GWU Issues Mgt PMGT 230.PR

A New Direction -- But Who Will Follow?

2010-04-04T17:05:00.000-07:00

Last week President Obama announced a lifting of the ban on offshore drilling for oil and gas on the Outer Continental Shelf along portions of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, as well as off parts of Alaska. Interior Secretary Salazar called it "a new direction in energy policy..."

Who is this announcement directed at? How should the president use it to position the "new energy policy" cited by Secretary Salazar?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/31/AR2010033100024.html?sub=AR&sid=ST2010033100712

Does Adrian Fenty Need More Friends?

2010-03-07T12:05:00.000-08:00

Washington D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty is running for re-election in 2010. A voter survey in the January 31 edition of the Washington Post found that the mayor's approval rating has dropped from 72% in January 2008 to 42% in January 2010. Among African-Americans, his approval rating was 29% -- down from 68% in 2008.

Poll respondents cited concerns including Mayor Fenty's refusal to give Nationals tickets to members of the City Council, a secretive trip he took to Dubai, and his failure to attend memorial services for the victims of the June 2009 Metro crash.

Now, a special counsel is investigating the Fenty Administration's awarding of some $86 million in construction project contracts without the approval of the City Council. Recipients of those contracts include Sinclair Skinner and Omar Karim. Both are college friends and fraternity brothers of Fenty's.

Mayor Fenty says that he is working to empower a new group of minority builders in the city, and that his administration has adhered to the city's requirements to do business with minority-owned companies. Critics say it has more to do with the contract recipients being friends of the mayor.

With his re-election prospects dimmed, what steps should Mayor Fenty take in order to rebuild his reputation?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/07/AR2010030701156.html

Training Plan a Dud with Maryland Town

2010-03-01T06:57:00.000-08:00

No need to post to this blog this week -- for Wednesday's class, we'll discuss the situation used as the topic for your practical writing exercise.

Some Eastern Shore Residents Oppose Anti-Terrorism Bomb Drills in Their Back Yards

Who are the key players in this situation? What is the State Department's goal? Which stakeholders' support is necessary to achieving the goal? What messaging will be most likely to shape their opinions?

White House Communications Plan Changes

2010-02-22T10:37:00.000-08:00

Last week the White House announced that it was making changes to its communications strategy. The changes come amid administration concerns that the communications team had not taken the initiative often enough in policy debates. The changes are designed to revamp their operation from one that was more of a campaign-style approach to one that is more suitable for the demands of governance.

Which of the steps outlined in the article at the link do you think will be particularly effective? What challenges do they face in implementing this new strategy? Are there specific messaging strategies or tactics you recommend?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/14/AR2010021403550.html

Winning Strategy for Offshore Windfarm

2010-02-08T11:32:00.000-08:00

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar recently went to a section of Nantucket Sound between Cape Cod and Nantucket Island to inspect the site that has been selected for a wind energy farm. His visit was designed to evidence the Obama Administration's intent to act on developing renewable energy resources. The proposed Cape Wind project is supported -- and opposed -- by various stakeholder groups in Massachusetts.

There is a larger issue at play, too. On February 19, Sec. Salazar will convene a group of East Coast state governors to get their input on developing a broader regional approach to offshore wind energy development.

Consider this meeting scheduled for February 19. Which stakeholder groups would you expect to support offshore wind development? Which would you expect to oppose it? What messaging would you recommend to help solidify support from allies, mitigate opposition from foes, and win over agnostics?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/07/AR2010020702965.html

Changing Mind About Changing Trial Venue?

2010-01-31T14:59:00.000-08:00

The Obama Administration is reportedly considering moving the trial of Khalid Sheik Mohammed and several other September 11 terrorist attack suspects. After Attorney General Eric Holder proclaimed that the federal court in New York City was the "right place" to try the alleged terrorists, it seems unlikely that that will be the venue.

What is at issue here? Local security requirements or national security interests? The use of civilian courts vs. military tribunals?

