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SACRAMENTO — Children under the age of 6 or weighing less than 60 pounds will be required to ride in booster seats, under a bill signed by Gov. Gray Davis. 

California will be the first state to enforce the stricter requirements when the new law takes effect January 2002. Six months later, a similar Washington state law will take effect. 

The California bill’s sponsor, Sen. Jackie Speier, D-Daly City, contends standard seat belts are designed for adults and fail to protect young children adequately. 

“This is going to enhance the safety of about one million 4 and 5 year olds who are riding around in cars with seatbelts designed for a 165-pound male, and which are unable to provide protection to a 40 or 50 pound child,” Speier said Monday. 

A small child can slip out of a standard seat belt in a collision and get thrown from the vehicle, or receive serious internal injuries or cuts in the throat from the belt.