One would expect firefighters would know a thing or two about fire safety. So when they speak up and tell the state legislature that adding pounds of flame retardant chemicals to single pieces of furniture doesn’t protect them, or folks whose houses or businesses catch fire, and in fact puts their lives MORE at risk, you would hope our lawmakers would listen.
Many of them are listening, as is Governor Jerry Brown, who directed his administration to revise an outdated law that served as a de facto requirement for furniture manufacturers to add flame retardant chemicals to their products. The growing evidence of harm from these toxic chemicals convinced the governor that the law must be changed, and it convinced the legislature last year to pass a new law, AB 127 (Skinner), that would decrease the use of these chemicals in building insulation. But there is still work to be done to protect Californians’ health from these chemicals, which have not been banned.
Enter SB 1019, a simple right-to-know bill that would require furniture manufacturers to add some information to the label already affixed to their products. Authored by Senator Mark Leno, who has been a champion for protecting consumers from flame retardant chemicals for years, the bill passed the state Senate and is now due to be voted on by the state Assembly any day now.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle:
The bill, introduced by state Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, comes on the heels of changes to a state regulation designed to make it easier for furniture manufacturers to meet safety requirements without using flame-retardant chemicals.
But Leno, who has tried to regulate chemical retardants for the past seven years, said the changed regulation still doesn’t tell consumers all they need to know.
The regulation “merely states there is a new flammability standard … and there’s a way to meet that standard without the use of chemicals,” Leno explained. “But if you go to buy some furniture and there’s no labeling of what it is and what it isn’t, you’re still in the dark.”
Leno’s SB1019 would require manufacturers to disclose to consumers whether the furniture contains fire-retardant chemicals.
Notably, this bill, which has bipartisan support, got its only “Nay” vote from Assemblymember Sebastian Ridley-Thomas when the bill was voted on by the Appropriations Committee on August 14th.
The chemical industry has spent over $23 million over the last five years lobbying against laws to halt the use of toxic flame retardant chemicals in consumer products, and they’re not giving up now. They don’t want you to know what’s in your own couch because consumers prefer chemical-free furniture.
A 2012 investigative report by The Chicago Tribune — “Playing with Fire” — revealed that the chemical industry lied for years about the protective benefits of flame retardant chemicals, and there’s little evidence that they even work the way they’re intended. But there is plenty of evidence that these chemicals actually cause harm.
The chemicals are known to be toxic, with health effects including reproductive and developmental impacts, and the potential to cause cancer as chemical residues accumulate in blood, fat tissue and even breast milk. They also needlessly put firefighters’ health at risk, since firefighters are exposed more than anyone else to the toxic by-products of burning chemicals.
As Governor Brown said in 2012:
“Toxic flame retardants are found in everything from high chairs to couches and a growing body of evidence suggests that these chemicals harm human health and the environment. We must find better ways to meet fire safety standards by reducing and eliminating—wherever possible—dangerous chemicals.”
Along with other environmental groups, firefighters, and consumer and public health advocates, we’re asking the members of the Assembly to vote “Yes” on SB 1019 to further reduce our unwilling exposure to toxic flame retardant chemicals and we hope more Californians will join us.
