Politics & Government
City Expands Plastic Bag Ban
The City Council directed staff to broaden the scope of a plastic bag ordinance to include all retail businesses.
In response to criticism from business and environmental groups, the City Council Tuesday directed staff to expand to include all retail establishments.
The council considered an ordinance that would prohibit certain grocery stores from distributing single-use plastic bags. Customers would either have to bring reusable bags or pay a minimum of 10 cents for a recycled paper bag.
Tim James of the California Grocers Association said the trade association is concerned that the ordinance would only affect the city’s five grocery stores.
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“Other retailers would not be affected by the ordinance and would therefore have a competitive advantage,” James said.
Allison Chan of Save the Bay said the ordinance, which would be the first of its kind in San Mateo County, falls short of effective policy and would lower the bar for similar regulations.
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The San Mateo County Board of Supervisors recently and has encouraged cities to join the effort in adopting a uniform policy. Council members, however, said they weren’t interested in waiting for the county.
“I personally am not willing to wait for the county,” said Councilwoman Gina Papan. “I agree with the representative from the Grocers Association that we need to include all retailers. We need to be fair.”
The council closed the public comment period on a negative declaration concerning the environmental impacts of a plastic bag ban for grocery stores. But since the scope of the ordinance will be broadened, staff will have to conduct another environmental review.
The ordinance would have gone into effect for stores that gross $5 million annually, including Safeway, Lucky and Trader Joe’s, on July 1, 2012. Phase two of the ordinance would have added two more stores—Pape’s Meat Company and Dean’s Produce, which gross annual sales of $2 million or more—with implementation on Jan. 1, 2013.
The remaining retailers that use single use plastic bags would have been asked to follow the ordinance on a voluntary basis during phase two.
Councilwoman Nadia Holober suggested that the new, broader ordinance be implemented within the same timeframe.
