It's Our City is a project that uses TV, Radio and Web
to promote civic engagement in the Philadelphia region.Just one word: Plastics
Thursday, June 18th, 2009 at 2:23 pm - by Alan Tu. Filed under: Community.
The Philadelphia City Council voted down a plan to ban plastic bags. This means stores can continued to offer shoppers the choice of plastic or paper bags. Heard in the Hall reports that one of the plan’s sponsors was so mad at Shoprite’s lobbying effort that helped kill the bill that he will urge a boycott people to decide for themselves whether to patronize the stores.
Councilman Jim Kenney, a co-sponsor, blamed ShopRite for lobbying against the bill, and encouraged Philadelphians not to shop there. DiCicco (Frank DiCicco the bill’s other co-sponsor) accused the plastic bag industry for undermining the bill.
“I have never dealt with an industry that has been so manipulative,” DiCicco said on the Council floor.
We want to know what you think. Is a boycott of Shoprite is justified over this?
June 19th, 2009 at 9:03 am
I never used the word boycott in my remarks. I said that I will be informing all the folks I can who are concerned about our national and worldwide environment, the condition of our streets, trees, shrubs and riverways about ShopRite’s activities in helping to kill this bill. Folks can then make a decision whether or not to patronize these stores.
Mr Brown, one of the owners of ShopRite stores worked behind the scenes to have councilmembers switch their committed votes for the bill. These councilmembers should explain their flip, but Mr. Brown and ShopRite should be exposed for their obviously successful attempt at killing a good bill that took two years to reach a compromise.
I have never been anything short of helpful to Mr. Brown and ShopRite during my years in city council. His activities regarding his thwarting our attempt at cleaning up our city and its environment should be known to the public.
June 25th, 2009 at 1:13 am
Does the plastics industry really have that much influence in Philadelphia? Considering that all democratic council members and all but one republican council members run in races which they can’t lose, it just seems odd that they would let any industry tackle their bid to ban the use of plastic bags. Way to go, council–failing the city yet again.
-W
http://bill84121.blogspot.com
June 26th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
Does this blog still exisit? it has not been updated in forever.
June 30th, 2009 at 9:53 am
It’s Our City? Damn, I thought with the gradual dying of print media, WHYY might be able to pick up some of the slack. This blog really did help me understand Our City and its often dysfunctional government. Did you guys get cut from the budget? Did everybody just go on vacation? Is the last word really gonna be “Plastics?!”