Front Page  »  

SLO County votes in plastic bag ban

January 12, 2012

Following impassioned arguments for and against the use of plastic bags, the San Luis Obispo County Integrated Waste Management Authority’s board voted Wednesday to ban single-use plastic bags countywide in most stores, beginning in October, and to mandate stores charge 10 cents for paper bags.

The board voted 8-5 to outlaw the use of plastic bags in most San Luis Obispo County stores.

In July, the California Supreme Court upheld the right of cities to ban plastic bags in a unanimous decision called a victory by environmentalists. The court ruled that local governments can ban plastic bags without conducting a full-scale environmental review.

Even so, a lawyer for plastic bag makers said the manufacturers would continue to sue municipalities that impose bans without environmental impact reports.


Loading...
Subjects:     
Related:


49 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

I was just thinking. Without plastic bags, think how different the scene in “American Beauty” would have been. ;-)


0

Just go to Santa Maria, which is in Santa Barbara county. They are not affected by the bag ban. Shop there once a month to restock your bag supply. Problem solved, and maybe when the powers that be see the loss of sales tax revenue they’ll get the point.


0

Brilliant idea! You’ll show them! Just like when SLO Co. banned smoking in public places, all the bars and restaurants said that they would lose business to Santa Maria because everyone would go to another county to smoke,,look how great that worked out. The bars and restaurants didn’t lose business and we were the model for the rest of the state. Deja Vu all over again.


How much are you willing to spend on gas to teach this county a lesson BTW?


0

Oh, excellent point. Plan your Santa Maria trip around your car’s gas tank. Shop at Vons and then fill up your tank on the way back through Nipomo. The $.50/gallon savings will make up for the trip! Thanks for the tip typoqueen!


.


0

Yeah, you’ll show us!


0

So, will they allow the plastic bags in the vegetable section of the stores for packing the vege’s????

Or do we need to buy a 10 cent bag for string beans and a 10 cent bag for tomatoes and a 10 cent bag for peppers……or bring canvas bags for each. Maybe use the six pack wine bags to separate vegetables….that will add to the wait at the check out line. There goes the cleanliness of our food. And what about the water waste….Those bags have to be washed routinely. Here we are facing a drought year and our supervisors want us to waste water washing shopping bags. Or maybe they just want us all to get sick. They are probably thinking of ways to up the fees to use hospitals to increase their profits. Its a good thing the economy is so healthy that we can afford to pay for all these paper bags….I guess the environment has all the trees it needs and we can go back to clear cutting mountainsides to make all these bags. WHO GETS THE 10 CENTS FROM THE BAGS….DOES THAT GO TO PAY THE SALARIES OF CITY OR COUNTY EMPLOYEES…..THAT IS A SERIOUS QUESTION


0

“So, will they allow the plastic bags in the vegetable section of the stores for packing the vege’s????”


Yes.


“Or do we need to buy a 10 cent bag for string beans and a 10 cent bag for tomatoes and a 10 cent bag for peppers……”


Not that much but you do realize that you’ve always paid for those bags right?


The rest of your post is moot because we will continure to have produce and meat bags as always.


0

Just grab a handful of those veggie bags to put your groceries in! Another great tip by typoqueen!


.


0

Well, perhaps you need a little reading comprehension 101. But hey if you can’t figure out a system that works better and if that makes sense for you then you go for it.


0

The real irony here is that the reason we all use these lousy plastic ‘single-use’ bags was to SAVE THE ENVIRONMENT! What happened? It was supposed to save trees! I remember all the hype and up-front marketing that was done to sell the public on accepting these horrible bags. Are the new paper bags made from something other than trees now?


I submit that all this government interference about what’s good for the environment results in more harm! So in truth this isn’t about saving the planet, or the animals, or the trees, or anything of the sort. Its another revenue stream – plain and simple. The plastic bag concession wouldn’t play ball so they’re out!


0

If you keep using natural resources such as the petroleum based product in plastic bags then we will run out of that petroleum. Forget about what the govt. says, does that not make sense to you? How do you not care about running out of an important natural resource like that? Or do you just believe that we will never run out, that we can get more,,,I don’t know, perhaps get more petroleum in space? Please explain where we get oil from when the planet runs out of it or do you think that we will never run out? We have booming world population, commensense dictates that we have to run out of this stuff.


