Union City doesn’t ban Styrofoam
By Matt Artz
Wednesday, July 9th, 2008 at 6:39 pm in Fremont, Union City.
Once again, I spoke too soon. Union City voted two weeks ago to prohibit restaurants from using Styrofoam containers. But on a second vote Tuesday night, the council reversed itself. Manny Fernandez swiched sides, and the ban failed on a 2-2 vote.
Richard Valle recused himself since he runs the non-profit that handles recylcling for Union City.
Kind of interesting that in the past few months Union City has backed down from a Styrofoam ban after business interests voiced their opposition to it and Fremont backed down from a Styrofoam ban, plastic grocery bag ban and higher hotel tax hike under similar circumstances.
Union City might be the All-American City and Fremont might be the healthiest city for men, but one quality that seems to bind their city council’s is caution. Maybe they made the right call. Still, both cities dipped their toes in the pond of making a bold statement on the environment, but, in the end, neither one wanted to make a spash.
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July 30th, 2008 at 11:17 pm
I applaud the decision by both Union City and Fremont to support individual freedom when it comes to this topic. Instead of making a “bold statement” in favor of a nanny state that stamps on individual liberty, they properly avoided assuming powers that rightly belong to citizens.
If you or another individual feel that you think Styrofoam or plastic grocery bags are not good for the environment, by all means avoid patronizing restaurants that use Styrofoam and avoid plastic grocery bags. However, don’t take that right away from me by cheering on the state to enforce your opinion onto me.
I am a big fan of plastic grocery bags. I use them for trash bags. If you bag plastic grocery bags here, I will shop in other cities. If you ban them in the state, I will buy them from Walmart so I can use them for my trash. You’ll achieve making my quality of life lower by reducing the amount of income I have to spend for my children and family.
Plastic is more recyclable than paper, at a cheaper cost, and with less energy. It requires that no trees be cut down. And regardless, it’s your choice. At least it is now.
July 31st, 2008 at 10:47 am
What about all the wildlife that is threatened.
What about our polluted Oceans that are killing off our Marine life.
Plastic kills.
Neither the city of Fremont or Union City has a city council with any vision.
July 31st, 2008 at 11:27 am
The plastic bags that you get at the grocery store are not recyclable at a normal recycling facility. At least at TriCed (the recycling center for Union City) they have to separate the plastic bags out from the rest of the recycling – that according to one of their employees.
It takes more energy to take them from the little grocery store collection bins and drive them to a special facility where they can be recycled and/or disposed of than it would to produce a paper bag.
July 31st, 2008 at 12:04 pm
I’m afraid that the claims of plastic killing is false.
A front page story from the March 8,2008 edition of the London Times says, “Scientists and environmentalists have attacked a global campaign to ban plastic bags which they say is based on flawed science and exaggerated claims.
The widely stated accusation that the bags kill 100,000 animals and a million seabirds every year are false, experts have told The Times. They pose only a minimal threat to most marine species, including seals, whales, dolphins and seabirds.
Lord Taverne, the chairman of Sense about Science, said: “The Government is irresponsible to jump on a bandwagon that has no base in scientific evidence. This is one of many examples where you get bad science leading to bad decisions which are counter-productive. Attacking plastic bags makes people feel good but it doesn’t achieve anything.”
Campaigners say that plastic bags pollute coastlines and waterways, killing or injuring birds and livestock on land and, in the oceans, destroying vast numbers of seabirds, seals, turtles and whales. However, The Times has established that there is no scientific evidence to show that the bags pose any direct threat to marine mammals.
They “don’t figure” in the majority of cases where animals die from marine debris, said David Laist, the author of a seminal 1997 study on the subject. Most deaths were caused when creatures became caught up in waste produce. “Plastic bags don’t figure in entanglement,” he said. “The main culprits are fishing gear, ropes, lines and strapping bands. Most mammals are too big to get caught up in a plastic bag.”
He added: “The impact of bags on whales, dolphins, porpoises and seals ranges from nil for most species to very minor for perhaps a few species.For birds, plastic bags are not a problem either.”
The central claim of campaigners is that the bags kill more than 100,000 marine mammals and one million seabirds every year. However, this figure is based on a misinterpretation of a 1987 Canadian study in Newfoundland, which found that, between 1981 and 1984, more than 100,000 marine mammals, including birds, were killed by discarded nets. The Canadian study did not mention plastic bags.
Fifteen years later in 2002, when the Australian Government commissioned a report into the effects of plastic bags, its authors misquoted the Newfoundland study, mistakenly attributing the deaths to “plastic bags”.
The figure was latched on to by conservationists as proof that the bags were killers. For four years the “typo” remained uncorrected. It was only in 2006 that the authors altered the report, replacing “plastic bags” with “plastic debris”.
In a postscript to the correction they admitted that the original Canadian study had referred to fishing tackle, not plastic debris, as the threat to the marine environment.
Regardless, the erroneous claim has become the keystone of a widening campaign to demonise plastic bags.
David Santillo, a marine biologist at Greenpeace, told The Times that bad science was undermining the Government’s case for banning the bags. “It’s very unlikely that many animals are killed by plastic bags,” he said. “The evidence shows just the opposite. We are not going to solve the problem of waste by focusing on plastic bags.
“It doesn’t do the Government’s case any favours if you’ve got statements being made that aren’t supported by the scientific literature that’s out there. With larger mammals it’s fishing gear that’s the big problem. On a global basis plastic bags aren’t an issue. It would be great if statements like these weren’t made.”
July 31st, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Sounds like Robert Kelley gets his science from the same people that President Bush uses.
This smells, sort of the far right.