National Recall Round-Up Day, 1998

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Title 3--
The President

Proclamation 7082 of April 15, 1998

National Recall Round-Up Day, 1998

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

More than 21,000 Americans lose their lives each year
in accidents involving consumer products, and more than
29 million are injured. These accidents cost our Nation
over $200 billion annually, and the cost in terms of
human suffering is immeasurable.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is on the
front line of the Federal Government's efforts to
protect the safety and well-being of our citizens,
especially our children. The CPSC monitors the
performance of more than 15,000 types of consumer
products and secures the recall of those that prove to
be defective and potentially hazardous. Last year
alone, the CPSC negotiated 362 recalls involving over
76 million individual consumer products that presented
a significant risk to the public. But getting dangerous
products off store shelves is only the first step. The
real challenge is getting them out of the homes of
people who have already purchased them.

On April 16, the CPSC, in conjunction with State and
local governments and community organizations across
the country, will conduct the second annual Recall
Round-Up Day. This initiative is a public safety
campaign to warn Americans that they may still be
exposing themselves and their families to recalled
products that could seriously injure or even kill them.
Despite recalls and safety alerts issued by the CPSC,
many of these hazardous products are still in
consumers' homes or can be purchased at secondhand
stores and garage sales.

This year's Recall Round-Up effort will spotlight the
dangers associated with five types of previously
recalled consumer products: playpens, bunk beds,
halogen floor lamps, hand-held hair dryers, and lawn
darts. The CPSC encourages government officials,
health, safety, and consumer agencies, community
organizations, and the media to alert the American
people--particularly parents and child care providers--
to the importance of repairing, returning, or
destroying any of these products if they have been
recalled. I encourage all Americans to make use of this
vital information to protect the safety and health of
their families and to avoid preventable tragedies.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, WILLIAM J. CLINTON, President of the
United States of America, by virtue of the authority
vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United
States, do hereby proclaim April 16, 1998, as National
Recall Round-Up Day. I call upon all Americans to
observe this day by working with safety, health, and
consumer agencies and other appropriate community
organizations to organize and conduct local round-ups
of dangerous and defective consumer products and to
warn parents, child care providers, and the general
public about the hazards of using recalled consumer
products.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
fifteenth day of April, in the year of our Lord
nineteen hundred and ninety-eight, and of the
Independence of the United States of America the two
hundred and twenty-second.