Which stakeholders -- and which stakeholder interests -- are the Administration hoping to meet by this move?

Sept. 11 Trial Likely to Get New Venue
By Peter Finn, Carrie Johnson and Anne E. Kornblut
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 30, 2010

The Obama administration has all but abandoned its plan to put Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, on trial in Lower Manhattan, according to administration officials.

A senior administration official said no decision has been formalized, but the Justice Department is already considering other venues. Said another official close to the discussions: "New York is out."

The reversal would mark the latest setback for an administration that has been buffeted at every turn as it seeks to close the military detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Its options for closing the prison had already been dwindling, and without the backdrop of Ground Zero for a trial, the administration would lose some of the rich symbolism associated with its attempt to forge a new approach to handling high-profile al-Qaeda detainees.

The decision to reconsider the plan for Mohammed's trial comes after a surge of political opposition to holding it in Manhattan, a venue that Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. described in November as the "right place."

New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (I), an early supporter of holding the trial in the city, said this week that the security and financial costs would be too onerous. And in a letter to President Obama on Friday, Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Senate intelligence committee, said a New York trial heightened the risk of a terrorist attack.

"Without getting into classified details, I believe we should view the attempted Christmas Day plot as a continuation, not an end, of plots to strike the United States by al-Qaeda and its affiliates," Feinstein said. "Moreover, New York City has been a high-priority target since at least the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993. The trial of the most significant terrorist in custody would add to the threat."

Late Friday, Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) issued a statement saying a decision to relocate the trial from Lower Manhattan "is obvious."

Moving the trial in the wake of political objections would not augur well for the administration's plans to bring other leading Guantanamo Bay detainees to other federal jurisdictions. Administration officials have said they plan to put about 35 Guantanamo detainees on trial, either in federal court or in military commissions.

Republicans and a number of Democrats in Congress have demanded that the detainees be tried in a military commission at Guantanamo Bay, arguing that they are enemy combatants in a war with al-Qaeda and the Taliban, not criminals deserving of the protections of civilian court.

But the decision to bring Mohammed and his cohorts onto U.S. soil for a civilian trial is a linchpin of Holder's tenure, and an administration official said the Justice Department would not back down on the central principle of trying the men in federal court and inside the United States.

That commitment was welcomed by proponents of using criminal courts to try terrorist suspects.

"As long as these trials occur in federal criminal courts with proper due-process protections, the actual venue doesn't matter very much," said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union. "All of our federal courts are equipped and able to handle such cases. That's where they belong, and that's where they should stay."

But the administration would appear to have few good alternative locations. There was intense local opposition in the other mooted venue, the Eastern District of Virginia, and simply moving the case to another federal courthouse is likely to lead to a replay of the controversy that bubbled up in Manhattan.

Some officials have suggested that a federal proceeding could be held within a military base, keeping with the administration's desire to hold a criminal trial while providing the kind of security bubble that would contain the impact on a community.

Within the Southern District of New York, there is an Air National Guard base near the city of Newburgh, but using it would require building a courthouse and pretrial detention center.

The administration also hopes to acquire a state prison in Thomson, Ill., both to hold military commissions and to house detainees who are deemed too dangerous to release but unprosecutable. Conceivably, the Thomson facility, which would be guarded by the military, could also house a federal courthouse and a federal prison wing for detainees such as Mohammed.

Officials said they have not decided where to turn, and the administration still needs funding from Congress to acquire the prison in Illinois. One official said several domestic locations are under review.

A "military base is not cuckoo," said one official, acknowledging the administration's dwindling set of options.

Romero said the ACLU, a harsh critic of military tribunals at Guantanamo Bay, would not object to a military cocoon for a temporary federal courthouse in the United States.

Others, including relatives of the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks, said the administration should reconsider its decision to close Guantanamo Bay.

