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California court upholds San Francisco bag ban

January 6, 2014

bagbanA California appellate court upheld San Francisco’s single-use plastic bag ban in a precedent setting ruling Friday. [SF Gate]

After the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed the bag ban in February 2012, Save the Plastic Bag Coalition, a pro-plastic bag organization, filed a lawsuit demanding an invalidation of the ordinance because the board passed it without conducting an environmental review.

The coalition filed a similar lawsuit in San Luis Obispo Superior Court, as well.

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors claimed exemption from California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) review of the ordinance, as did the San Luis Obispo County Integrated Waste Management Authority

Judges in San Francisco and San Luis Obispo upheld the bans, finding that they did not cause harm to the environment and thus did not require CEQA review.

Save the Plastic Bag Coalition then appealed the San Francisco ruling, which the First District Court of Appeals upheld Friday.

Evidence supports San Francisco’s conclusion that the plastic bag ban can only benefit the environment, Justice Paul Haerle said in a 3-0 ruling.

 


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Hasn’t everyone noticed how low food prices have dropped since stores no longer provide us those “free” bags?


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My thought is that no bags means people will buy less. I certainly do and expect to lose a couple of pounds too. In the past I was never concerned about the transport issue and now with that in mind I carry less, spend less and eat less. I do not miss the waste, the habit has changed.


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What a P.O.S. idea this is. Plastic bags are not the earth’s environmental Armageddon; it’s the 6 billion people on this planet. What a waste of time you eco whack-jobs are.


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seven billion , five billion with cell phones


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Excellent decision!


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Filing suit under CEQA is a daft idea. CEQA only requires analysis of things that hurt the environment, and since banning plastic bags helps the environment, where’s the beef? The suit is also a waste of money since winning it would simply require the county to do an EIR, which they’d do, and then reinstate the ban. Only the plastics industry could have money to waste this way. Ah, yes, didn’t we already know the save-the-bag coalition was industry astroturf?


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Guess you’ve never been inside a CEQA action. There is LOT to consider which would constitute fodder for a CEQA analysis:


unknown enviro effects from you enviro boys refusing to perform a CEQA analysis of ban


and the following list of possible environmental impacts from your dictatorial ban:


enviro effect of soaps, water and energy spent laundering dirty re-use bags,


enviro demands of paper products for bags for us luddites who refuse to re-use and so we buy clean, fresh paper (TREE products) bags on every trip


enviro effects of us purchasing extra plastic bags for the purposes that we’ve long “re-used”the one use traditional store bags


enviro effects of lost productivity from those, if any, who become sick from re-use bags contaminating the environment, the home, the stores


enviro effects of the thicker materials needed to produce the so called “re-use bags”


enviro effects of SHIPPING to USA the “re-use bags” from points of Chinese manufacture


enviro effects of lost jobs and productivity from killing the “single use” bag industry


enviro effects of my time wasted attempting to enlighten you about bags, CEQA, and the concept of liberty in a free county, and,


enviro effects of having to produce “mutt-mitt” replacement dog waste bags instead of today’s nifty and handy 7-11/Spencers/Ralph’s bag. (In our family we now re-use the Trib newspaper bags since some of the Trib’s liberal articles and lock-step liberal editorial positions CONSTITUTE the equivalent of dog waste. Seems apropos.)


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