WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is turning to South Carolina’s former school superintendent to head an expanded Consumer Product Safety Commission, an embattled agency that has been criticized by advocates for being too cozy with industry.
The president asked Congress today for $107 million to fund the agency charged with ensuring that products from toys and cribs to ATVs and toasters are safe for use. He is also increasing the number of seats on the commission from three to five.
The budget request falls short of the president’s campaign pledge to double the agency’s funding, although aides say it is almost three-quarters of the way there.
“We must do more to protect the American public, especially our nation’s children, from being harmed by unsafe products,” Obama said in a statement.
Obama announced the nomination of former South Carolina Education Superintendent Inez Moore Tenenbaum as chair of the commission. He also nominated Robert Adler, a former lawyer and adviser to the panel, for one of the new positions.
If confirmed by the Senate, Tenenbaum would replace acting chair Nancy Nord, who has been a lightning rod for Democrats in Congress and consumer advocates though defended by Republicans and manufacturers.
Nord, a former Eastman Kodak Co. lobbyist appointed by President George W. Bush, came under fire for accepting at least three trips, worth thousands of dollars, from industry, purportedly to share information about CPSC priorities and discuss toy safety. Democrats demanded her resignation.
Nord defended the trips as legal and bemoaned the overall criticism as unfair. She said complaints were motivated more by politics than a desire for meaningful change.
Tenenbaum, who ran for the Senate in 2004, served two terms as South Carolina’s education chief. Before that, she practiced law and worked for the state House.
Adler, who advised Obama during his transition, teaches at the University of North Carolina. Earlier in his career, he spent 11 years at the CPSC as an attorney and adviser to two commissions.
The CPSC, headquartered in Bethesda, Md., has about 430 employees. The agency oversees about 15,000 products.
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