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A bill awaiting the governor's
signature would impose or increase deposits on billions of containers.
Rising redemptions and raiding to balance the budget have left the state
fund facing bankruptcy.
Reporting from Sacramento -
Californians could soon be paying new deposits on half-gallon juice jugs,
small juice boxes and soy drink containers -- and handing over twice as
much as they already pay on some soda and water bottles -- because
lawmakers have been raiding the state's recycling fund to help balance the
budget.
Officeholders have yet to repay $451 million they've taken from the
recycling fund since 2002 to cover the state's bills, siphoning away $100
million this year alone. Recycling and deposit redemptions, meanwhile,
have risen amid the recession and the fund is now facing bankruptcy.
The Legislature recently passed a vast expansion of California's recycling
program. The proposal would replenish the fund by imposing new 5-cent
deposits or doubling existing ones on billions of containers. Buyers could
get the deposits back, as usual, by turning in the empty containers.
If Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signs the measure into law, consumers will
pay an estimated $295 million more per year on beverage containers,
according to the state Department of Conservation. The governor has not
taken a public position on the measure, which would create no new
environmental programs.
Opponents call the Legislature's proposal a hidden tax, the product of
years of botched fiscal management.
"It's a backdoor tax increase," said Sen. George Runner (R-Lancaster).
Recycling advocates concede that the larger deposits won't pay for new
programs. But they say extending deposits to more than
5 billion
containers annually will curb the waste that ends up in landfills.
"This crisis created an opportunity to expand and improve the recycling
program," said Mark Murray, executive director of
Californians Against
Waste, a nonprofit recycling group.
The current threshold for 10-cent deposits is 24 ounces. The new
legislation would lower that, capturing an extra nickel on the ubiquitous
20-ounce bottles, of which there are an estimated 3.6 billion in
circulation annually in California.
Among the containers that would be newly subject to deposits are juice
jugs larger than 46 ounces; half-gallon cartons (milk excluded); small
foil pouches, such as those used in Capri-Sun; 8-ounce juice boxes; and
containers of drinks made from almond, soy, rice and other grains -- all
currently exempt.
The new structure would go into effect July 1, 2010.
"Maybe it will make people more aware of our container usage,"
Eve
Imagine, a 37-year-old city college professor in Sacramento, said as she
unloaded a Prius full of bottles and cans at a recycling center. "It's a
tax -- I see that. I will just continue to recycle."
Fellow capital resident Kathy Lockhart, 51, who is unemployed, disagreed:
"I don't want to give them any more money."
Created in 1986, California's recycling program requires a deposit on
beer, water, soda and other drinks in aluminum, plastic and glass
containers. Consumers pay 5 cents for small containers, 10 cents for large
ones. A byzantine set of rules governs which containers and drinks are
affected.
Unredeemed deposits go into the state's recycling treasury, which spreads
the money to environmental programs, local governments and industry
subsidies.
The recycling rate reached 74% in 2008, up from 67% the year before.
Without repayment of the $451 million the state took, the fund was broke
this summer. Except for people recycling bottles and cans, officials cut
disbursements from the fund by 85% on
July 1.
The Schwarzenegger administration did not expect the fund to dive into the
red when it proposed borrowing $100 million from it in early in 2009, said
finance department spokesman H.D. Palmer. Lawmakers rejected the
administration's plan to balance the fund and, in the final hours before
the year's lawmaking deadline, approved the higher deposits.
The bill, SB 402 by Sen. Lois Wolk (D-Davis) received only a single
hearing -- on the final day of the session.
Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley), who shepherded the legislation,
said it is necessary "to make the program whole and make sure that
recycling continues."
The soda industry, which produces many of the containers facing new or
higher deposits, was more skeptical.
"The money's been taken for other purposes," said Bob Achermann, executive
director of the California/Nevada Soft Drink Assn. "It seems a bit
disingenuous."
If the governor doesn't sign the legislation, environmental advocates say,
the effects will ripple across California.
State-subsidized recycling depots, such as those in supermarket parking
lots, could close. Manufacturers' processing costs would rise if state
money continues to shrink. Local conservation corps, which employ and
train at-risk youths with money from the fund, could be imperiled.
Scott Dosick, a spokesman for the California Assn. of Local Conservation
Corps, estimated more than 1,000 youths could be removed from programs
statewide. The corps' state subsidy could be cut by $16 million. "Not only
were we using the funds to recycle over 15 million bottles and cans [in
2008], we were using them to transform lives," he said.
Powerful industries, some of whose recycling costs have long been
subsidized by California's deposit fund, are lobbying for the bill.
"The impact to our company was $7 million," said Julian Green, spokesman
for MillerCoors, the country's second-largest beer company, referring to
the July 1 cutback.
Skinner said producers' extra costs will ultimately be borne by consumers,
who would pay more for their products. The higher deposits at the cash
register, in contrast, could be redeemed.
The prospect of higher redemptions excited at least one person recently.
"More money, better for us," said Taz, a 50-year-old homeless man in
Sacramento who makes his living collecting recyclables. "They should
definitely raise it."
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