"I applaud the president for recognizing that a better decision needs to be made," said Hamilton Peterson of Bethesda, who lost his father and stepmother on United Flight 93, which went down in Shanksville, Pa. "But it seems insane to those of use who have visited the pristine $40 million courthouse in Cuba that he would not use it. I would hope he would also revisit the issue of military tribunals."

Google in China?

2010-01-24T13:02:00.000-08:00

Freedom of speech is a fundamental American right. And the Internet has done more to promote the exercise of free speech than any other innovation in our lifetimes. But what happens when an American Internet service provider does business in countries that restrict free speech? What compromises does it make, and do those compromises create gaps between stakeholder expectations and the company's behavior?

Google, which has operated in China since 2006, recently announced that it was considering withdrawing from the country in response to Chinese security attacks and government censorship. What impact does that potentially have on Google's revenues, reputation and operational integrity?

In China, Google flexes some foreign policy muscle
By Rob Pegoraro
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 24, 2010; G01

It's not every day, week, month or year that one American company essentially threatens to fire an entire country -- much less one with its own stock of nuclear weapons.

But Google not only suggested that it would have to walk away from its business in the People's Republic of China, it did so in a Jan. 12 blog post condemning a list of Chinese offenses including censorship and attempted break-ins of its computer systems.

"These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered -- combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the Web -- have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China," Google declared in the post. "We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn," its China-based search site.

That's a far more public rebuke than anything the U.S. government has said in public. Next to that, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's speech on Internet freedom Thursday reads like a diplomatic (understandably so) attempt to catch up to Google's lead. (And China's Foreign Ministry predictably blasted Clinton's speech, saying that the United States should "cease using so-called Internet freedom to make groundless accusations against China.")

Google's newfound militancy cannot be what the Mountain View, Calif., Internet firm had in mind when it agreed to do business in China in 2006.

At the time, Google took a lot of criticism for agreeing to censorship by Beijing's Communist rulers of Google.cn. In response, it argued that it could make more of the Web's information available to Chinese users with a locally based search engine, and that disclosing when censorship forced it to withhold relevant results -- it follows a similar practice in the United States after removing a YouTube video in response to claims of copyright infringement-- lent transparency to its operation.

(Considering that China's Web filtering apparently operates by making users think that an un-"wholesome" site doesn't exist or isn't working, that second argument seems a fair point.)

Further, Google said it would keep its Gmail and Blogger services based offshore to protect Chinese users of those sites.

But Google might not have realized then that the Chinese government would alter the bargain by demanding stricter censorship or blocking other Google services -- or that Chinese hackers would launch a widespread, well-orchestrated series of attacks on its computers and those of other U.S. companies to break into the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.

There aren't many things foreign companies can do to stop the abuses of another country's government, but suggesting that the other country's money is no good has to be among the most severe responses possible.

By way of comparison, when Western computer manufacturers didn't want to install "Green Dam" Web filtering software, they did not publicly threaten to boycott the Chinese market -- and, with help from protests by Chinese users, Beijing backed down on that requirement.

Is Google mashing down the panic button just to distract people from worrying about the security of its own systems? That's possible.

But if you analyze its moves in strict business terms, it's easier to conclude that Google is acting against its own shareholders' interests. The company may have a minority of the search market in China, but even that current business is substantial. The potential rewards for staying in the market are far larger. Neither is something to toss aside lightly.

What comes next? Who knows? Google says it has not yet removed the filters on Google.cn and continues to talk with Beijing about its next move. But why would that regime relent on such a fundamental instrument of state control? Is a shunning by Google that much of a punishment?

That's what makes Google's move -- essentially, setting aside business concerns to act more like a fourth branch of government with its own foreign policy -- so bold. Especially if you compare it with the past conduct of tech companies in the Untied States that complied with warrantless wiretap requests.

And yet there's something just a bit odd about our most public defender of human rights being an unelected, for-profit company that happens to run an e-mail service in which computers scan your messages to match them up with ads.