If we keep using single use disposable items at such a high rate ie plastic bags where to you think these single use things go? Let us bring all the plastic bags to your home, lets fill your home with this stuff that basicly never goes away. Many of us feel that the earth is our home, we want to protect it from being filled with garbage that will never degrade. We are multiplying millions of pounds of an non degradable product daily and throwing it away. How can you be so naive to believe that this doesn’t hurt the planet? It’s pretty basic, is it that cons just close their eyes and listen so much to right wing media dribble that they are unable to think independently for themselves? I don’t care if it’s a govt. mandate or not, in my mind I know that that throwing away millions of tons of plastic is not a good thing, how does one not understand such a simply concept? I wonder what kind of little narrow box the cons live in that they can’t see past their pretty little yard with flowers and a nice car in the driveway. As long as you can’t see the issue then it’s okay by you because you are unable to think about the reality of what happens outside of your narrow world. My yard looks great and that’s all that matters.


I believe that ONE of the main reasons we switched to plastic was because plastic was cheaper. But for arguments sake I’ll go along with what you say. We evolve, we learn new things so the way we do things changes, a change of thought is healthy. Everything in life with a con is a govt./liberal conspiracy, you’re just unable use commensense. I’ve been using reusable bags for a few years now simply because it makes sense, I don’t need the govt. to tell me to do it but people like you do and that’s just a fact of life. I am serious with my questions, especially the ones in the first paragraph. It would be great to hear those questions answered by anyone here.


Typed fast, no time to proof read, excuse typos.


0

For your information, Typo, I am not in favor of plastic bags. I hate them. They tear easily, are barely suited for the purpose they were designed, and we as the consuming public were at first given a choice – “paper or plastic?” Then the environmentalist LOBBIES took over and forced the price of paper bags up by systematically restricting sources of paper (i.e.taking away logging rights and clearing over-grown forests, which has caused yet another problem of heavy fuel loads and wildfires) – not purely a market-driven price increase.


I am not a ‘con’ as I have never served time in jail. I am also not a conspiracy theorist, however the facts being what they are point to the government inventing a new source of revenue where none existed before – the government set the price, didn’t they?


Speaking of new things, look what they can do with a cheese byproduct;

http://www.environmentalleader.com/2011/08/30/cheese-waste-turned-into-plastic/


Where do you stand on whey-based plastics? You should also know that most of the plastic bags in the supermarkets are corn-based plastics, and do bio-degrade with a little help from the sun, which starts the oxidation of the material. Problem is, they usually GET BURIED so this isn’t the best method of bio breakdown.


To answer your misguided rant about petroleum being a ‘limited’ resource, there are many studies, and some suggest that the Earth’s core is still making petroleum as it continues to cool. Geophysicists are still arguing over that one, since no one’s been down there except Jules Verne. One study published in 2003 suggests that the petroleum will continue to flow until the iron in the core solidifies, collapsing the Earth’s magnetic field and frying us all. Another study gives the time frame of petroleum depletion of between 100 years and 10 billion – a narrow window in Geophysics.


You should also confine your rhetoric to things that are pertinent to the article, rather than your preferred method of attack – personal and inflammatory. I further submit that YOUR ability to use common sense – as you continue to illustrate openly on this forum – is clouded by an outright hatred of anyone who holds an opposing viewpoint to your own. You should keep a civil quill, Typo, and show some respect.


“There are people who are so full of common sense that they haven’t the slightest cranny left for their own sense.” – Miguel De Unamuno, philosopher, 1915


0

Wow, chill, take a valium. Okay okay, we have plenty of oil and plastic degrades just calm down. Don’t you think,,,no let me rephrase that, don’t you ‘feel’ that you over reacted a bit there?


I have mentioned bio plastic bags in this forum on a number of occasions but that isn’t what they use in supermarkets,,never mind I shouldn’t keep going on. You’re a bit too sensitive for me, I don’t want to set you off again.


I didn’t say anything that warranted such a heated response. I asked you some honest questions. You did answer one, you feel that there is plenty of oil enough said don’t bother with the other questions.


You are wrong on many levels in your post but I’m afraid that you might have an embolism or a heart attack or rupture something so I won’t try and discuss this with you.


Listen to some jazz and take deep cleansing breaths, you’ll be okay.


0

I LOVE IT!! She (ds) hits you with a great response and you took a dive. You couldn’t and wouldn’t answer her question, (which was and is spot on) and took a I don’t have a response so give a wishy washy answer. Nice.


