The usually trustworthy Snopes.com has screwed the pooch on the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) of 2009.

There’s been a lot of talk about it’s effect on flea markets and thrift shops, and Snopes tries to oil the troubled waters.

However, the new regulations are not as restrictive as first feared, nor will they put the thrift shops out of business.
…
Sellers of used children’s products, such as thrift stores and consignment stores, are not required to certify that those products meet the new lead limits, phthalates standard or new toy standards.

Oh, is that so? Reading further we find:

In other words, used children’s items offered for resale after 10 February 2009 must still meet the new CPSIA standards regarding lead and phthalate content, but vendors will not have to have such items tested and certified.

Hmmmmmm…

Vendors should therefore “avoid products that are likely to have lead content, unless they have testing or other information to indicate the products being sold have less than the new limit.”

Now what might that include?

How about just about everything? Including, it seems, ALL children’s books made before 1985. By law it will be illegal to sell, give or transfer ownership of any children’s book published before 1985. You don’t have to do any expensive testing. You just can’t do it.

I can’t wait ’till someone tries to burn one of these lead containing books. Or put it in a landfill. Maybe they can be snuck into landfills with fluorescent lamps.

So what if one of these unthreatened thrift shops fails to test their items and sells something that violates the standards of the new law?

“Those resellers that do sell products in violation of the new limits could face civil and/or or criminal penalties,” a reasonable interpretation of that statement as it applies to the sale of used goods would be that the agency will focus its attentions on those retailers who blatantly take a cavalier attitude towards the used childrens’ items in their inventory by continuing to vend merchandise items they have good reason to suspect contain lead.

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