Letters to the Editor

W.Va.'s filthy hills do need a bottle bill

A recent Daily Mail editorial quoted Kevin Dietly, who said the bottle bill proposed in West Virginia would be ineffective.

However, the bill was modeled after laws in other states that work. Also, the West Virginia bill had been reworked to accommodate all of the objections that had been presented in the last five years.

It should be noted that Dietly, in a presentation before the Interbev Conference a few years back, said of Maine's bottle bill:

"Cost to consumers is insignificant. Prices were not affected. Sales were not affected. Cottage industries have grown up with over 350 redemption centers in Maine. The bottle bill, originally passed for litter prevention, enjoys a strong measure of public support."

Having read Dietly's contradictory statements, it's hard to know what to believe.

Members of Friends of the Lower Greenbrier River have been bending over picking up trash for more than 15 years. We know that by the time we are done with the cleanup, more beverage bottles will appear behind us. We know our population needs to be reeducated.

Within the weeks to come, that road will look as if no one did a cleanup.

The bottle bill introduced in this session works well in 11 other states. The statements printed in this paper reflect the corporate wording used to suppress this legislation.

The West Virginia Citizen Action Group has been working on the flaws for five years to get a bottle bill passed, with lying politicians that tell you they will vote for it, but then will not.

There is a growing movement to temporarily withhold our Adopt-a-Highway services until the governor and the Legislature pass a bottle bill.

No matter what the outcome, these beverage corporations will profit. The argument that border city residents will travel to another state is bogus. Local convenience stores have been doing just fine charging more over discounted large food stores.

Look at the cost of gas, and the deposit is only 10 cents.

When the governor and Legislature take responsible actions for the sake of the people who continuously pick up the nastiest beverage bottles (50 percent of what we gather), we will resume our voluntary chores of keeping West Virginia clean again.

Filthy hills need bottle bills.

Mark Blumenstein

Alderson

http://www.dailymail.com/story/Opinion/Letters+to+the+Editor/2007031315/Letters-to-the-Editor