N.Y. State Senate Passes Bill Outlawing Kids Under 8 Waiting in Cars

Looks like I’ll be breaking the law.

In CA it is illegal for ages under 7. It was a royal pain in the butt with my 3 kids. I did not, however, take them all out when I was paying cash for gas. I had one who was a runner, impulsive, and has auditory possessing issues that is, you say “STOP!” and 10 seconds later it gets through to him what I said. 10 seconds is a long time when a car is coming.

Thank goodness here in WA it is only illegal to leave them in the car if you are parked in front of a bar (and presumably you are inside.)

If we go to NY, at least my daughter is old enough to stay with her brother, although she probably wouldn’t want to.

Um, that’s “didn’t even need a KEY to start the ignition.”

*blushes*

This is absolutely ridiculous. I live in Houston, a place that gets *very* hot in the summer. There are days when leaving a small child alone in a car for even ten minutes could be very dangerous. But anybody who has ever gotten into a car in Houston on a summer day — even a car left in the shade — already *knows* how hot it gets. Anybody with half a brain would not *intentionally* leave a child in the car under those conditions. And I can’t see any reason why a person who *did* intentionally leave their child in a hot car couldn’t be punished under already existing laws.

The only purpose for such a law is to give authorities the power to meddle in the affairs of reasonable parents (ie, those who left their kid in a car at a reasonable temperature for a reasonable amount of time), and to punish parents who have made a tragic mistake.

*So saying, “Forget your child and you will get a ticket!” is not likely to have a bigger effect than, “Forget your child and he may DIE.”*

So true!

We only have one state in Australia that has a law regarding this, it seems. Western Australia. It is only a crime if “they are likely to suffer emotional distress or temporary or permanent injury to health” though, which is pretty vague too, especially the emotional distress part. I am sure I have left my child in the car crying at times. Usually over something like me not agreeing to buying her a softdrink or chocolate bar!

I sometimes leave my child in the car on hot days – in the shade! – with all the windows wide open for 10 minutes. But of course that puts her at risk of being snatched. *rolls eyes* If it is too hot to leave her in the car, she is allowed to wait for me on her own outside the shop. *Shock horror!*

Sarah, when the police or another parent talks to you about this (but hopefully won’t,) I would ask them to demonstrate to you how, exactly you are supposed to do this. Let them try it out with your kids. Now, given that kids tend to behave better for other people, I would also tell my kids that if you say that, they are act normal and do exactly what they normally do – run to the car without looking either way!

mollie-not to give them fuel, but Ive seen quite a few hybrids and a few VW’s that start with no key in the ignition, and some that run so quietly that you can’t tell when they are running. In my older cars (2001) it still has a ‘real’ engine so my kids can tell when it is on and when it is off. Still no excuse for this retarded law.

Paige-I would have Warrant Officer “Wannabe” the same thing I tell every police officer or ‘security official’ that likes to quote personal wants as actual law-citations, please, and Ill see you in court, have a nice day.

I was in the Army, so I know all about inane security posturing and I can usually tell bullshit when I hear it. Id LOVE to see the city ordinance that your school security guard was quoting, because im doubting that there is one, or he’s mis interpreting it.

I agree with Sarah. I don’t live in New York, but if I did, yes, I’d be breaking the law. The government has no right telling me how to parent my children. Any law like this, frankly, I fully support people breaking the law on purpose just to make the point. (Obviously, though, don’t leave your kids in the car for 5 hours while you gamble in the casino, that IS wrong.)

