Child Safety

It's not exactly the community-based child-protection effort that Terry Sanginiti envisioned, but the child-safety program she helped to arrange for Friday and Saturday at the Gallery could be a good start. At least, that's what Sanginiti - president of the Christ the King Home and School Association, in the area near the Northeast Philadelphia Airport - is hoping. At times, she has felt she is all alone in her convictions, but Sanginiti remains convinced that two recent Northeast crimes involving young people - the September 1986 murder of Tina Severns and the abduction and rape of a 10-year-old girl in March - were not such flukes that parents can afford to forget them.

Cherry Hill School Superintendent Morton Sherman has proposed expanding the maximum walking distance from 2 miles to 2.5 miles to Cherry Hill High School East, denying busing for some children, including my daughter. Sherman has described the transportation provided as a "courtesy" that the district can no longer afford. Apparently, child safety is not considered a basic right, nor even a privilege. Also, he has proposed eliminating the 5:30 p.m. late bus for everyone, forcing students to make their way home at night during rush-hour traffic.

A deaf child sniffs the acrid smoke; he tastes the powdery ash on his tongue; he sees the bedroom door frame growing redder, redder. But the one sense that could save him fails him. He hears nothing. But fire warnings - alarms using strobe lights and vibrations - will soon be available for the beds of deaf children in low-income families in the area, said Kelly Franchetti, an emergency-room nurse. At a news conference last week, she announced the formation of the Camden-Gloucester County Safe Kids Coalition, a branch of the national campaign formed in 1987.

Evan Tsao might be alive today if he had been in a child safety seat on that summer day in 1989 when the plane carrying him and his mother crashed near Sioux City, Iowa. His mother walked away. Lost in the wreckage, 22-month- old Evan died of smoke inhalation. The number of infants who have died in plane crashes because they weren't in safety seats is small - the National Transportation Safety Board has found five cases in eight years. One occurred last year in a crash at the airport in Charlotte, N.C. Flight attendants, worried that the incidents will continue, are beginning a letter-writing campaign to encourage Congress to act on legislation to mandate the safety seats.

For many children, this weekend marks the start of the most fun time of year. But summer is the most dangerous season, too. Fully a third of injury-related deaths involving children occur between Memorial Day and Labor Day, with July being the deadliest month of all, according to a new study by the National Safe Kids Campaign, an advocacy group. "Summer - we call it the trauma season," said Gina Duchossois, a safety educator at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia who chairs the local Safe Kids organization.

Try as she might, and she tried mightily, 15-month-old Audra Leimberg could not poke her chubby fingers through the mesh netting that separated her from the handrail spindles at the top of the stairway. Behind her, in the wall, was an equally impenetrable obstacle: an electrical outlet with a spring-loaded lock cover. Downstairs, a group of 5-year-olds shrieked with glee as they ran from room to room playing hide-and-seek, oblivous to the precautions around them. The carpeting had extra padding to soften falls, the edge strips on the flooring were designed to prevent trips, and a door alarm would sound if one of them sneaked outside.

The tragic accident involving Akeem Williams illustrates the need for child safety locks on handguns. Akeem and his siblings were visiting the home of a family friend when they stumbled onto a .25-caliber pistol. The children, naturally curious, began to play with the weapon - and pop, a 4-year-old is wounded and his 5-year-old sister is traumatized. This tragedy and others could have been avoided if a child safety lock had been installed on the firearm. Child safety locks prevent unauthorized discharging of handguns.

In observance of Pennsylvania's Child Passenger Safety Week, local police officers will be on the lookout next week for drivers who use safety seats to protect their children. Upper Providence Township Police Chief Thomas Davis said the officers in his department would write down the license numbers of drivers using safety seats and send them to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, which will issue each vehicle owner a certificate of commendation. Other municipalities planning to keep an eye on safety-seat use include East Lansdowne, Eddystone, Glenolden, Lansdowne, Media, Millbourne, Nether Providence, Ridley Park, Ridley Township and Yeadon.

A suburban Williamsport woman whose daughter was killed by an air bag in a three-vehicle accident has been charged with involuntary manslaughter and vehicular homicide. According to an affidavit filed by state police in Lycoming County, 23-month-old Melissa Ann Bruch was riding on the lap of a front-seat passenger when her mother, Lois Marie Bruch, who was driving, rammed into the rear of a stopped pickup truck. Neither Melissa nor the passenger, Timothy L. Hampton, was using safety restraints.