If you were waiting for confirmation that Google takes your privacy and its "don't be evil" commandment seriously, this act of defiance may be all that you'd hoped for. But please don't treat it as a reason to hand all your business over to Google; applaud the company if you wish, but don't let yourself forget how to fire it.

Debt Repayment or Punishment?

2010-01-17T12:16:00.000-08:00

Please read the introduction and the article at the link and be prepared to discuss in class on Wednesday night. We will use this as an example for future blog discussions, which will follow this format:
1. Situation analysis
2. Identify relevant issue(s)
3. Impacts
4. Goal/desired outcome(s)
5. Stakeholders
6. Message strategy
7. Tactics
8. Measures of success

President Obama has announced that he intends to seek new taxes on banks that received federal loans under the Toxic Asset Relief Program. The Financial Crisis Responsibility Fee would raise $90 billion over 10 years and would apply to major banks -- even those that have already repaid their government loans.

Is this measure intended to shore-up the financial system, or is it designed to punish banks for issuing executive bonuses?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/16/AR2010011602831.html

Welcome to PMGT 230.PR - Issues Management

2010-01-10T13:29:00.000-08:00

Throughout the course we will use this blog to identify and share ideas on specific issues in the public policy and public opinion arenas that affect organizations and their ability to operate successfully.

Religion & Politics in the 21st Century

2007-12-02T14:56:00.000-08:00

For more than 200 years Americans have debated the proper relationship between church and state. Recent presidential campaigns have featured candidates who have openly embraced their faith and others who have shied away from discussing it. Now, presidential aspirant Gov. Mitt Romney has announced that he will publicly address the issue of his faith at a speech in Houston the coming week.

Is Gov. Romney's religion more of an issue for him that it is for other presidential hopefuls? Why or why not? What impact does it have on his candidacy and on his fitness to serve in government? What messages should he convey to stakeholders in the upcoming address?

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/02/romney-to-deliver-faith-in-america-speech/

Second Thoughts on First Class Academic Standards

2007-11-11T15:56:00.000-08:00

Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley wants to improve the quality of high school - and of a high school diploma - in Maryland. The State Board of Education concurs and has set a 2009 date for implementing state-wide tests that would be a requirement for graduation.

Now, four of the governor's appointees to the Board are seeking to delay the implementation of that testing. If he is serious about making a Maryland high school diploma meaningful, what should Gov. O'Malley do to demontrate his seriousness to education and business leaders, parents and the students who are the intended beneficiaries of the new academic standards?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/10/AR2007111001305.html

Land War on the High Plains

2007-11-05T15:03:00.000-08:00

Since the birth of the republic, two principles have been a part of the American experience: providing for the common defense; and, respecting private property rights. On the high plains of Colorado, those two principles are now in conflict.

The U.S. Army wants to acquire 418,000 acres of private ranchland near the New Mexico border in order to increase the size of an existing training area that it says will enable Army units to better prepare for future conflicts in that kind of rugged terrain. Many of the ranchers whose land is targeted in that 418,000 acre parcel want to continue to work their land rather than sell it to the federal government.

Is approving the Army's acquisition of that land -- and thereby promoting readiness in support of providing for the common defense, more important than respecting the property rights of ranchers, some of whose families have owned that land since the 1870's? Why or why not? What messages are likely to resonate with legislators who will make that decision?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/03/AR2007110300333.html?sub=AR

Money for Nothing

2007-10-30T16:15:00.000-07:00

The Senate Finance Committee has approved a bill that would provide a $5.1 billion permanent disaster relief trust fund for farmers. The idea behind the trust fund is the sense that "Farmers are entitled to a secure source of disaster relief..."

Over the past 20 years, some 60% of existing disaster relief funds have gone to farmers in the same four drought-prone states. Should the same farmers who consistently fail to produce crops in the same drought-prone states be rewarded for doing so with a permanent trust fund? Why or why not?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701076.html

DC Jail Population -- Who's the Judge?

