August 25, 2009
By Denis C. Theriault
SAN JOSE — San Jose on Monday moved one step closer
to becoming the largest American city to ban not only plastic
shopping bags — but also most paper ones.
Major grocery stores and big-box retailers would be prohibited
from giving out plastic bags. Paper bags made with mostly
recycled materials would be allowed, but only for a fee. Restaurants
and nonprofits would be off the hook.
The San Jose City Council will now take up the issue as soon
as November, thanks to a unanimous recommendation Monday by
a four-member council committee. If approved it would take
effect in 2011.
And while there's no guarantee the full council will support
the ban as proposed, doing so would put the city on the vanguard
of a brewing international movement to encourage reusable
shopping bags at the expense of so-called "single-use"
bags.
Among large cities, advocates say, only San Francisco has
enacted a ban similar to what's sought in San Jose. Both kinds
of bags bear sizable environmental costs, they say.
But many cities have looked into forbidding only plastic
bags, which are often found fouling up creek beds and gumming
up garbage machines. Those cities would either place fees
on paper bags or leave them unregulated.
"San Jose is proving that it's absolutely a leader in
this effort to reduce single-use bags," said David Lewis,
executive director of Save the Bay. "San Jose is the
largest city in the Bay Area, and what San Jose does can be
a model for everyone around the bay."
Monday's committee meeting brought out dozens of activists
from both sides of the issue: trash haulers and environmental
advocates clamoring for strict regulations on one side and
small-business owners and plastics industry representatives
calling for increased education and recycling efforts on the
other.
"The time and effort that's spent" fishing plastic
bags out of trash sorters "raises up garbage rates,"
said Steve Jones of Garden City Sanitation, arguing for the
ban. "People don't stop and think about that stuff."
Months of meetings
The effort, led by Councilman Sam Liccardo and supported
by Vice Mayor Judy Chirco and council members Kansen Chu and
Nora Campos, took shape after months of meetings with and
study involving the city's Environmental Services Department.
It was initially driven by a Santa Clara County commission
that urged cities to find ways to crack down on single-use
bags.
City officials settled on a ban after deciding that fees
would be too nettlesome for consumers amid difficult economic
times and that recycling efforts and public outreach have
already been tried and generated too small a return for their
million-dollar price tags.
"Once people get the fact that they're already paying
for the cost of single-use paper and plastic bags through
higher food prices and higher recycling rates," Liccardo
said, "they warm to the idea that reusable bags could
reduce their costs and those of the planet."
But several groups question whether that community support
is really that broad and whether the problems associated with
single-use bags are as severe as portrayed.
'Punitive measures'
At Monday's meeting, Ryan Kenny of the American Chemistry
Council, a plastics industry group, called bans "punitive
measures" that won't change anyone's behavior.
He noted efforts in other cities that have run aground and
said cities and community groups should focus instead on extolling
the virtues of reusable bags — and even handing them
out to shoppers.
"We don't think bans would work," he said.
The American Chemistry Council has spent hundreds of thousands
of dollars working to defeat bans and fees in other cities
and other groups have filed lawsuits on behalf of the plastic
industry.
Oakland shelved its effort amid a lawsuit that criticized
it for failing to adequately study the effect of its ban,
and Palo Alto settled a similar lawsuit to keep its ban on
pace to take effect next month. But Liccardo said he remained
unbowed.
"We're taking the time to study the impacts to ensure
we avoid those fights to the extent that we can," he
said. "We can't be afraid of what the plastics industry
and its lawyers might do."
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Contact Denis C. Theriault at 408-275-2002.
SAN JOSE"S PROPOSED BAN OF PAPER BAGS
All retailers would be affected, but restaurants and nonprofits
would be excluded.
Paper bags made of at least 50 percent recycled material would
be allowed, but for a per-bag fee "” pending further
study "” of either 10 or 25 cents.
The law would take effect no earlier than Dec. 31, 2010.
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