LRH

Getting gas for your car must be so much harder now… Drag the kids from the car, fuel the car (while making sure they don’t run off), drag them inside to pay the attendant, strap them back in, leave…

Wow, I must say some of the things I read I agree with, but Paige, if I saw you leave a 2 year old and a 7 month old in a car unattended, let alone with the car running for goodness sake, I would be calling the police straight away. You can all quibble over what age kids can be left alone at home, walk home alone, talk about maturity and common sense. What you can’t do is argue that a running car is a red flag to a would be thief, that a 2 year old is quite capable of escaping a car seat and putting a car in gear or releasing the brake, or in fact exiting the car. A 2 year old isn’t responsible for your 7 month old or himself, you are. I have witnessed very distressed children left in cars on extremely hot days, and all too often hear of children being run over inadvertently due to parents being distracted or downright negligent. So if this type of law protects just one child from one parent who thinks 10 minutes more to do something as ” inconvenient” as take them with them, then so be it. I’m sure those of us who grew up in the 70’s had parents who thought seatbelt laws were pretty stupid too, but I bet you wouldn’t consider not using one for your child.

@Nic are you aware of a difference between a very hot day and a day when it is not very hot?

What you are saying is, that it should be illegal to leave kids in a car for a short period during winter or spring, because some people left their children in a car during a very hot day.

It is like saying that wearing jeans should be illegal, because some people are killing other people with grenades.

I think the point is not that we SHOULD leave babies in the car, but that we should be able to use common sense without being deemed a criminal. Do I leave my kids in the car alone? Yes I sure do! But I do it when it’s safer for them, not when it’s a matter of laziness on my part. I don’t know that I would describe myself as a “free range” parent, just one who refuses to conform to the absurd hovering people do these days. But I would hardly consider my decision to leave them in the car a “very extreme stance on my right to parent any way I see fit”. I turn the engine off and I lock the doors, and I also never let the car out of my sight. That said, I would never judge that women who left the kids while she ran in the school. Is it risky? Maybe, but HOW risky? Is it really fair to say that it was as risky as a loaded gun? I hardly think so. Yes, in theory a thief could have stolen that car or they could have been kidnapped. But what is the likelihood that at that exact moment a thief would be in that exact place and have the time to steal the car… it’s just not likely to happen. I applaud her refusal to operate out of fear. There are threats every single second of every single day. But I think the point of this site is that these threats shouldn’t dictate the way we operate because what kind of existence does that provide? I won’t walk around in fear and put all 4 of my kids in danger because there’s a chance my car might spontaneously explode when I step out of it. At what point do we stop taking risks with our kids? Well, I think that would be where common sense should step in and I resent the fact that the law wants to assume I don’t have any.

This woman once created a scene at a parking lot because I left my teen son in the car with his brother. She even called the police who ignored her.

Nic – the point is that we can’t legislate common sense. Or, in the case of parenting my three boys – they have to learn to use common sense because I can’t think of enough things to tell them not to do.

Rapel down from our deck from the plant hanger? It never occurred to me to tell them not to do that. I am only glad that the plant hanger broke before an actual child was dangling.

As hinted before, a big part of the problem are judgmental busy-bodies who can’t mind their own business, & who can’t make the distinction between respecting boundaries in terms of not interfering with other parents vs “looking the other way” at REAL abuse. There is a difference between the two, a BIG difference, but you can’t seem to explain to people that being told to mind your own business does NOT mean that one is advocating that society at large is supposed to look the other way when a child really is being abused or done wrong in some way.

In the interest of “not looking the other way” or whatever, such people go overboard & take it upon themselves to butt in to more petty-everyday situations where they’re not needed nor wanted, & the thing is this is every bit as wrong as looking the other way at real abuse. Parents who aren’t being monsters should not have to look over their shoulder to see who’s watching & not be comfortable in their parenting role because of people who can’t make the distinction between being a concerned citizen vs being a nosy & interfering one. Again, in my opinion, a parent being subjected to this is just as outrageous as a child being subjected to abuse it can’t escape. Both are equally horribly wrong.

Also, even if leaving a car running is a temptation for someone to steal it, blaming the parent is hardly the right response. To me, if you will pardon me going “DUH!,” it’s the THIEF who is at fault. Blaming the motorist for leaving the car running & saying they “asked for their car to be stolen” is no different than blaming a woman who was wearing a tight skirt or bikini at the lake-pool as having “asked for it” if someone tries to force themselves on her.

