May 17, 2007

New Haven Register

Bottle deposit expansion killed
Gregory B. Hladky

HARTFORD — Legislation to expand Connecticut’s bottle deposit system to water and other non-carbonated beverages was killed by a minor legislative committee Wednesday, but its supporters vowed to revive the bill.

The legislature’s General Law Committee voted 13-4 against the bottle bill, which had already passed the state Senate by a wide margin.

"We will give it mouth-to-bottle resuscitation," said state Rep. Richard Roy, D-Milford, co-chairman of the legislature’s Environment Committee. Roy and other supporters argue the state must do something to push recycling of the huge numbers of water bottles being discarded.

Roy said there was a strong lobbying effort by the beverage and supermarket industries to kill the measure.

Several of the bill’s supporters suggested the decision by state House leaders to send the bill to the general law panel was a maneuver designed to kill it.

State House Speaker James A. Amann, D-Milford, said he made the decision to refer the bill to the General Law Committee at the request of its chairman, state Rep. Christopher R. Stone, D-East Hartford. Amann denied he intended to have the measure killed, although he admits he’s "never been a fan" of the concept of an expanded bottle deposit system.

Amann said he is worried that the expansion of the deposit system "will be very costly to a lot of companies."

"I didn’t think it needed to go to General Law," said committee member state Rep. Robert Megna, D-New Haven. "They buried the bottle bill today. It was sad."

Megna, who voted for the bill at Wednesday’s committee meeting, said he would support the effort to revive the measure.

One of the bill’s primary sponsors, state Sen. Bill Finch, D-Bridgeport, said he is confident there’s enough legislative support for the measure to attach it as an amendment to another bill.

"It’s unfortunate, but this is just a minor setback," said Finch, co-chairman of the Environment Committee. He pointed out that the bill won Senate approval on a strong 26-7 vote.

Roy said he was "a bit surprised" by the size of the General Law vote against the measure. He said the bill’s supporters need to review it "to see what we can do to make the bill more palatable."

The bill would place a 5 cent deposit on each of the estimated 500,000 water bottles being sold annually in Connecticut, as well as on other non-carbonated beverage containers.

The measure also would increase the 2 cent per container fee that stores and recycling centers now receive to 3 cents for each can or bottle redeemed.

The legislation, if approved by the House and Senate and signed into law by Gov. M. Jodi Rell, would take effect Oct. 1, 2008.

Gregory B. Hladky can be contacted at ghladky@nhregister.com or (860) 524-0719.

http://www.nhregister.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=18351225&BRD=1281&PAG=461&dept_id=31007&rfi=6