Attorneys of Record for
Tires

Taras Kick
The Kick Law Firm
660 South Figeroa Street
Suite 1800
Los Angeles, CA 90017
213-624-1588
217-624-1589 fax
taras@kicklawfirm.com
kicklawfirm.com

C. Tab Turner
Turner & Associates, PA
4705 Somers Avenue, Suite 100
North Little Rock, AR 72116
501-791-2277
501-791-1251 fax
tab@tturner.com
tturner.com

Safetyforum.com Issues
Holiday Safety Warning:
Regulators For Hire May Be
Hazardous To Your Health

JULY 3 -- As Americans take to the highway for this Fourth of July holiday, they will have renewed questions about whether Federal vehicle safety regulators are representing the public interest or just waiting to cash in with the auto industry when they leave government. 

The question is heightened by Ford's announcement that former NHTSA administrator Sue Bailey, after months as the most visible NHTSA official in the Ford Explorer/Firestone tire controversy, has gone to work for Ford Motor Company.   "This will further erode whatever confidence the public has left in NHTSA's ability to be an unbiased and independent arbiter in serious questions of public safety when the auto industry is involved," according to Ralph Hoar, director of Safetyforum.com, a product safety research firm.  The firm is a longtime chronicler and critic of senior NHTSA officials who have left the regulatory agency to work for the auto industry. 

"Dr Bailey's deal with Ford comes just when the country needs assurance that NHTSA will be an honest broker in addressing lingering concerns about the safety of the Explorer and Firestone Wilderness tires.  This will undermine public confidence," Hoar said. 

At least twenty (20) senior officials have left NHTSA in the last decade to work for the auto industry, Hoar pointed out. (Go to Safetyforum.com for the names of those NHTSA officials, the agency positions they held and the industry jobs they took.) Bailey is at least the third NHTSA administrator who has worked for Ford after leaving the agency.  Former administrators General Jerry Curry and Dianne Steed have also worked as consultants to the auto maker defending Ford's other rollover-prone vehicle, the Bronco II. 

"At a time when Ford is seeking to increase its credibility, it does nothing but call its credibility into question by hiring former government officials who can't wait for the ink to dry on their last government paycheck before going to work for the industry they once regulated," according to C. Tab Turner, Safetyforum.com's attorney of record for tires and vehicle stability.  Last week, in addition to hiring Bailey, Ford announced that it has also hired former NTSB Board Chairman Jim Hall as a consultant. 

Safetyforum.com, the Tire Action Group, Turner and numerous other attorneys have provided volumes of information to support NHTSA's defect investigation, including 19 confirmed deaths not reported to the agency by Ford or Firestone.

(07/03/01)