Besides, I’ve been known to actually PURPOSELY leave a car running when by myself. Typically this was during a quick stop & was because either (a) it was very hot & I didn’t want to have to re-cool the car’s interior all over again or (b) the car had been difficult to start (maybe the battery was low & I had to ask someone to help me jump it) and I didn’t want to risk not being able to re-start the car again. Whatever the reason, I surely don’t think my leaving the car running was akin to giving my consent for someone to steal the car.

I will tell you what–next time you see money laying loose at a booth in Burger King or McDonald’s, try taking the money & walking off and see if the excuse is accepted “well they left out in broad daylight, they were practically BEGGING me to take it.” Why should a car be any different?

LRH

My then 7-year-old son and I stopped at a fundraiser car wash hosted by a college social group. He opted to stay in the car during the car wash rather than get out and have to talk to the girls who were washing the car. (Girls were, at the time “yucky”) While washing the car, the girls expressed concern about my son sitting in the car. We live in Phoenix, where leaving kids or pets in the car is potentially lethal, and we all know better than to leave kids in the car.

However, when I told my son about the girls’ concern after the 5-minute car wash, he said “Don’t they know I’m SEVEN?”
Of course I don’t leave my kids in the car in the Phoenix summer heat. But if they are old enough to 1.Get out of the car on their own and 2. Come find me if they want to get out of the car, it seems reasonable in certain circumstances. Stopping in to a convenience store, for example. My son is now 11, and if he would rather stay in the car and read while I pop in for a moment, even if I was significantly delayed, he’s old enough to get out of the car and come in and find me. He keeps the doors locked, so he’s actually safer from kidnappers than he would be just playing outside (that’s still legal, right?)

Once he waited in the car while I went in to pick up some library books. There was a long line, and it took a few minutes, and my son came in, because he wanted to make sure that I hadn’t been “adult-napped” He figured I was at greater risk walking around in the library than he was sitting in the car.

The actual risk is the “forgetting the sleeping infant” which is tragically easy to do, especially for sleep-deprived new parents. No law or fine is going to make people think “Oh shoot, I better bring the baby in, so I don’t get a ticket.” Educating people about the risk, and sharing best practices for prevention is a lot better than assuming that these parents are lazy or stupid and that it could never happen to you.

Leaving a two-year-old and a 7-month-old in a running vehicle is the same as leaving them alone with a loaded gun? What sort of gun? A pistol, a rifle? What’s the trigger pull weight? I only ask because there’s a lot of variables here we have to take into account. A two-year-old would not be able to pull the trigger of a gun with a sensible trigger pull weight. Why not give him or her a knife instead? It would be easier for him to hurt himself. Or…maybe not. I knew a two-year-old who understood knife safety and could chop vegetables without cutting herself. She was also calm and would sit in her carseat without trying to escape, even give her little sister her binky and pat her gently if she could reach and baby was upset. I knew a four-year old who would throw a knife at you if she had one, and who I would never leave in a vehicle alone, even strapped into a car seat, even just long enough to put my groceries in the trunk.

Could it be possible that a mother might know her children well enough to know what is or isn’t safe for her particular children?

Uly, 7 months and 2 yrs IS too young to get out of the car, and they ARE at risk of hyperthermia. Furthermore, these aren’t even Paige’s children, and I’d be PISSED if she thought it was too much of an inconvenience to take my kids out because it would make a longer trip…

I’m with Nic on this.

