City Council discusses details of bag ban

Council met in committees Monday at council chambers, on the third floor of the city building, 8 E. Washington St., Athens.

The issue they discussed was enforcement of the ordinance, how food trucks fit in the ordinance and the definition of product bags.

Currently, enforcing the ordinance would fall to the city police, and would be complaint driven, according to Alan Swank, 4th Ward Council member.

“Someone walks out of a store with 14 plastic bags and you make a simple call to the police department,” he said.

City administration asked for a month to continue to research the issue with how to enforce the ordinance and be able to make recommendations on how to amend it.

“We opted to use law enforcement because they were out on the streets and able to deal with something like that under a state health emergency,” said Mayor Steve Patterson. “It made the most sense as opposed to say, somehow looping in the Athens City-County Health Department or some other enforcement agency within the city of Athens.”

If code enforcement was to enforce the ordinance, the process would be more delayed.

“They can be empowered to file a notice of violation,” Patterson said. “They don’t have the same ability to file a charge that has to go through the prosecutor’s office. That is a way to do it. As it’s written currently, my understanding is it would be solely a police enforcement action.”

The city wants to make sure the ordinance is enforced correctly, understand who will be charged, how the city will charge for an offense, etc.

One issue they are working on is who ultimately gets the citation. For a small, local business, the city would cite the business owner.

“Walmart is a very big organization. We would send it to their general manager, the managers here locally,” Assistant Service-Safety Director Andrew Chiki said. “Is that getting to the right person? Is that getting to the right ears to be able to make those changes? We just want to make sure that we have that right.”

So far, Code Director David Riggs and Police Chief Tom Pyle have talked with some of their counterparts in other cities on how they enforce their bag ban.

“The feedback we’ve gotten back so far is they haven’t written a single citation for their bag ban,” Chiki said. “It sounds like there’s an on-the-ground delay between actually doing those citations. Most of their efforts have been in education and getting the businesses on board. So, we’re just trying to understand how other places do it, so we can, we can do it effectively.”

The next point concerns food trucks, as the ordinance defines stores and restaurants as being in permanent buildings.

“The city, on city property, could regulate that, but then someone could put a food truck down at the BP Station here,” Swank said. “… So the thought was that we need to amend this and add some language around food trucks, which would then cover everything, whether it’s a store, four walls, a roof, and a front door or a food truck no matter where it’s located.”

City Council will work with Law Director Lisa Eliason and the clerk of council to draft an amendment.

The final point they discussed was about product bags, which are used to package products, like the bags for 5 pounds of potatoes or a loaf of bread.

Swank noted that produce bags have the UPC codes on them. “In talking about it with the law director, she thinks it’s okay to just have ‘product bag,’ otherwise we could have a list from here to the Ohio River.”

“This is single-use bags that walk out of the store holding other things,” he said of the ordinance. “That’s what we’re trying to eliminate.”

In terms of businesses being able to make the transition away from single-use plastic bags, Swank noted that information about the ordinance appeared in Tuesday’s Messenger. Starting this week, businesses will have four and half months to make the transition.

While visiting Asheville, N.C., Swank brought a paper bag from a restaurant that he showed council.

“This is the Cadillac of bags and you can buy cheaper bags,” he said. “… This bag is a 100% recyclable and it costs $0.32. That’s the best bag.”

He said he was confident that businesses can transition away from single-use plastic bags by Aug. 1.

Crowl asked whether the city would possibly add a provision to the ordinance about the percentage of recycled content a paper bag should have.

“We talked about that with the folks that Bexley and just their thought wasn’t adding one more enforcement item,” Swank said. “… That might be a step too far. I think we can certainly do this, and this goes back to something I said a long time ago, and the mayor actually comment on, he kind of liked the idea. I would love to see unofficial Athens-branded bag.”

Barbara Stout, an Athens resident who owns the Athens Underground, a vintage clothing store on Court Street, noted that she recycles everything and plans to make her own bags to use.

She noted that recently she visited the Goodwill in Jackson.

“They had a big sign up that said, beginning August 1st, all Goodwills will be plastic bag free. ‘We encourage you to bring your own bags,’” she said. “So if a big organization like Goodwill can do that. I told all my employees about it, and we ask people. I would say right now about 40% of our customers decline a bag anyway. When they get one, they get a Kroger one. So they are getting, they’re not single use, they’re at least double use, those plastic bags.

“I think if everybody knows and gets on board, and we put up signs now telling customers, and then you have some paper ones for out-of-town people who don’t know,” she said.

She also noted that a $0.32 bag may not be a lot, but if she uses a “32 cent bag on a $4 purchase, that’s a big hefty percentage. So small businesses that have small amount purchases and even restaurants that can really be hefty. So I wouldn’t be too casual about the 32 cents bag thing. … But I’m all for it. I am totally 100% behind it.”

Another Athens resident asked about all the plastic bags currently in existence all over town.

At-large Council Member Sarah Grace noted that the Athens Farmer’s Market is currently collecting plastics. Once they have a certain number of pounds, they can send it to a company and get a bench.

“So if you have a stash in your room closet or under a kitchen sink, as I know many, many people might have, and you’re looking for a worthy use. because we cannot put film plastic in our curbside recycling, there is a collection space at the Athens Farmer’s Market, so that send those off and get a bench,” she said.

Having this collection become a community-wide effort is something the council members thought would be a great opportunity.

City Council will meet in regular session at 7 p.m. Monday at council chambers, on the third floor of the City Building, 8 E. Washington St., Athens.