Montgomery County residents are being asked to get hooked - on seat belts. The slogan is part of a campaign, being developed with a $90,000 federal grant to Montgomery County and Pottstown Memorial Medical Center, to educate county adults and children about automobile safety. "The usage rate of seat belts in Pennsylvania is 35 percent, but according to our research, in Montgomery County the usage rate is only 25 percent," said Gale De Mayo, coordinator of the new program. De Mayo said the program would concentrate on educating the public about seat-belt safety through workshops, seminars and demonstrations.

Mayor Nutter announced Thursday that he had hired a child-abuse expert who has intimate knowledge of Philadelphia's child-welfare system as the city's first medical director of the Department of Human Services. Cindy W. Christian is director of Safe Place, the Center for Child Protection and Health, at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, and is an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. In 2007, Christian was named Pennsylvania Pediatrician of the Year by the Pennsylvania Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

The city is doing a better job of protecting vulnerable children, but needs to step up visits to families that need help and to more quickly open neighborhood offices, according to an oversight report issued yesterday. The Department of Human Services has been slow to ensure that its social workers visit families every month, according to a report by the Philadelphia Community Oversight Board, a group of nine people appointed by Mayor Nutter to recommend and monitor changes at the agency.

More than 80 percent of child-safety seats inspected in vehicles earlier this month were improperly installed, state police said yesterday. State police inspected 1,073 seats at 82 locations during National Child Passenger Safety Week, Sept. 12 to 18, said Jack J. Lewis, state police spokesman. He said problems were reported in 82.7 percent of the inspections. That number represents a slight increase from 2008, Lewis said, when 81 percent of the installations were faulty. The most prevalent mistake involved the improper anchoring of the car seat to the vehicle, Lewis said.

Superintendent Arlene Ackerman needs to keep Philadelphia students in class for two extra days this school year to make up for bad-weather closings. But one of the makeup days she proposed has set Ackerman on a collision course with city election officials. That day is May 19. Primary day. With about 200 schools serving as polling places, that could mean thousands of voters walking through school doors while classes are in session. City officials say their chief concerns are the safety of students and whether voting booths, if they have to be confined to certain areas, will meet federal rules on handicapped accessibility.

An 11-year-old boy has admitted his guilt in a 2004 attack on a Stetson Middle School student who was sexually assaulted in an unmonitored fire tower. Too bad the adults running the schools can't follow the child's lead and admit some responsibility for the tragedy. Stetson was run by Edison Schools Inc., the for-profit company that also operated 19 other city schools. Edison's contract pays it millions, but it claims the deal doesn't include providing a safe learning environment.

Facebook, the world's second-largest social-networking Web site, has reached an agreement with state law enforcement authorities across the country aimed at protecting children from sexual predators. The agreement with attorneys general in 49 states and the District of Columbia would ban convicted sex offenders from the site and limit older users' ability to search for underage subscribers. "Pennsylvania continues to be one of the leading states concerning Internet safety for children," said Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett, who announced the agreement with his counterparts.

The Inquirer should be commended for its continued coverage of breakdowns in the child-welfare system in Philadelphia. But coverage of problems with the Department of Human Services and its contractors, such as Multiethnic Behavioral Health Inc., has ignored a key responsible party in the oversight of vulnerable children: the board of directors of each and every nonprofit agency that receives DHS funding. Beyond and behind the chief executive officer of any nonprofit should be a fully accountable board whose job is to hire/fire the executive, watch the money, and ensure at least a minimum level of quality in programs.

The children's advocacy group that last month asked for a federal court takeover of New Jersey's beleaguered child-welfare system has consented to a cease-fire. Children's Rights Inc. of Manhattan has agreed to suspend its dramatic request for four months to give the new Corzine administration a chance to refocus and reinvigorate efforts to improve the Division of Youth and Family Services. Officials at the advocacy group said their willingness to return to the negotiating table had a lot to do with Kevin Ryan, the former state child advocate whom Corzine this month tapped to head the Department of Human Services, which includes DYFS.

A couple of hundred million dollars and hundreds of new workers notwithstanding, children under the watch of New Jersey's child-welfare system are still getting the short end. That's the assessment of Edward Cotton, who was brought in two years ago to help fix the myriad problems at the Division of Youth and Family Services and stepped down Friday as its chief. He regrets not quitting sooner as his frustration over what he believes are skewed priorities grew, Cotton said in an interview.

Residents of National Park who walk their dogs in public parks might soon find themselves collared by police. The Borough Council is expected to approve a measure this month that would ban dogs, including leashed ones, from parks and playgrounds. Violators would face a maximum $500 fine or up to 90 days in jail, though Police Chief Lin T. Couch Sr. said first-time offenders would more likely get just a finger-wagging from officers if the dog was "nonaggressive. " The idea is to protect children from bites and keep the areas free of dog waste.