When I was working as a receptionist, an employee in my building entered the lobby one day and said, “Call the police!” When I asked him why, he said there was a baby left in a car outside the building. I looked out the window, and saw a young child asleep in a car parked in front of the house next door. There was no adult around. The employee abruptly walked off in a huff without another word. If he had stuck around, I would have said, “You have a phone on you, YOU call the police!” How are you being a responsible citizen by throwing that command on someone else (he was by no means my boss, either) and then walking away? Why would you even say something like that? Just to make yourself feel better by telling other people what to do? Other employees came in and, after seeing the child, nervously joked about calling the police. It was like nobody really knew what to do. I was surprised at how uncomfortable people got about it. Even so, everyone ended up walking away. I watched the child from the window, and sure enough, within a few minutes, a man came out of the house next door and took the child inside. He probably just had to put some things away from the car or something. How silly would it have been for me to call the police, when it turned out the child lived in the house in front of which the car was parked?! It seemed like people were very willing to sound off about it, but no one was willing to hang around for a few minutes and make sure things were okay. If you’re going to stick your nose in someone else’s business, at least follow up!

Katherine, they’re at risk if they’re forgotten in the car. They’re generally not at risk if they’re left there intentionally. Virtually ALL cases of children dying in cars are of children whose parents forgot they were toting a child in the first place, generally because they were overtired and had suffered a change of schedule.

More nanny laws from a government that continually puts their nose where it doesn’t belong. The sheer arrogance of these lawmakers is astounding. The bottom line is that they think they know what’s better for kids than the parents do. Again, sheer arrogance.

Sorry, I meant hyperthermia.

I had heard a while back that leaving kids in cars was starting to be legislated because of the risk of the kids putting the car into gear and getting injured. I was confused about this because I had been a kid left in a car so many times back in the 70s, keys in the ignition so we could listen to the radio, and we never started the car up or put it into gear. We didn’t wiggle the gear shift and get it into neutral and start rolling. But perhaps there were cases of this. I haven’t seen the stats.

Hearing in this thread, though, that the main issue is hyperthermia is interesting for me. NY state is not a year-round hyperthermia risk region. What exactly is so risky about leaving your kids in the car while you return something at the department store or pay for the gas or pick up the dry cleaning or milk?

Is it carjacking and kidnapping? Isn’t abduction of children in cars just as rare, or more so, than kids being snatched off the street as pedestrians? Where do we stop attempting to legislate away this enormously unlikely harm scenario?

Is it the scenario where the kids put the car into gear and come to harm through collision? Again, how many times in the history of post-1980 manufactured cars has this happened? Is it worth “protecting” kids against this vanishingly small possibility of harm when many parents know by instinct that crossing the parking lot is more dangerous than anything inside the car?

As for hyperthermia, is there any documented case, anywhere, of a child over the age of, say, three or four who died because it got too hot in the car? Sure, it’s too hot to leave your pets in the car, but your pets don’t have opposable thumbs. A 7-year-old who died in the car of hyperthermia, no matter how long he was left there? These legislators are actually making it illegal for a sentient, awake child reading a book or pressing buttons on a game console to remain in a car in any weather circumstance?

I’m still not clear about what danger it is that they’re trying to mitigate with this law.

@C.S. – I have a Prius and if I stop the car, lock the doors, and leave the immediate vicinity with my key, my boys can’t start the car.

So, Ann in L.A., those statistics you use would suggest that the NY Senate, by mandating parents remove their kids every time from the car, would actually be endangering the children instead of protecting them.

“What if the state needs to make money and penalizing my parenting decisions is an easy way to grab it?”

That’s what the real issue is. As a lifelong NYer, this is what this state is all about, more and more each year, as the population continues to dwindle and the tax base continues to erode. Remember at the height of the recession, how they wanted to force everyone to buy those hideous “new” license plates for $100 a pop and public outcry forced them to abandon the scheme?

Like so many other things on this blog, it’s about money, not child safety. Last year, the craziest, worst-case scenario happened in the next town over. A man had his children (ages 3 and 5 I believe) in the car with him, and needed to drop something off at his cousin’s house. He left the kids in the car with either the car running or the keys in the ignition. During the five minutes he was inside this home in a safe residential area, someone stole the car. The thief, as it turned out, was a young guy, who wanted to steal a car, not children, and got caught shortly after he abandoned the car in a public place.

