Car Safety Seat Program Comes To East Windsor This Summer

EAST WINDSOR TOWNSHIP, NJ — East Windsor Township has received a $6,000 grant from the New Jersey Division of Highway Traffic Safety grant to launch a Child Passenger - Car Safety Seat initiative, township officials announced on Wednesday. The program will run from June through September 2017. The program is designed to educate drivers about properly securing children passengers in child seats as required by state law.

As part of this program, residents can have their child car seats inspected for proper fit and installation in their vehicles, and receive educational materials regarding use of child car seats and current child restraint laws.

These free inspections for township residents will be held at the East Windsor Police/Court building located at 80 One Mile Road on Wednesday, June 14, Saturday, July 22, and Thursday, Sept. 14, 3 p.m. to 8 p.m. An additional session will take place on Tuesday, Aug. 1 at East Windsor Township’s National Night Out event at the East Windsor PAL complex, 30 Airport Road, 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

A complete inspection of a child passenger safety seat takes less than 10 minutes and will be conducted by nationally certified child passenger safety seat technicians.

“Statistics from all groups including AAA and NJ Highway Traffic Safety underscore that having a properly installed child car safety seat is extremely important to ensure the safety of our young children in motor vehicles,” East Windsor Mayor Janice S. Mironov said. “It is noteworthy that motor vehicle crashes are the number one cause of death for young children and that four out of five child safety seats are incorrectly installed. The proper use of child safety seats is one of the simplest and most effective means to protect young children passengers.”

Motor vehicles crashes are the leading cause of unintentional injury-related deaths among children ages 14 and under in the United States. Properly installed child safety seats, can prevent injuries and save lives.

Young children restrained in child seats have an 80 percent lower risk of fatal injury than those who are unrestrained. Child safety seats have been shown to reduce fatal injury by 71 percent for infants less than one year old and by 45 percent in toddlers ages one through four years.

National studies have determined that most child safety seats are improperly installed or misused, thus negatively impacting the safety value of these devices.

Patch file photo