BALLE Seattle Joins Green Bag Campaign

Urges Seattleites to approve Referendum 1

BALLE Seattle joins over twenty other pro-environment groups and an assortment of notable Seattleites in urging Seattle voters to approve Referendum 1, the "green bag fee" ballot measure, on August 18th.

If approved, Referendum 1 would uphold the ordinance passed by the Seattle City Council in 2008 that created a $0.20 fee on disposable shopping bags at grocery, drug, and convenience stores. The purpose of the fee is to discourage the use of disposable paper and plastic bags and encourage the use of reusable bags. The law, modeled after a similar law in Ireland, is expected to reduce disposable bag use by up to 90%.

Most of the funds collected would go to Seattle Public utilities to pay for an educational campaign to encourage reusable bag use; a bag giveaway program for soup kitchens, low income families and those who need assistance; and to offset the costs of solid waste and recycling programs in Seattle.

Stores would keep 25% of each bag fee they collect to cover the administrative costs of the program. Smaller stores, defined as those with less than $1m in annual gross sales, would keep the entire fee.

"The huge reduction in disposable bag use that the green bag fee facilitates will have a major positive impact on Seattle by reducing waste, pollution, and litter, and markedly reducing the cost for merchants to supply bags free of charge," says BALLE Seattle chair Derek Hoshiko. "These sustainability and livability improvements are at the core of the local living economy ideal that BALLE is all about."

HOW TO HELP

• Vote to APPROVE Referendum 1 on your primary ballot on August 18th.

• Donate money or time to the Green Bag Campaign.

• Remember your reusable bags when you shop.