January 30, 2009
Bottle law proposal gets mixed reaction
Patrick sees $58m raised, foes disagree
Now, after Governor Deval Patrick this week proposed expanding the state's bottle law, Edwards, from Roxbury, hopes to double his daily income.
"This could be huge," said Edwards, 36, who like other collectors has left behind countless discarded bottles of water and other noncarbonated beverages. "It would be great not to have to leave all those other bottles. . . . And it would mean a lot more change for me. It would also keep the streets cleaner."
As part of Patrick's effort to raise money for the fiscal 2010 budget, the governor has proposed expanding the state's 28-year-old bottle law - the 5-cent deposit fee for carbonated sodas, beer, and malt beverages - to include bottled water, juices, and sports drinks, which now account for about one-third of beverages sold in Massachusetts.
Patrick estimates the state would raise about $58 million by allowing the redemption of an additional 1.5 billion containers a year, or about $20 million more than the state earns from the current law. He expects the additional money because only about 65 percent of all bottles sold in the state are redeemed.
Robert Keough, a spokesman for the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs, said $10 million of the new revenue would go to reducing Massachusetts Water Resources Authority rates. The rest would be divided between the general fund and grants for municipalities to expand recycling programs.
"This is nothing but expanding the existing programs that have been successful for years in reducing litter and other waste," Keough said. "It brings the bottle bill up to date."
But efforts on Beacon Hill to expand the state's bottle law are nothing new, and there are powerful interest groups vowing to block the governor's proposal. Similar bills proposed in recent years have not made it beyond the committee level.
"We're assembling our opposition," said Chris Flynn, president of the Massachusetts Food association, which represents the state's supermarket industry.
Flynn and others who oppose expanding the bottle bill consider it a tax that raises the cost of beverages, promotes fraud by encouraging cross-border sales of bottles, and curbs efforts to expand other recycling programs. They argue the state would be better off encouraging curbside recycling, which now exists in fewer than half of the state's 351 communities.
"For this to be in a budget is disingenuous," Flynn said. "If the law was successful at promoting recycling, there would be no money going back to the unclaimed nickel fund."
But those supporting the governor argue that the existing law has been an unqualified success and that expanding to nearly identical bottles is only logical.
They counter that litter has been vastly reduced since the 1980s and call it absurd to suggest that allowing people to redeem deposits on their bottles reduces other recycling efforts.
"It's not often that one can find a revenue item that is good for the environment, especially in tough economic times," James McCaffrey, director of the Massachusetts Sierra Club, said in a prepared statement. "It is over 10 times more likely that a nondeposit container will end up littering, rather than being recycled."
If the bill is approved, Massachusetts would join Maine, California, Oregon, and Hawaii in requiring deposits on noncarbonated beverages.
As Edwards unloaded more than 100 beer bottles yesterday at Fuentes Market in Roxbury, he looked forward to collecting the trashed Snapple, Gatorade, and Dasani.
"It's a good way to help poor people," he said.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/01/30/bottle_law_proposal_gets_mixed_reaction/
