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Trash the bottle bill (SB1408/ HB1829)
A forced drink container deposit program is a bad idea from the 1970s that will undermine the progress of community and voluntary recycling programs. This proposal would hit consumers with an enormous new cost at the checkout line and create massive new government bureaucracy while doing very little to clean up our environment.
The bottom line on the bottle bill
- Amounts to massive new taxes on consumers - an additional $2 per case of sodas, bottled water and beer.
- Undermines the great growth in voluntary and community recycling efforts across our state.
- Wildly misses the target on litter - drink containers amount to less than 10 percent of the litter stream. That means we'll be ignoring 90 percent of the trash on roadways.
- With our already high sales tax rate, it will chase even more consumers over our state borders to shop, costing us even more sales tax collections.
- Requires a new state government department with dozens of employees to collect your money and handle refunds, which has proven notoriously inefficient in other states.
- Writes an open check for fraudulent redemption, as neighbors bring bottles and cans into our state to collect refunds.
