seats, Penny says, have a sticker or printed area of plastic that indicates the manufacturer date.

Penny also says parents should be wary of buying a safety seat secondhand, such as through consignment or at a garage sale.

"Unless you know the person well who used the seat and they can tell you it has never been in a wreck or damaged in another way, don't buy it," she says.

A seat that has been in a car involved in a crash has compromised stability.

Since correct installation of safety seats can be difficult, a car seat check is a parent's best bet for a safe seat, Penny says. The Safe Communities initiative in Cape Girardeau will perform the check free of charge for parents and caregivers who call 573-335-7908 and make an appointment. In Jackson, the fire department has trained technicians who can perform car seat checks. Parents or caregivers must first call 573-243-1010 to make an appointment for an inspection and be flexible with the appointment time, according to city staff, should an emergency should arise and responders are called out.

More local opportunities for safety checks can be found by visiting www.seatcheck.org and entering a zip code. An interactive tool that explains recommendations and rules for safe use of child seats can also be found online at www.safercar.gov/parents/CarSeats.