Tag Archives: plastic bag ban

Will California voters overturn the bag ban? Maybe this issue will piss people off enough to raise voter participation in 2016

15 Jun

From Ballotpedia:

The California Plastic Bag Ban Referendum is on the November 8, 2016 ballot in California as a veto referendum. If the measure approved by the state’s voters, it would:[1][2]

  • Ratify SB 270 (2014).
  • Prohibit large grocery stores and pharmacies from providing plastic single-use carryout bags on July 1, 2015, and small grocery stores, convenience and liquor stores on July 1, 2016.
  • Allows single-use plastic bags for meat, bread, produce, bulk food and perishable items.
  • Mandate stores to charge $0.10 for recycled, compostable, and reusable grocery bags.
  • Exempt consumers using a payment card or voucher issued by the California Special Supplemental Food Program, a public assistance program, from being charged for bags.
  • Provide $2 million to state plastic bag manufacturers for the purpose of helping them retain jobs and transition to making thicker, multi-use, recycled plastic bags.

The American Progressive Bag Alliance is leading the campaign to repeal SB 270.[3]

This measure is a veto referendum; this means that a “yes” vote would be a vote to uphold or ratify the contested legislation – Senate Bill 270 – that was enacted by the California State Legislature, while a “no” vote is a vote to overturn Senate Bill 270.

Read more here:

http://ballotpedia.org/California_Plastic_Bag_Ban_Referendum_(2016)

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Huntington Beach has overturned their bag ban – “the citizens of Huntington Beach are adults and deserve to be treated like adults who can make their own choice”

22 Apr

I think people in Huntington Beach California hit on an important point here – we are adults, and deserve to be treated like adults who can think for ourselves. The bag ban was “heavy handed government,” and not based on hard science, but on the hysteria of a few environmental zealots. Here’s an article from last January, when Huntington Beach council began the process of overturning their ban. Like Chico, they’d had a turnover in their November election, the councilors who’d strong-armed the ban onto the public were ousted. 

http://fighttheplasticbagban.com/2015/01/22/huntington-beach-city-council-votes-to-repeal-plastic-bag-ban/

The bag ban was clearly behavioral modification, and that’s not what we need out of our government. When God scratches, “thou shalt not use plastic film bags…” on a rock, and throws it through the windshield of my car, I’ll pay attention.

Yeah, now I’m wondering about Sorensen and his posse. We’ll have to see what happens in 2016 when the state bag ban ban goes up to the people. For a change.

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California bag ban referendum winds it way through the process – could be on November 2016 ballot

13 Jan

Here is the Ballotpedia entry for the proposed plastic bag ban referendum.  

http://ballotpedia.org/California_Plastic_Bag_Ban_Referendum_(2016)

If the required number of signatures are ratified, the ban will have to be placed on the November 2016 ballot for the voters to make the call. The ban, SB 270. was originally passed by the California legislature and ratified by The Moonbeam, but sufficient signatures and a majority of California voters could overturn this legislation. 

Of course this will not overturn county of city ordinances. I don’t know how we can overturn our local ordinance – the clock is ticking, I don’t think we have much time if any for our own referendum drive. That doesn’t mean we can’t get petition council to overturn it.

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California “single-use” bag ban opponents gather enough signatures to qualify a “bag ban ban” for 2016 ballot

2 Jan

Here’s the latest on the effort to overturn the statewide bag ban:

http://patch.com/california/northridge/bag-ban-opponents-submit-petition-overturn-law

Here’s an interesting website with more information:

http://fighttheplasticbagban.com/tag/initiative/

Here’s my prediction – wait til they find out, people don’t re-use the new bags, they accumulate them, forget to take them to the store again, and then when the space under  their kitchen sink is full to overflowing they will dump them in their garbage cans – they aren’t recyclable! 

This bag ban is a bigger scam  than The Interview!

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Rick Clements: The council should manage city operations and finances as duly elected representatives

5 May

As much as I’d like to forget the city’s “plastic bag ban,” it won’t go away. The latest news is, the city has stalled their decision on this ordinance because of a threatened lawsuit by a group called, “The Plastic Bag Coalition.”

No, I do not make this stuff up.

There has been an enormous amount of $taff time wasted on this ordinance. Sometimes I wish they’d just passed it when they first brought it up, years ago, or even better – let the bag ban the state has passed go into effect, and that would be the end of it! Instead, $taff, always looking for ways to beef up their paychecks, have dragged this poor dead horse around the block about 150 times, like some sick palio.

Here’s a letter, below, from Rick Clements, who reminds us, this decision is being made without any real support from the public. Sure, you’ve seen the same tired little mob of less than two dozen make their way to the podium again and again during the discussions, you’ve seen less than a dozen letters to the papers in support of this ban, but when I asked Sustainability Task Force $taffer Linda Herman who requested this discussion, she gave me one name – a woman named Leslie Johnson,  who works for the Butte County chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Rick also reminds us, this discussion has cost the city an undisclosed amount in $taff time – Linda Herman’s time alone is worth over $100,000 a year. Then there’s the city attorney, at over $200,000 a year. The city clerk, at about $135,000 plus benies.  Etc.

All for politics. The ACLU is basically an arm of the Chico Democrats, Johnson is just another toady. I find it ironic that this woman, who fronts an organization that is supposed to care about the individual’s “rights”, is pushing an ordinance that disproportionately affects the lower income citizen.  Thanks for nothing Leslie!

And thanks for this letter Rick, I hope we can get some good discussion out of it.

Regarding your story “Avoiding a Lawsuit”.

We have all heard the pros and cons of the plastic bag ban. That’s not what’s at issue here. The council members should manage the city operations and finances as duly elected representatives.

The majority did not elect or authorize their political correctness. to impede upon the arenas of “personal freedom” and “the individual’s right to choose”. If five political philosophies restrict the constitutionally protected right to decide at the ballot box; refusing the 70,000+ voters whose lives will be affected to vote for or against a ban that places restrictions on personal freedoms of choice, then that’s communism.

During the 70’s, the liberals below made this same argument. They demanded ballot box democracy against a conservative council’s decisions constantly. Those liberals were clearly correct then; but today’s council; its left wing majority, they are wrong. They are clearly afraid that the ballot box might weaken or nullify their misused powers. That’s why they never offered up the ban decision for a public vote. Talk about a hypocritical slap in the face to people like Jane Dolan, Bob Mulholland, Karl Ory, and Kelly Meager. Their coalitions fought for guaranteeing everyone’s personal right to voice their ballot box opinion on issues that affected everyone. The Green Line and Bidwell Ranch! So whose power hungry now?

Rick Clements

Paradise

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