0

ds asked where I stand on whey based plastics. Well that’s not the topic, of course I would imagine that they’re better than petroleum based plastics but that isn’t what we’re talking about, this article is about the bags used in stores. To you his/her response was good to me it was over the top and very combative. I am blunt and I don’t mind a debate and once in while I cross the line and carried away but why would I answer such a silly rant that is full of so much BS? Frankly I didn’t feel it was worth my time.


I have lots of responses but I’m not in the mood to fight. This ds person is simply misinformed. the line about most plastic grocery bags being corn based is simply wrong, it’s incredibly dumb to just spout something silly like that out. But that person believes it, no matter what I say they are stuck on that, I can tell just by the superior attitude, so what’s the point. But here’s a bit of an education for the both of you referring to plastic grocery bags:

http://www.salon.com/2007/08/10/plastic_bags/


“… by some estimates the single most ubiquitous consumer item on Earth, numbering in the trillions. They’re made from petroleum or natural gas with all the attendant environmental impacts of harvesting fossil fuels. One recent study found that the inks and colorants used on some bags contain lead, a toxin. Every year, Americans throw away some 100 billion plastic bags after they’ve been used to transport a prescription home from the drugstore or a quart of milk from the grocery store. It’s equivalent to dumping nearly 12 million barrels of oil.”

“Only 1 percent of plastic bags are recycled worldwide — about 2 percent in the U.S. — and the rest, when discarded, can persist for centuries.”

————–

http://fooddemocracy.wordpress.com/2008/07/16/plastic-bags-and-oil-consumption/

“Plastic bags are made from oil: it takes about 430,000 gallons of oil to produce 100 million plastic bags, and the U.S. goes through 380 billion of them a year.

A statistics class at Indiana U did the math: more than 1.6 billion gallons of oil are used each year for plastic bags alone. The more we use plastic bags, the more we waste oil.”


You have to be pretty creative to find a website that makes the claim that most plastic grocery bags are corn based. This ds person is just gullible or a liar.


——–

Then there was this piece of cr@p from this ds person:

“there are many studies, and some suggest that the Earth’s core is still making petroleum as it continues to cool.”


Where did ds pull this one out of, oil is made from prehistoric plants/algae and dead sea life, it’s not produced in the earths core. I would like to see some data to back up that little porkie. But just to help you guys out I pulled this up for you:


http://www.scienceonline.co.uk/energy/nonrenewable.html


“Oil and gas are non-renewable: they will not last forever. New sources of oil and gas are constantly being sought. It is thought that the current resources under the North Sea will last about another 20 years and the world resources will last for about 70 years.

Estimates vary, however, because we do not know where all the resources are and we do know how quickly we will use them”


I would love to see the study that claims that we might have oil for another billion years. It’s just more creative babble.


Commonsense, some of us have and some of you don’t. Now don’t bother me with nonesense propaganda like this.


0

Well I will take you to task on the renewable oil. I don’t know where ds got their infomation but it is true, that they are looking into the possiblity of it. Popular Mechanics did an article that I first read about it (and was surprised that it might be possible) around 2-4 years ago. Not a magazine that has a political bent one way or the other if you ask me. Then since I have read that it is something they are still looking at the possibility of. The ramifications this has for the no oil crowd is hugh if this proves true. Time will tell.


0

I don’t know where ds got their infomation but it is true

There is some speculation that oil is abiotic in origin — generally asserting that oil is formed from magma instead of an organic origin. These ideas are really groundless. All unrefined oil carries microscopic evidence of the organisms from which it was formed. These organisms can be traced through the fossil record to specific time periods when quantities of oil were formed.


0

“The ramifications this has for the no oil crowd is hugh if this proves true.”


There are lots of studies to say what ever we want to hear. You must look at a lot of studies from reliable sources and then use your own mind to see what is obvious. Fracking is causing hefty earth quakes now, look at what we are doing out of such desperation to find and bring up oil. So lets get this study of yours moving moving. Gas will go down to $1.00 a gallon. Happy days,,when will we know the results?


0

Boy there you are back to you typical snarky responce. Why don’t you pull your head out. It’s not my study. DUH!! I was responding, with source I might add, of something I read. Again as usual you just don’t like to hear anything someone else has to say.


0

BTDT, don’t be sensitive. I have been given so much cr@p in this forum for my political views that I’ve grown a tough shell in this forum. Please lighten up.


0

ds_grau,

It was Liberal’s that brought in the “single-use plastic bags…

And

It is Liberals that got rid of them….!!!


0

This is rich: the PRO plastic people are the same pro- DOGSH!T people .


OH, What a mystery !


0
1 2