2007-10-07T11:25:00.000-07:00

A DC Superior Court judge and Mayor Fenty are at odds regarding the number of inmates that can be held in the DC jail. Judge Wright has ordered the city to limit the number of inmates that can be held; the city asserts that the judge doesn't have the authority to set such a limit.

From the perspective of Mayor Fenty and the DC government, discuss the issue, impacts, goal(s) and messaging strategy to support your goals.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/05/AR2007100502268.html?sub=AR

So Sorry

2007-10-01T04:04:00.000-07:00

The president of Duke University publically apologized for the university's lack of support for former lacrosse players falsely accused of crimes.

Which stakeholders is he communicating with, and will this message be enough to re-shape their perceptions and behaviors?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/29/AR2007092901538.html?sub=AR

Metro Fare Hike Delyed

2007-09-23T13:57:00.000-07:00

Metro General Manager John B. Catoe, Jr.'s plan to increase fares in order to cover a projected budet revenue shortfall has hit a snag. Oppostion to the plan has forced him to reconsider the plan.

Please read the article and commment (from the perspective of Metro managment) on the issue, impacts, stakeholders and actions that could be taken to align Metro's behavior with stakeholders' expectations.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/22/AR2007092201344.html

It's Only Money

2007-09-16T12:59:00.000-07:00

Sen. Hillary Clinton's presidential campgain announced that it is returning $850,000 in contributions raised by fugitive Norman Hsu. Please review the article and then discuss the issue(s), impacts and stakeholders affected by this event.

Clinton's Campaign To Return $850,000

Her Team Cuts Ties To a Top Fundraiser Jailed in Fraud Case
By John Solomon and Anne E. KornblutWashington Post Staff WritersTuesday, September 11, 2007; Page A01

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton announced last night that she will return $850,000 in campaign donations solicited by Norman Hsu, severing ties with a top fundraiser who was jailed last week after attempting to flee from criminal charges in California.

The refunds, among the largest in political history, come after weeks of reports about Hsu's controversial history and murky business practices. Clinton officials said that the senator, acting out of "an abundance of caution," had directed the campaign to return donations from about 260 contributors tied to Hsu because of his apparent involvement in an illegal investment scheme.

The campaign would not identify the donors involved.

Aides also said the campaign will begin conducting criminal background checks on big fundraisers to prevent a similar incident from occurring in the future.
Hsu was wanted on a 15-year-old warrant issued in California; after turning himself in to authorities last week, he did not appear at a hearing and later fell ill on a train ride through Colorado, where he was taken into custody.

The Hsu scandal has brought unwelcome reminders for Clinton of her husband's fundraising controversies in the 1990s, including an episode involving a Little Rock businessman named Charlie Trie. The Clinton legal fund returned or refused to accept at least $640,000 from Trie after allegations that he funneled phony donations from contributors who could not afford to write big checks.

Also in the 1990s, the Democratic National Committee returned more than $360,000 in donations from Taiwanese American businessman Johnny Chung, who raised money for the party during Bill Clinton's 1996 reelection bid and later admitted that he accepted some of the money from Chinese military officials.

Hillary Clinton's campaign decided more than a week ago to return $23,000 that Hsu had personally donated to her various campaigns. "Mr. Hsu donated to numerous charities and more than two dozen candidates and committees," Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson said. "Despite conducting a thorough review of public records, our campaign, like others, was unaware of Mr. Hsu's decade-plus-old warrant. "To help ensure against this type of situation in the future, our campaign will also institute vigorous additional vetting procedures on our bundlers, including criminal background checks," Wolfson added. "In any instances where a source of a bundler's income is in question, the campaign will take affirmative steps to verify its origin."
Clinton "simply didn't want to have to keep answering questions about a bundler whose background is now clearly in question," a senior adviser said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Although Clinton will return the money raised by Hsu, Wolfson said the individual contributors could make new donations. "We will accept their contributions and ask them to confirm for our records that they are from their own personal funds," he said in an e-mail.

