Salem Citizens Call on Keenan to Update the Bottle Bill

Citizens in Salem are clamoring for the Updated Bottle Bill. Check out this Letter to the Editor from the Salem News:

Citizens in Salem are clamoring for the Updated Bottle Bill. Check out this Letter to the Editor from the Salem News:

To the editor:

A May 29 article described state Rep. John Keenan’s ambivalence about bottle-bill legislation before his committee, which would increase the deposit to 10 cents and expand the bill to cover most drink containers.

While I am sympathetic to store owners who will have an additional burden under this bill, the burden is not that big. It is insignificant compared to the burden they took on when the first bottle bill went into effect. This is just an adjustment to a system already in place.

Most convenience stores are not affected much by the existing bill, nor would they be by its expansion. People rarely redeem their bottles at such stores, regardless of where the drink was purchased.

As to the benefits: It’s not just less litter, although that benefit would be real. Of at least equal benefit is the efficiency of source-separated recycling: Much less wasteful and more cost-effective than the unsorted recycling process applied to our curbside bins.

Finding cost-effective markets for recycled material can be a real challenge: No sale, no recycling.

More importantly: It just makes sense. Sad to say the sheer quantity of disposable and disposed-of products today makes the source-separated deposit approach advisable, practically and culturally.

Drink containers are a start. We really need this model for computers and electronics, light bulbs with mercury, and many other things that really should not be buried, burned or lost at sea.

We should keep this ball rolling.

Duncan Cox
Salem

Authors

Janet Domenitz

Executive Director, MASSPIRG

Janet has been the executive director of MASSPIRG since 1990 and directs programs on consumer protection, zero waste, health and safety, public transportation, and voter participation. Janet has co-founded or led coalitions, including Earth Day Greater Boston, Campaign to Update the Bottle Bill and the Election Modernization Coalition. On behalf of MASSPIRG, Janet was one of the founding members of Transportation for Massachusetts (T4MA), a statewide coalition of organizations advocating investment in mass transit to curb climate change, improve public health and address equity. Janet serves as Chair of the Board of Directors for the Consumer Federation of America and serves on the Common Cause Massachusetts executive committee, Alliance for a Healthy Tomorrow board of directors, and Department of Environmental Protection Solid Waste Advisory Committee. For her work, Janet has received Common Cause’s John Gardner Award and Salem State University’s Friend of the Earth Award. Janet lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with her husband and two sons, and every Wednesday morning she slow-runs the steps at Harvard Stadium with the November Project.