My uncle was the lead police officer on the case. He emphasized repeatedly in every statement to the press that the parent didn’t do anything wrong, and certainly nothing that every parent hasn’t done at least once. Sadly, now, he’d be forced to arrest the guy.

As for Paige’s example, they didn’t die, but in all honesty if I paid someone to look after my 2 year old and 7 month old, I would be very upset if she left them alone in a running car. My neighbor left her 2 year old and 1 year old in a running car for maybe 5 minutes while she ran into a convenience store to pay. Her 2 year old was a VERY obedient, gentle natured child. However, she’s two – enough said. Being two, she chose that moment to get out of her car seat and play with the stuff up front. She got the car in gear and it rolled out into the street. Luckily there were no cars coming at that moment and another person nearby was able to run out into the street and stop the car. Did she ever leave her babies alone in a running car again? Nope. She learned the lesson I would hope we all know by instinct – or if not we will now know. You don’t leave young children alone in a running car. Period. Now if she had turned the car off and locked the door, preventing them from being able to leave the car unpredictably, then I see nothing wrong with running in for 3-5 minutes.

I think some are stuck in the 1980’s with this fear of a car getting knocked out of park and rolling. Automatic transmission cars (the vast majority of cars on the road today) have had a locking mechanism on the gear shift so that it can’t be accidentally engaged from park for many years now. I tried to knock my 2005 Mazda and my 2007 Civic out of park just to see if it was possible. It’s not. You have to push a button while moving the gear shift to get it out of park. It may be possible that a toddler could figure out how to push the button and move the shift but it’s not possible to accidentally knock the car out of park.

This may be a reasonable fear in manual transmission cars and very old cars. But it is one of those things that we can decide the risk for ourselves based on our own circumstances. We can consider that we have a late model automatic transmission vehicle and a toddler that has no idea how to move the gear shift and decide that it is safe – as I’ve done probably 1000 times over the course of my daughter’s 6 years in my own driveway while I ran back into the house to get something I’d forgotten without a single incident.

But before we go crazy, this law DOES NOT prevent all kids under 8 from being left alone in cars. It only prevents them from being left alone in unsafe conditions – something that was already illegal under child endangerment laws so I’m not sure what this adds other than a LESSER way to address the issue through an infraction and fine.

The law seems a bit confusing, the part quoted just talks about leaving kids in a situation that posses a ‘significant threat’. It doesn’t say anything about cars. How could a situation with a vanishingly insignificant risk of anything bad happening possibly be considered a ‘significant threat’? I know people are stupid, but if such a ticket got issued it seems like a run to the court house with some statistics would clear up the ‘significant threat’ lie.

About the little kids left in a running car everyone is upset about. They are a whole lot more likely to have been put in danger because the car was parked IN A NO PARKING zone than because the car was left on. A fire, threat, or other that requires emergency vechiles to access that area, or a sleepy bus driver or other parent that foolishly assumes the car is moving and runs into the back of it is a far more likely outcome than someone stealing even a running car. I see nothing weird nor dangerious about leaving kids that age briefly in a car (personally I would lock it, might leave it running given circumstances if I had an extra key, but realistically it’s just not a situation likely to cause a problem), but parking in a no parking zone really ticks me off.

If it says ‘no parking’, it does in fact apply to *you*, not just to ‘someone else’.

This is unrelated, but struck me as along the lines of some of our pet peeves. Today I saw an article by some doctor arguing that it is not healthy to allow kids to use the potty until they are older preschoolers. Now, I’ve heard the argument that you wait until the child is ready bla bla bla, but this goes further and recommends that we don’t even encourage or allow a child to hold his pee / poo because that causes medical problems. The healthiest option is for a child to soil himself the instant he first feels the urge to go.

