[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 92 (Thursday, June 18, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Page S6759]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         LEADERSHIP AT THE CPSC

  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Madam President, I wish to speak to the 
nomination of Inez Tenenbaum to be Chair of the Consumer Product Safety 
Commission. Over the past few years, the Consumer Product Safety 
Commission has faced a number of serious challenges: inadequate 
staffing, insufficient funding, a product testing facility that was a 
joke. As a matter of fact, we saw a picture of it--it was a couple of 
cardboard tables with all of the imported toys dumped on it--when we 
were having that trouble with the defective imported Chinese toys. Most 
significantly, it lacked leadership at the top.
  We took action last year, and we gave the CPSC new authority, new 
funding, and a new lab facility. Today we have to deal with the final 
issue, and that is leadership. I commend to the Senate that I think 
Inez Tenenbaum is going to be that leader. She had her nomination 
hearing earlier this week in the Commerce Committee. Throughout her 
career in the South Carolina Legislature, Inez Tenenbaum showed 
compassion and leadership on environmental and children's issues. Then 
she was South Carolina's superintendent of education. It was an elected 
position. She took charge and reinvigorated an agency with over 1,000 
employees. By the time she stepped down from that post in 2007, she was 
recognized for her efforts to improve the accountability, standards, 
and performance in South Carolina's public schools. I think this is 
exactly the kind of leadership the CPSC needs at this time. I met with 
her personally, and I know her personally, and I strongly support her 
nomination.

  So my concluding comment is, we are not only having problems in 
Florida with Chinese drywall--Chinese drywall that is completely 
ruining the lives of people in their homes because of the smell and the 
corrosion and the sickness that it is bringing on to people--lo and 
behold, they are finding that Chinese drywall now in daycare centers, 
in commercial buildings, and it is even reported in Virginia that they 
are finding it in a hospital.
  This is going to be a big issue in front of the Consumer Product 
Safety Commission. They have the authority under the law to do 
something about it. They have lacked the leadership. Now, with Inez 
Tenenbaum, they ought to be able to start doing the regulatory 
oversight that the U.S. Government should have been doing in the first 
place with these defective imported products into our country.
  That is why I think we need to go ahead and get Ms. Tenenbaum 
confirmed as quickly as possible.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Georgia.

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