Clinton's campaign chairman, Terence R. McAuliffe, declined requests to explain how Hsu had become so prominent in her fundraising.

A portion of the money, at least $29,300, will be returned to members of a single family -- the Paws -- who live modestly in a small house near the San Francisco airport. The Paw family members first attracted attention to Hsu because they were writing large checks to the Clinton campaign even though they held such modest jobs as a postal carrier and a nurse.

It is illegal for a bundler to reimburse donors for the campaign checks they write because it would violate strict federal limits on how much an individual can donate to a candidate.
Lawrence Barcella, a Washington lawyer who has defended Hsu against allegations that he was funneling money back to the Paws in exchange for their donations, said the Paws had other sources of income to support their hefty schedule of giving, which included more than $200,000 in checks to scores of other Democratic candidates over the past four years.

Others expected to get their money back include a range of employees for various firms -- most in the apparel industry -- that have been connected to Hsu. And there are many more who have regularly appeared among Hsu's stable of donors, such as the owners of a San Francisco gift shop, the Lim family, whose connections to him are unclear.

A report emerged yesterday that the Clinton campaign ignored warnings about Hsu. Earlier this summer, Democratic Party officials raised questions with the campaign about whether Hsu had been involved in an illegal Ponzi scheme, according to a source familiar with the exchange. (The Los Angeles Times first reported yesterday that a Clinton finance director for the West Coast brushed aside questions about Hsu.) The source, who would speak only on the condition of anonymity, said the Clinton finance team did a second search of public records looking for any problems based on the allegations and found none. The campaign did not directly talk to Hsu about the allegations, the source said.

Kent Cooper, the Federal Election Commission's former chief of public disclosure, said Clinton's move to shed the tainted money was "a stunning development" certain to affect other campaigns in what is shaping up to be the most expensive election in history. The presidential candidates in both parties raised about a quarter-billion dollars in the first half of this year.
"The financial controls of these campaigns as they get bigger and bigger and raise more money need more resources," Cooper said. "It is a smart move by the Clinton campaign . . . to try to get ahead of the issue and claim some leadership on double-checking fundraisers and activities.
"To seek permission to do criminal backgrounds indicates a willingness to take more responsibility for the personal actions of these big fundraisers out in the field and will bring extreme pressure on other candidates to more carefully monitor and control their fundraisers," he said.

Clinton had raised roughly $52 million for her campaign through the end of June. Her chief rival for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), had raised more than $57 million at the same point.

Hsu, who grew up in Hong Kong and moved to the United States in the 1969 to attend the University of California at Berkeley, came onto the scene as a fundraiser in 2003 when he began raising money for Sen. John F. Kerry's presidential bid.

A Black Eye for Barbie?

2007-09-09T08:38:00.000-07:00

This week, Mattel Inc., the maker of Barbie and other popular toys, announced a recall of about 800,000 toys because they contain excessive levels of lead paint. It's the third such recall for the company since August 1.

Please review the article and discuss the issue facing Mattel, its impacts, where the issue is in its lifecycle, and what the company's goals in managing this issue should be.

Mattel Recalls 800,000 Toys Worldwide

By ANNE D'INNOCENZIOThe Associated PressWednesday, September 5, 2007; 10:52 AM
NEW YORK -- The third major recall by Mattel Inc. of lead-tainted Chinese toys has left the world's largest toymaker fighting to maintain its reputation with the crucial holiday season fast approaching.

Mattel announced late Tuesday it was recalling 800,000 toys, including 675,000 accessories for one of the company's biggest sellers, the Barbie doll. Also part of the recall, the third in just over a month, were 90,000 units of Mattel's GeoTrax locomotive line and about 8,900 Big Big World 6-in-1 Bongo Band toys, both from the company's Fisher-Price brand. The Big Big World products were sold nationwide from July through August of this year, while the GeoTrax toys were sold from September 2006 through August of this year.

