PROGRAM SPOTLIGHT

National Child Passenger Safety Week 

Child Passenger Safety (CPS) is vitally important to protect our youth while traveling on our roadways.  One way MoDOT’s Highway Safety Office (HSO) is able to assist our citizens of Missouri in protecting their children while in their vehicles, is to purchase car seats that are distributed to those that are not able to afford these seats for their children.  The families have to meet the Federal Poverty Level guidelines in order to receive a car seat.

The HSO purchases car seats twice per year through funding from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), once in the Spring and once in September.  These seats are distributed to the registered car seat fitting stations across the State of Missouri.  In order to be a registered inspection station, the agency has to have at least one Child Passenger Safety technician on staff in order to educate the caregiver on the proper way to install the car seat.

In the Spring of 2023, the HSO was able to order 1,427 Convertible and 826 High Back Booster seats for the inspection stations that were in need of the seats.  In September 2023, the HSO was able to order 624 Convertible and 57 High Back Booster seats for the needed inspection stations.

September 17 -23, 2023 is the National Child Passenger Safety Week, with September 23rd being National Seat Check Saturday.  There will be car seat check events all across the State of Missouri.  The listing of inspection stations in Missouri can be found on the SaveMOLives.com website under the Occupant Protection tab and Child Passenger Safety Enforcement Week link.  The HSO also has free Child Passenger Safety brochures and CHAD stickers for car seats that can be requested at any time.  These brochures clarify the Missouri State laws regarding car seat usage. The CHAD stickers are used to put on the car seats, so in the event of a crash, if the driver and/or passengers are incapacitated in the crash, the first responders will know who to contact for the children. You can contact the HSO at 1-800-800-2358 to order any of these items.