[img]1307|left|Ms. Meghan Sahli-Wells||no_popup[/img]Standing in a community where 160 million bags are said to be in annoying circulation every year, City Councilperson Meghan Sahli-Wells and Helen Kerstein from the Public Works Dept. presented the Council’s case for a proposed ban this morning to a large audience at the Senior Center.
An eloquent spokesperson for one of her most passionate causes, “you can blame me if you don’t like it,” a smiling Ms. Sahli-Wells told her closely tracking mature listeners. “I will gladly take the blame. This is a really important issue.”
It was she who ignited a blaze beneath the Council last year to start moving on this central environmental issue.
As legislators in Sacramento ponder a statewide ban being urged by state Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Pacoima), Culver City is seeking to join 67 other counties – including Los Angeles, in unincorporated areas – and communities that already have taken the decisive step.
Resulting litter – on dry land and wet – lies at the heart of the motivation for imposing a prohibition.
Paper bags, too, are held to be undesirable, and only slightly more tolerable than plastic containers, said Ms. Kerstein.
Last December, the Council asked city staffers to develop an ordinance, and they are expected to inspect it at the May 13 meeting.
The only Culver City exceptions to the intended ban likely would be restaurants and retail outlets that do not sell food. Grocery stores, drug stores and convenience stores are the primary targets.
If you want a bag, you likely will be charged an extra 10 cents.
“We say that bags are free,” said Ms. Sahli-Wells. “But we know they are not.
“There is a cost to making these bags, transporting the bags, to throwing them away.”
Even recycling bags is not a satisfactory panacea, Ms. Sahli-Wells said.
“The bags that get away are the worst. The (cost of) cleaning up is incredible,” in the millions, annually, for Los Angeles County, according to Ms. Kerstein.
“Nothing is really free, as we know,” Ms. Sahli-Wells said. “When you make a decision (to give up plastic bags), you will find it is really easy.
“Single-use plastic bags only have been around since the 1970s. We lived very well before them, and we can again in the future.
“We need to be more wise with our resources,” said Ms. Sahli-Wells, an ardent environmentalist.
For any uniformed member of the audience unsure of what a plastic bag was, Catherine Vargas, a colleague of Ms. Kerstein, wheeled an artful tree containing hundreds of plastic bags as a persistent reminder.
