Thanks, State of Washington!
New Booster Seat Law takes Effect
The state’s new booster seat law went into effect Friday.
The law required children to be belted into booster seats until they’re at least eight years old and weigh 80 pounds, or are 4 feet 9 inches tall.
Babies must be in rear-facing car seats until they’re at least a year old and weigh at least 20 pounds.
Children 13 and under must ride in the back seat.
Violators face a $112 fine.
Oh yeah, and it IS a primary offense, just like all seatbelt laws weren’t supposed to ever be.
I really wonder how that’s going to work for small, short females. My wife is 5’2″. I don’t think she reached the minimum metrics for height and weight until she was 12 or 13.
So, small kids, which biologically means mostly girls, are going to be forced to ride in booster seats until sometime in junior high school.
Which means they’ll all be arranging unobserved drop off points a block or two from school, so they won’t be seen in the booster.
And taking your 12 year old daughter and her friends to the movies will be a lot tougher when half of them have to ride in booster seats.
Now, I wonder if anyone will sue to overturn this law on the basis of gender discrimination, because girls will be stuck in boosters longer than boys?