OK, so I could go on for a while regarding why that is full of crap (no pun intended), but seriously – fear-mongering against allowing tots to graduate to underwear even when they can and want to? To me that sounds like abuse, but at the very least that is holding many kids back from healthy independence.

“I think some are stuck in the 1980′s with this fear of a car getting knocked out of park and rolling. Automatic transmission cars (the vast majority of cars on the road today) have had a locking mechanism on the gear shift so that it can’t be accidentally engaged from park for many years now.”

My neighbor own an automatic transmission 2006 car and her toddler figured it out. My own toddler (age 2 1/2) was sitting on his Daddy’s lap in the front seat while I was picking up a few groceries. The car was running, as it was hot outside, and he pulled the gear shift out of the “locked” position, much to my husband’s surprise, LOL. We owned a 2001 model at the the time and there was no button, but you did have to pull forward and then down. I think most toddlers are smart enough these days to easily figure it out, though. Let’s just hope people don’t underestimate their child’s intelligence. :/

skl1, I’m all for free ranging, but at the appropriate age. If you have an adventurous tot (1-3 year old), let’s hope you keep an eye on them and install out of reach locks and such so that they do not have “free range” to the family car, while you are doing dishes or anything else.

David, this is all very easy to say in hindsight. I imagine that few kids drive off in the car more than ONCE.

I have 9 kids, so I’m definitely familiar with tots. 😉 I also know that a very important concept is to learn from other’s mistakes. Before my first child learned to walk I was observant enough to realize that while you certainly can’t prevent every accident, there are a few simple things you can do to prevent some of the greatest risks. For example, a 1 or 2 year old wandering out the front door or into the garage unsupervised can be deadly. So it took me less than an hour to install childproof locks at the very top of our door that we can lock if we know we’re going to be in the shower or something. When doing dishes, my wife always sat our toddlers on the counter top so they could help mommy. This way they learned to enjoy work by mommy’s side and it let her keep an eye on them so they weren’t coloring on the walls – certainly not hazardous, but still a pain, LOL. 🙂 Of course our tots got into mischief. But looking back I’d say we did a decent job of protecting them and teaching them what was safe and not safe and keeping an eye on them while they were little. Then when they got a bit older we knew we could trust them to come and go and learn more self sufficiency.

Yeah, I agree normal locks could be figured out. Luckily my wife was pretty diligent about teaching our kids obedience and limits (and she kept them in sight when they were toddlers) so we never had any problems with any of them trying to climb the door frame (!) to get to the lock, LOL. But some kids are just little monkeys, I guess. Ours were actually a type you had to type a code into to unlock, so they still would have been OK even if they had climbed. (We got them for free from a friend who’s kids had outgrown them, I have no idea where he got them from, but they definitely gave us a peace of mind.) We didn’t have to use them very often, because, like I said, we were pretty diligent at keeping an eye and my wife actually had a little play area set up in the corner of our bathroom so if she were home alone with 1 or 2 year old they would play quietly there while she showered. If they would try to leave she would get out and bring them back every time. She did this from the time they started crawling so they learned early. 😉

I live in CA and find it rediculous that it is illegal for me to leave my 11 and 6 yr old in the car (safe and locked) while I run in to get the cleaners, but if I let them go in alone (where “strangers” are lurking) that is perfectly okay.

Wow, what’s wrong with a little convenience, folks? Especially when there are such vanishingly small risks involved (risks no higher than those incurred when doing the “inconvenient” version… dragging kids out of the car and across the parking lot).

Why call someone “lazy” just because they enjoy some ease, flow, harmony, and yes, perhaps even safety? Don’t we all love those things? When the solution is working for the parent and the kids, why judge it from the outside?

When you call a parent “lazy,” are you longing for a sense of responsibility? Can you stretch your understanding of responsibility to include a parent that makes a mindful choice to meet their own and their kids’ present needs?

