NYC Bag Fee Overturned By State Senate

NEW YORK, NY — The New York State Senate passed legislation Tuesday that would outlaw NYC's new 5 cent fee on non-reusable paper and plastic bags. The fee was approved by city officials last May and was set to go into effect this coming August.

"With all the problems that New York City residents face, there's nothing else that's more important than taxing people a nickel over and over and over again?" Brooklyn Sen. Simcha Felder said on the Senate floor Tuesday.

The Senate bill — which would cancel NYC's bag fee altogether — won't become law until it's approved by both the Assembly and Gov. Andrew Cuomo. As of Tuesday, an Assembly vote had yet to be scheduled.

The anti-bag fee crusade in the Senate has been led by Felder, whose district includes Sunset Park, Borough Park, Flatbush and Ditmas Park. Felder introduced his legislation last year, forcing the city to delay implementation of the fee by several months.

Specifically, Felder's bill outlaws "any charge, tax or any other fee that has been assessed or directed to be imposed upon customers by a city with a population of one million or more for the provision of any carry out merchandise bag."

The NYC bag fee was championed most vocally by City Council Member Brad Lander, who represents Park Slope, Carroll Gardens, Red Hook, Cobble Hill, Gowanus, Windsor Terrace and Kensington. Lander argued the fee would reduce plastic bag waste and help the environment.

According to Kathryn Garcia, who heads the city's Department of Sanitation, 91,000 tons of single-use paper and plastic bags end up in city landfills annually. An estimated 9.37 billion plastic bags are used in the city each year.

On Monday, one day before the Senate took its vote, Lander accused the anti-fee crowd of having no interest in coming up with an alternate solution to reducing bag use.

"I believe they just don't care," Lander said. "They just want us not to do it. They have no plan for plastic bag waste."

But on Tuesday, Felder said the accusation was "a lie," referring to an existing state law requiring retailers to provide recycling bins for bags — though it only applies to shopping malls, stores that are 10,000 square feet or more, or chains which run five or more stores of 5,000 square feet each.

Felder said that dating back to his time in the Council, he couldn't "recall an issue that has brought up the ire of the average constituent more than this."

"They ask me about the bags all the time," he said of the people he represents.

Rather than passing a new fee, the city should enforce the existing recycling law, and should use positive reinforcement to encourage recycling, Felder said.

"If you don't want people to use plastic bags, why don't you give them a nickel for every bag they don't use?" he said.

The city's fee, he stressed, would place an unfair burden on the working class.

While wealthy New Yorkers can afford to have their groceries delivered, Felder said, "People in my district go to the grocery with a shopping cart, and they schlep those groceries home, and they need those bags."

"I think the average New Yorker is sick and tired of being told by the better people, the elite, what's good for us," Felder said.

On Monday, State Sen. Liz Krueger, whose district includes Manhattan's Upper East Side, expressed her disappointment with the Senate's vote.

"New York State is facing unprecedented environmental challenges — from climate change, to poisoned water, to failing infrastructure, the list goes on and on," Krueger said in a statement. "Yet for their very first environmental bill of the year, the Senate Majority Coalition has chosen to do the bidding of corporate special interests and overturn New York City's plastic bag fee. If this bill becomes law, it will set a shameful and dangerous precedent that local solutions to local environmental issues will be vetoed in Albany."

City Council Member Anthony Reynoso, representing Bushwick and Williamsburg, is head of the council's sanitation committee and a strong supporter of the bag fee.

A spokeswoman for Reynoso said Tuesday that the councilman was "dismayed that the State would choose to consider preempting this bill, which would have a significant impact on the waste stream and represent a major cost savings to the City."

Top photo by Kate Ter Harr on Flickr