Here’s an interesting follow-up to an old issue: remember back in 2009 when there was a referendum on the ballot to add a tax on plastic grocery bags, with the intent of encouraging bag re-use? Despite our articulate and passionate support, the referendum was voted down.
Well, it’s back! City Councilmember Mike O’Brien is proposing a ordinance that would implement ban “the use of single-use plastic carryout (shopping) bags and ‘biodegradable’ carryout bags, and requiring retail establishments to make a pass-through charge of at least five cents for each single-use recyclable paper carryout bag provided to customers, with exceptions for those receiving food assistance under state or federal programs,” according to the notice we received from Seattle Public Utilities. The ordinance would take effect approximately six months after passage by the City Council-no earlier than July 1, 2012.
Again, we’re for it: anything to discourage the waste of resources and the proliferation of trash in our environment. We’re feeling a bit extra emotional about the subject having listened to photographer Chris Jordan‘s talk at this past weekend’s TEDxRainier.
Chris learned that due to the way currents work, huge amounts of our garbage that gets swept into the ocean ends up near the Midway Islands, home to a large native albatross population. Sadly, those birds not only end up eating the plastics we throw away, but feeding them to their young. The beaches are littered with dead adult and baby albatross, their stomachs filled with lighters, bottle caps, and other detritus. The photos and movies he shot was absolutely heart-wrenching. I warn you, though, the imagery is deeply disturbing.
Anything we can do to reduce this carnage we are wreaking on our planet is well worth it, certainly a nickel per bag incentive to re-use.
Should you disagree, appeals must be filed by 5:00 p.m. on December 8, 2011. Contact the Hearing Examiner at 206-684-0521 to ask about or to make arrangements to read the procedures for SEPA appeals.
Wally,
When Wallyhood writers speak of “we” or “we’re” in your articles and reports, it makes it sound like they’re speaking for the neighborhood of Wallingford, but that’s just not the case. I realize Wallyhood is a personally owned blog and forum so you’re more than welcome to do whatever you like on on your personal website. But when it’s open to (Thank You) and used by the public in the manner that it is, the extremely bias reporting really makes me see Wallyhood as an unreliable source of info. Which in turn makes me think twice about the credibility and reliability of the businesses that sponsor Wallyhood.
As to the topic of the bag tax, I go with Nancy “Just Vote No to Dopes”……or something like that. I strongly agree with banning plastic bags and strongly agree with encouraging reusable bags, but introducing another tax is just wrong. Being environmentally responsible is a good thing, taxing our freedoms is not. Taxes have never solved a problem without creating more problems.
I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country… Corporations (or municipalities) have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.
Ab Lincoln Nov 21, 1864
Steve
@Steve
I read ‘we’ as ‘we at the Wallyhood blog’: sometimes that might be 1 person and sometimes the entire team of writers. It is just a choice in writing style.
Wallyhood is a blog and not an independent news source. Wallyhood offers an opinion in some of the blog posts and we get to comment and discuss.
That’s what makes the internet fun.
Yeah, what we he said. 🙂
I (Jordan) am the only writer who indulges in the “Royal We” and it’s kind of a gag. I wrote a post on it a while back: http://www.wallyhood.org/2010/10/wallyhood/
So yeah, I know I’m not speaking for everyone, and hopefully people can tell the difference between factual reporting and opinion. I don’t think there’s anything in the above that is ambiguous in that regard.
I would say, however that a statement like “Taxes have never solved a problem without creating more problems” is a statement that purports to be fact but is in fact opinion. Are you really suggesting that we could be enjoying our roads, safe food supply, safe air travel, relatively crime free neighborhoods, etc. without any taxes? Who would pay for the policeman, the fireman, the teachers, the food safety inspectors, etc? Or do you mean SOME taxes are good? In which case we agree, it’s a matter of which ones.
From what I have read, the 5 cent fee per paper bag is not a tax, as it goes back to the stores to help defray their costs in making the change.
Disturbing… to say the least. The imagery looks surreal.
I just read that two intrepid scientist explorers have found (in the jungle) a fungus that eats, consumes, enjoys noshing, on polyurathane. Really. No joke. And the hope is that they can introduce it to garbage dumps to help in the disintegration of plastic (bags included) that usually take many, many years to distintegrate.
