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Home › Articles › Safety › Car Seat Conundrum

Car Seat Conundrum

Keeping Toddlers Safe on the Road

By Teri Brown

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Common Safety Mistakes
Joyce Prager from Encino, Calif., assistant vice president of community relations for 21st Century Insurance, spends much of her time coordinating safety fairs and directing car seat inspections. She has noticed that parents make many of the same child safety seat mistakes. These include straps that are too loose on the child (straps should fit snugly against the child), having the harness chest clip in the wrong position (it should be positioned at the child's mid-chest or armpit level to keep the shoulder straps in the correct position) or using a baby carrier as a safety seat.

Prager believes the key to safety is that parents know the safety seat laws in their state. "Parents often don't know the law in their state about child safety seat use, which is so important," she says. "Take the time to learn the child restraint laws in your state, and when in doubt, follow the national guidelines that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) offers."

Prager says the NHTSA recommends that children under 4 feet, 9 inches tall remain properly restrained in a child safety seat or a booster seat, although most state laws aren't as stringent.

"21st Century Insurance adheres to the national guidelines when we hold safety inspections, and we keep plenty of booster seats on hand to take care of kids who fall under those guidelines," Prager says. "We want every child to be as safely secured as possible when they leave our events."

Amy Frias, a certified child passenger safety technician and instructor at Children's Hospital of Orange County Community Education Department in Orange County, Calif., says many people only know part of their state law. "The current law in California is that children that are under 6 years or 60 pounds need to ride in a booster seat or car seat," Frias says. "What most people don't realize is that there is a second part of the law that states that children under 16 need to ride 'properly' in a seat belt."


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