Mattel shares dropped more than 3 percent, or 68 cents, to $21.29 at the open of trading Wednesday.

Mattel's last recall, announced on Aug. 14, covered about 19 million toys worldwide. They included Chinese-made toys that either had excessive amounts of lead paint or had small magnets that could easily be swallowed by children.

On Aug. 1, Mattel's Fisher-Price division said it was recalling 1.5 million preschool toys featuring characters such as Dora the Explorer, Big Bird and Elmo because of lead paint. That action included 967,000 toys sold in the United States between May and August.

Robert Eckert, chairman and chief executive of El Segundo, Calif.-based Mattel, warned at a press conference last month that there may be more recalls as the company stepped up investigations into Chinese factories and intensified production checks.

In a statement issued late Tuesday, Eckert said: "As a result of our ongoing investigation, we discovered additional affected products. Consequently, several subcontractors are no longer manufacturing Mattel toys. We apologize again to everyone affected and promise that we will continue to focus on ensuring the safety and quality of our toys."

Mattel added that it has completed its testing program for the majority of its toys and spent more than 50,000 hours investigating vendors and testing toys over the past four-week period.
Mattel, which has cultivated an image of tightly controlled production in China, may have trouble convincing consumers that its products are safe this holiday season. The Consumer Product Safety Commission may investigate how quickly Mattel notified authorities of problems before the Aug. 14 recall.

With more than 80 percent of toys sold worldwide made in China, the problems go well beyond Mattel's image.

In June, toy maker RC2 Corp. voluntarily recalled 1.5 million wooden railroad toys and set parts from its Thomas & Friends Wooden Railway product line. The company said the surface paint on certain toys and parts made in China between January 2005 and April 2006 contained lead, affecting 23 retailers.

In July, Hasbro Inc. recalled Chinese-made Easy Bake ovens on reports of second- and third-degree burns to children. It was the second time the iconic toy has been recalled this year.
A Chinese quality official said Wednesday that the country is investigating the latest recall.
Wang Xin, an official with the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection, and Quarantine, said the agency, which oversees all products made in China, is trying to get details on when the toys were made and the manufacturers involved.

Mattel vowed as recently as last month it would tighten its controls in China. About 65 percent of the company's toys are made in there, and about 50 percent of Mattel's production is in China at company-owned plants.

The recalled toys in the Barbie accessory line included a Barbie Dream Puppy House, which had lead paint on the dog; a Barbie Dream Kitty Condo playset, which had lead paint on the cat; and a Barbie table and chairs kitchen playset, which had lead paint on the dog and dinner plates.
Mattel said in a statement that the Barbie products affected by the recall were produced by Holder Plastic Company, a Mattel contract vendor, which subcontracted the painting of miniature toy pets and small furniture pieces to Dong Lian Fa and Yip Sing.

The two GeoTrax toys were made by Apex Manufacturing Company Ltd., one of Mattel's contract vendors, which outsourced paint work to a subcontractor, Boyi Plastic Products Factory. Apex supplied Boyi with certified paint; however, the toys were made with uncertified paint. Boyi is no longer in business, Mattel said.

The GeoTrax toys were manufactured between July 31, 2006, and September 4, 2006; however, the painted parts were stored and incorporated into toy production throughout the year. Mattel said it is recalling toys shipped between August 3, 2006, and July 31 of this year.
Fisher-Price's Big Big World toy was manufactured by Shun On Factory, one of Mattel's contract vendors, which outsourced the molding and painting of one plastic piece. A subcontractor, Jingying Tampo Printing Processing Factory, used uncertified paint on the recalled piece.

For information about Tuesday's recalls, consumers should call Mattel at 888-496-8330 or visit the company's Web site at http://www.service.mattel.com.

Welcome

2007-08-23T10:36:00.000-07:00

Welcome, GWU PMGT 250 students! This blog will be used in the Issues Management course during the fall 2007 semester to identify and discuss current issues relevant to our course work.