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Do you miss those plastic bags that have been banished from San Francisco? Well, boo hoo! You might soon be getting a rebate for the bags you bring with you to the store! Attractive young Supervisor Ross "Boots" Mirkarimi introduced legislation today that would send paper bags packing after their forlorn plastic cousins require retailers to provide a rebate of ten cents to each customer for each bag the customer has brought and uses to carry out their purchases. The new legislation would affect the same grocery stores and pharmacies that have been forced to abandon plastic.
This is an ordinance this writer can support, but only if it includes a requirement that the virtual self-check out lady at the Safeway has to stop bitching about unknown items in the grocery bagging area whenever he plunks down his Timbuk2 bag on the scale. Good call, Ross.
The text of the proposed legislation can be found here at SF weekly. (Warning: Word Document).
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Actually the ordinance would only require a rebate if you bring your own bag. That way the greens can feel so, so, SO happy about themselves as they save $0.40 on a $50 grocery bill while the rest of us can get on with our lives.
Yeah...SFist is making the same error that SFGate made (i.e. referring to this legislation as a Paper Bag "Ban"). It's not a ban on paper bags and I don't think a good discourse can be had on this topic until that is made clear. Can you edit your post, SFist?
It is NOT A BAN ON PAPER BAGS!
I agree. This is NOT a ban on paper bags Mr. Jones. Why do you portray it as such? It makes perfect sense to give people rebates for bringing in their own bags.
This proposed policy makes me angry. I would love to just go to a Board of Supervisors meeting and blurt every single foul language word on the microphone and have the pleasure of replaying it online to hear the long streaks of the censor beep. On the other hand, I would just point my finger at the board and laugh at them for the entire 90 seconds.
Akit - I would pay to see if if you blurt out those profanities in song a la Walter.
Just bring a BioBag (TM) full of compostables and leave it on the public comment lectern. It's green!
do you know what is being proposed?
getting a rebate if someone brings in their own bag makes you that angry?
I screwed-up; it's not a proposal to kill the paper bag, just only a bag credit. But a bag credit is another nail in the coffin of free grocery bags.
We've already made America a very green country by moving most of our jobs to other countries. Maybe it's time to outsource our government as well.
I picture lots of little old ladies forgetting to bring their Timbuk2 bags and being SOL at the Safeway out on Noriega. Maybe it would be better to put a 5% tax on the (recyclable) paper bags instead.
Way to sock it to the few remaining grocery stores! I already have to get out of town (to San Bruno Target) to get my supply of cheapo plastic shopping bags for my office garbage cans.
Since the BoS is so busy whittling away at consumer choices instead of solving real problems, SFist should come up with a poll of various other things that should be social engineered out of town (my nominations would include: perfume, tin cans, dogs left @ home all day while owners at work, PG&E, Republicans).
Seems like a good idea, and I usually have bags with me, but I have had the occasional day where I forget them. What happens then? At least paper is more easily recyclable...
Funny enough, plastic bags require less energy to recycle than paper bags.
But never mind actual science if it's not part of our dogma.
Wait, it's not a ban? Then what is it? I'm so confused. Oh well, I guess I'll deal with whatever it is when it happens. MalcoveMagnesia, you can use paper bags for garbage too. Or you can use the money you use on gas to get to your plastic bags and just buy a roll of small garbage bags.
Here you go:
"Mirkarimi...introduced legislation Tuesday at the Board of Supervisors that would require those stores to offer a 10-cent rebate as an incentive for people to bring their own bags."
That's it. It's not a ban on paper bags.
Correct, but just half of it. The other half would be a fine on retailers who do not offer the 10-cent rebate.
Carrot and stick.
Interestingly, there is no incentive for retailers.
No comment.
I'm still stinging from the intense angry glare and rolling eyes I received from a King Street Safeway checkout person yesterday after I had the audacity to suggest placing some pre-made salad mix into a half full grocery bag because I thought, stupidly enough, that the bag could hold it. I should have stuck with the cute checkout boy with the longer line.
Sigh.
Dear Chris Jones,
If you're not going to actually read the news report before doing your blog post, please don't do the blog post. As AJ has already pointed out, the post is not even a remotely accurate description of the policy.