Is “good parenting” necessarily without ease? I hope not!

Ugh, typos.

I meant to say–I mind my own business and only if someone ASKS me tot ell me what I think of their parenting style will I do so.

Now, that doesn’t mean I don’t get topical and speak in generalities about certain things & give my opinions, especially online. However, I don’t make it a practice of telling my friends or strangers I know or see in real life what I think of how they parent their kids, so long as it doesn’t affect me. I may think it ridiculous when I see these parents yell “no running!” to their kids at the park, & I may comment here about how silly I think that is, however I’m not going to poke my nose into that parent’s business at the park & tell them to their face “I think you ought to let your kids run, I mean, gee, they’re at the park.” They have the right to parent how they feel & I should respect that.

So, yes, when I parent a certain way for the sake of convenience, unless I’m doing something extreme like leaving them alone in a car for 8 hours while I gamble at a casino, that is no one’s business.

LRH

So is it a bit of a sin now to desire a little convenience when parenting multiple young children? Excuuuuuuuse me!

I will be breaking the law.

“If a minimal effort results in eliminating a minimal risk than I feel like I should make that effort.”

And that’s not an unreasonable way to live your life. However, the question is “is the effort really minimal?” and “is the risk really more minimal in the car instead of outside of it?”

Thinking individuals can come to different answers to those questions.

Excellent, I am looking forward to racking up my misdemeanor charges. Because about 90% of the time when we get home from somewhere, my kid can’t be bothered to stop reading in the backseat and stays in the car until it occurs to her that we’ve left her there. Maybe I’ll manage not to get caught in the six months remaining before she turns 8?

I agree with Nic and Bingabinga – this is not about being free-range, it is about convenience for the parents. Maybe that’s ok when your children are older, but for babies and toddlers, parents need to keep their eyes on them (think swimming pools and bathtubs). As I said on another post, I don’t understand how babies can be free range.

And why is it so awful for parents to be, you know, convenienced?

I do not believe that convenience for parents is awful. Of course it isn’t, in some situations, however, convenience is not the top priority.

Heather G – yes I understand that the conditions in the US may be quite different to those in Australia, certainly we never have to cope with sub-zero temperatures. I also agree that it should not be a criminal issue. My personal opinion remains, however, that it is preferable for babies and toddlers not to be left alone in a car.

My children are teenagers and this issue is less relevant for our family now. However, I do remember how difficult it can be to juggle drop-offs, naps, and all those errands that need to be done. Regardless, I believe that it is important to be observant when you have babies and toddlers, no matter how free range you intend to be with them when they are older. And although it would be wonderful if all parents were always able to make the best decisions involving their children, unfortunately this is not always the case. Examples of this occur too frequently, with a several young children here having been run over by their own parents in their driveways over the past year.

Although I do not agree entirely, I do appreciate your thoughtful response.

Sorry, but I don’t consider it exercise, educational, or fun, or togetherness, to haul my kids out of the car when I have to run back into the house for something I forgot, or stop at the post office for a book of stamps, or pick up my dry cleaning. If they are safely in the car, I guess I’ll be “lazy” or “irresponsible” and leave them there for a 2 minute trip.

Many speak of the fear that a child will knock the car out of park. I’m very surprised that nobody spoke of a most simple solution: Use your parking brake!!!

I don’t know of any young kids who could find and pull on the lever under the dash. Even more so for the hand brake that requires significant strength to pull up, push button, and then release. Now onto engaging the transmission.

Frankly, I don’t get why so many people are making a big deal about the law. I am sitting in a car right now because we have our dog in the car and my son. My wife wanted me to go with her into the Walmart and leave my 11 year old and his dog in the car while we went in. She wanted to leave the car running so the AC was on. We would be in the store for more than a few minutes as we had several things to get. I said no. Frankly, I don’t know when I will feel comfortable leaving my son alone in a car. Maybe when he is 16.