First Official Notices Sent Out To City Stores For Controversial Plastic Bag Bill

Last week stores citywide began receiving the first official notices reminding them that, as of February 15, 2017, they will need to charge customers five cents for all plastic bags. The notice reads, as per a photo of it published in the Brooklyn Eagle:

Pursuant to New York City law, all carryout bags provided by this store to a customer, with limited exceptions, shall be subject to a fee of not less than five cents ($0.05) per bag.

Carryout bags brought by customers into this store to carry purchased goods from this store shall not be subject to a fee.

The City Council’s controversial plastic bag fee legislation — which passed on May 5 — was initially intended to start in October but became held up in Albany thanks to opposition from state legislators, who call the fee a “tax on the poor” targeting lower income residents, the elderly, and others on fixed incomes.

The bill is intended to cut New Yorker’s reliance on environmentally hazardous single-use shopping bags, of which New Yorkers contribute roughly 10 billion bags to landfills every year, according to the Department of Sanitation.

The legislation stirred fierce controversy in the City Council, where it narrowly passed 28-20. Debate raged between pro-bag-fee Council Member Brad Lander, representing Park Slope, Windsor Terrace, Kensington, and Boro Park; and anti-bag-fee Council Member Chaim Deutsch, representing sections of Midwood, Brighton Beach, and Sheepshead Bay. The fee was also opposed by council members David Greenfield, Mark Treyger, and Vincent Gentile who voted against the legislation.

[H/t: Brooklyn Eagle]