We don't need to you look at SFGate headlines, then make up what we think the article is about. We already have the SFGate comment area for that.
But the erroneous ones are more fun!
If SFGate commenters had to base things on reality, their comments would be much more boring.
Sorry folks. I was just relaying what the original SFGate story reported. My bad for not double checking the facts.
meanwhile, Rome continues to burn...
No, not burning. During El Nino years, it's a cesspool. Weren't you here on Monday?
Out of town traveling at the moment. Lucky me. I remember the last El Nino in 97 - what fun. That was a 4C degree jump in the surface temp of the ocean, this one is pushing a 1C jump right now. Things begin to get interesting around a 2.5C jump.
Glad it's not actually a ban. I use the plastic bags I get from the corner store for trash bags, and the paper bags I get from Safeway to hold recycling.
And: the virtual self-check out lady at the Safeway has to stop bitching about unknown items in the grocery bagging area
YES. God, this annoys the crap out of me every time.
Safeway *used* to do this several years ago. It was kind of an on-again off-again policy randomly implemented at the whim of the cashier. You got either 10c or 25c total rebate for forgoing bags completely, say, if you were on a bike and could just cram everything into your backpack.
Both Cala & Whole Paychecks currently offer 5 cents back per bag... but you have to be smart enough to ask for the credits.
Jesus christ. If you wonder how the Republican party could possibly make a come-back, it's legislation like this. A store should be allowed to offer whatever credit it wants to offer (or not offer) for bringing your own bag. One of the many (albeit insignificant) reasons I shop at Rainbow is because they give me credit for bringing my own bags, bottles, jars, etc. But requiring them to do so?
I usually roll my eyes when I hear anti-gummamit twits cry "nanny state." But c'mmon Ross, you're making it too easy for them. This is an area where the market actually can work (stores pay for bags; they have a selfish reason to encourage people to bring their own.)
I agree that making it a requirement is overkill.
It's kind of like coffee places that discount for bringing your own cup (thanks, Peet's!). It's a little bonus and some good PR but I don't think they should HAVE to give me a discount.
burlap sacks are where it's at anyway
So, if I brought in one bag for each item I purchase, the store has no choice but to give me a rebate for each? What happens if I forgo a bag to carry my case of bottled green tea? The store has to pay me for not using a bag I wouldn't have used in the first place? While the goal is admirable, this strikes me as impossible to implement fairly and consistently. I can't believe I'm saying this, but it almost seems better to have the city impose a corresponding tax on each bag used.
The BoS doing what they do best... figuring out how to give away other people's money.
i'm torn between being frustrated when people feel inconvenienced at the slightest restrictions due to green measures (like the folks in Haight trying to have their neighbor's solar panels removed cuz they're ugly), and being frustrated that it's probably too late to really do anything meaningful anyway. period of consequences.
Jeff D
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At Dunnes and Tesco stores in Ireland, shoppers have to PAY for bags if they want one, and they have to bag their own groceries... I think other European countries do this too...We're so spoiled here and we don't even realize it!
Wouldn't this be a much easier solution? Better for retailers, plus it WOULD motivate people to bring their own bags...and if they don't, they pay 25 cents for one. Sounds fair to me.
San Francisco never banned plastic bags. I have a drawer full of em. Sorry to burst the liberal bubble, gang.
They should have at least required that plastic bags be big enough to line a small wastebasket. Lately I've been getting ones that aren't quite big enough to use for anything.
Ross has fallen off the rails.
What's so amusing about this guy is that he just seems to love creating silly market regulations like banning anymore water pipe stores in the Haight or this silly law to force discounts. His own bio says he has an economics degree but you'd never know he understood anything about economics by his his crazy ideology.
It can't possibly be constitutional for government to force one party (grocery stores) to pay a specific amount of money to another party (shopper) for services (use of reusable bags)that the first party is forced to accept, can it?
Probably no more legal than the permit renewal logistics issues that companies who don't play along would experience, if you get my meaning.
Mirkarimi saves the environment! Ban plastic bags! (at a few chain stores). Mandate commuter benefits! (unless your employer says no). Ban paper bags! (by not banning them).
I think someone forgot to tell the businesses in china town because I still see those pink plastic bags everywhere.