Members of the D.C. Council heard from supporters and opponents of a plan to charge 10-cent deposits for each beverage container sold in the District.
Under the bill, known as the , the money would be refunded when the items are returned.
Council members intend for the bill to decrease the amount of plastic bottles that end up in the District’s rivers and streets. The bill aims to incentivize people to recycle their bottles and encourage city residents to earn money by collecting discarded bottles and cans.
But the business community sharply rebuked the bill at Thursday’s roundtable discussion led by Ward 6 Councilmember Charles Allen, chair of the Committee on Transportation and the Environment, on the grounds that it would unjustly increase cost burdens on beverage distributors.
Brendan Williams-Kief, who testified on behalf of the District of Columbia Beverage Alcohol Wholesalers, detailed a study funded by his association indicating the bottle bill would increase costs to consumers by some $60 million every year.
Pushing back on that study’s findings was the bill’s main sponsor, Ward 1 Councilmember Brianne Nadeau, who said that extra cost would be ultimately refunded to consumers.
“Six hundred seventeen million bottles and cans per year are distributed and sold in the District, and we are paying for each and every one,” Nadeau said. “It’s no wonder that the big beverage industry doesn’t want this bill; they don’t want to pay for the cost to clean up the mess they created.”
“I haven’t paid myself in two months,” said Thor Chester, co-owner of Right Proper Brewing Company. “I cannot pay (for) another government program,” he said, adding that his margins are already narrow, and it was difficult to see how his business could incur any extra costs.
Allen and Nadeau say they have made changes to the bill that would negate any impacts to brewers in the city. Nadeau said the recycling program would be run by a nonprofit organization, minimizing any potential expenditures to the city.
Ten states in the U.S. currently have container deposit laws in place.
Supporters say there is evidence that financial incentives have a big impact on the environment. They point to the District’s five-cent plastic bag fee as an example, noting that plastic bags quickly disappeared from the Anacostia River after the charge was introduced.
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