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Monday, January 28, 2008

Plastic Bag Ban

City Councilmembers Nancy Nadel (District 3) and Jean Quan (District 4) will hold a press conference this morning at 10 a.m., at City Hall to affirm the City of Oakland’s commitment to reducing pollution, oil-consumption, blight, and global warming through its ban on single-use plastic bags.

On Tuesday, January 29, 2008, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch will consider the plastic bag industry’s lawsuit to stop the City’s ordinance banning the use of non-biodegradable carryout plastic bags at retail establishments in Oakland.  

“The tide is turning internationally against the plastic bag glut in our environment, and Oakland will not be intimidated against doing our part to switch to reusable bags,” said Councilmember Nancy Nadel.

The plastic bag industry’s lawsuit claims that the City did not consider potential environmental impacts of banning plastic bags.  However, the City determined that not only will a large scale reduction of plastic bags improve the environment, but there is no evidence that the plastic bag ban will harm the environment – and thus the plastic bag ban is exempt from environmental review.

The plastic bag ban was scheduled to go into effect on January 18, 2008, although the City has delayed enforcement pending a resolution of the lawsuit in the trial court.

“We’re hoping for the best decision from the Court, but regardless of the decision on Tuesday, we pledge to join a quarter of the world’s population that has already banned plastic bags,” said Councilmember Jean Quan, who co-authored the ordinance with Councilmember Nadel.

Oakland’s ordinance, passed on July 17, 2007, contains four elements:
•    It bans the use of non-biodegradable plastic carry-out bags provided at the point of sale at retail establishments in Oakland that gross one million dollars or more.
•    It encourages affected retail establishments to offer incentives to customers to use reusable bags.
•    It allows the use of single-use paper bags, but stipulates that they must contain recycled content.
•    Although it does not encourage or discourage their use, the Ordinance allows the use of biodegradable plastic bags.

A growing list of countries and foreign cities from Bangladesh to Zanzibar have already banned plastic bags, including China, Denmark, Ireland, South Africa, Taiwan, Singapore, Melbourne, and a number of East African countries.  Recently, San Francisco banned the use of plastic bags and a growing number of other U.S. cities are now considering similar legislation. Just last week, Whole Foods, Inc., announced that it is phasing out the use of plastic bags in all of its stores nationwide by Earth Day, April 22, 2008. City Car Share, which helps reduce air pollution and gasoline consumption by reducing the number of cars on the road through car sharing in Oakland, Berkeley and San Francisco, now provides reusable bags for grocery shopping in all of its cars.

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Posted at 09:44 AM | Permalink

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