Of course, my concern is that (since things don’t always turn out just as one wishes), the fungus will discover the polyester clothes in my closet and cosume them as well.
The voters spoke on this issue 2 years ago. Hopefully the voters can also vote in a council that listens to the voters in the future.
Also to correct your facts, the tax was not just on plastic as proposed then it was on all bags.
This won’t ever work. Studies from Ireland showed that people ended up using more plastic as they bought more plastic trash bags. I know I have been forced to buy these for my bathroom and smaller trash cans throughout my house as I didn’t have the plastic grocery bags to use when using my “green” reusable bags often.
Yes, I believe in paying taxes. But throwing money at a problem usually just creates a bigger band-aid and doesn’t solve the problem. Creating a new platform for taxes will landslide into another huge waste of tax dollars. Just think where it would go:
Costco box tax
dry cleaner hanger and slip cover tax
recycling bin collection tax
Dick’s food wrapper tax
the list goes on & on
The ideas for taxation on this platform are endless, and will be endless.
YES, get rid of the stupid plastic bags!
YES, education and changes need to be made to stop dangerous and over packaging of products, but Taxanity is not the answer.
PS: I sponsor a weekly 12 step taxaholic recovery meeting for those wanting to recover from taxaholism….insert Smiley (Here)
What if Wallingford’s residents who are troubled by plastic bags agreed to a Just Say No to Plastic Bags for, say, the rest of 2012? Set an example and then challenge the rest of Seattle. I think two places where I shop for groceries give credit, maybe 5 cents per me-provided bag (PCC and Madison Market) and eventually one remembers to take reusable ones to QFC and Fred Meyer (especially the latter). I’m not a dry cleaning person myself, but I am sure someone who is can figure out a better way to manage that arena without those large amounts of thin plastic.
Take-out food is where the plastic bags are and, again, eventually one remembers to take reusable bags there (Krittika’s Thai, Pinky’s Kitchen the Taco Truck).
And put our thinking caps on to find a green solution to household trash collecting and disposing that doesn’t require one to purchase something designed to be thrown away along with its contents. HAPPY FACE.
Another change would be if dog poop was picked up in something biodegradable like a small paper bag or piece of newspaper and temporarily put in a plastic bag but later shaken out into the trash; if not, at least don’t tie the top of the little plastic bag shut.
My $.10 cents.
I meant the rest of 2011, guess I am thinking ahead!
Isn’t the 5 cent charge only if you don’t bring your own bags? We spend a couple of weeks in France every couple of years and they do that too. Why shouldn’t you pay for bags that the store supplies?
Plastic shopping bags are recyclable, so I don’t see what the problem is.
I’m sincerely curious as to how paper grocery bags are killing albatross?
Steve
“Recyclable” and “Recycled” aren’t the same thing. I did a litter pick-up on my street a couple weeks ago and picked up many “recyclables” from the gutter. Many make it into the trash, too.
Steve: yeah, you’re right, the connection is weak. In Chris Jordan’s talk, though, he made this point more eloquently than I’ll paraphrase: “I don’t really care about the albatross. If this were just about this one bird, maybe it wouldn’t be a big deal. But coal miners don’t really care about their canaries, either. The point is that if this is happening to the albatross, think about all the other things LIKE IT that are going on. This is an indicator, an alarm, that we are hurting the Earth through our actions and we ought to stop.”
So, I guess the point isn’t that there is a DIRECT connection here, but that I saw a really interesting, compelling talk and work of art that seemed worth sharing in context, since it spoke to the same underlying idea.
@ Nancy M. re: plastic bags from the dry cleaners – Wallingford Dry cleaning (across from QFC), does not use plastic bags anymore. They put your clean clothes in these nice reusable cloth bags that you bring back when you drop off your dirty stuff (in their laundry bags).
What angers me is that if it was truly about the environment, there’s no doubt in my mind that a land slide vote would ban plastic bags. But these taxaholics that we call politician’s are just trying to sneak in another new tax platform in the name of being green. Lets stop whoring the tax payers and our environment and get serious about taking care of our environment. If stores want to charge $10.00 for a paper bag, so be it, that’s a choice to be made on both sides. But this is just another ploy for more taxes.
Once again, shame on many of our politician’s.
Steve