handmade-doll

(photo credit)

With the help of you and people like you, “Save Small Business from the CPSIA” was voted one of top ten ideas for change by Change.org.  As I understand it, these top ten ideas will be presented to president-elect Obama in an effort to encourage him to influence change in this over-reaching law that could effectively put an end to crafting and reselling handmade items for children. 

Some cool numbers:

  • This Cause was ranked in the top ten out of 7,847 ideas.  (Only the top ten get presented formally to the President).
  • There were 12,280 votes in the second round of voting by people out there just like you and me.  (Don’t ask me what happened in the first round, I came late to this party.  That’s a change.org question.)
  • There are currently 474 endorsements by nonprofits and bloggers, including me and many of my readers.  (Woo Hoo, Go us!)

This work is far from over.  The law is already on the books and set to go into effect on February 10th.  The key here is to mobilize to effect change from this point forward. 

Text from the change.org website informs us:

Over the next week we will be working with nonprofit sponsors for each idea, including 1Sky, Healthcare-NOW!, and The Peace Alliance, to craft national campaigns around each idea. In the meantime, we have opened discussion for how to most effectively turn each idea into a successful national campaign, and would love your suggestions.

There’s an area where you can make suggestions and give input regarding how/why handcrafted items should be an exception to the CSPIA’s prohibitively burdensome testing criteria.  If you’ve got a strong opinion about this whatsoever, I urge you to get involved, whether in this forum or another. 

We crafters and/or resellers are, in general, a pretty laid-back bunch of folks.  Usually, that kind of approach works just fine, thank you very much.  But please consider how this law would effect your ability and the ability of other crafters to make and distribute beautiful handmade items for children.  There is real (negative) impacton us with this legislation.  It’s likely that well-meaning elected officials didn’t consider how their vote for this messy law would effect people like you and me.  It’s not too late to let them know now.  Don’t wait.  Something can be done about this.

For more information on the Consumer Products Safety Improvement Act, also known as HR 4040, click on the following links.  And thanks!

https://shannonsays.wordpress.com/2009/01/09/sew-important-defend-your-ability-to-craft-for-kids/

http://www.change.org/ideas/view/save_handmade_toys_from_the_cpsia

Text of the actual Act: http://www.cpsc.gov/cpsia.pdf

http://coolmompicks.com/savehandmade/

http://savekidsresale.squarespace.com/

A similar post tailored to resellers will be posted on one of my other blogs, What Matters Most, at http://matteringmost.wordpress.com/.

[EDIT:  Please note the first comment from Jon below, which gives GREAT information and an important link to follow regarding (different site, folks!) www.change.gov, which is another site you’ll want to explore, along with explanatory links.  Let’s stick together and get some stuff accomplished here!]