City to bar single-use plastic bags
Surveys show 77 per cent back ban on sacks at retail checkouts
After eight years as a Regina city councillor, Bob Hawkins says getting rid of plastic bags is a proud achievement.
“I think it’s the most important thing I’ve done since I’ve been on council,” said Hawkins, speaking on Thursday.
Ward 2 Coun. Hawkins said the ban — unanimously supported by council on Wednesday — is a good first step: If council truly cares about the environment, concrete action has to be taken to ensure sustainability.
“Let’s make Regina a first-class environmental city,” he said.
He isn’t the only one who feels this way.
Tony Matharu, owner of India Food Centre, said it’s high time for these plastics to be banned. After 30 years of running this retail business, he said of the changes he’s witnessed, he’s happy the city is moving forward with this bylaw.
“People should be bringing their own bags to grocery stores,” he said. “I think it’s time and we have to catch up.”
Despite the availability of reusable bags, Matharu said it was hard to enforce a 100-per-cent renewable policy at his store without a bylaw.
“You get a lot of people that come in without bags,” he said, adding that close to half of his customers already bring their own bags when shopping at his store. “I mean, I see them all over. I was just in the back picking up garbage and there were bags all over the place,” he said.
Council voted unanimously in favour of Hawkins motion, setting it on track to become a bylaw.
“It’s a statement by all of council that they’re serious about Regina becoming a sustainable city,” said Hawkins. “The public wanted this.”
When council surveyed 10,538 Regina residents, 77 per cent supported a ban on single use plastics, and precedent has already been set in Saskatchewan with Prince Albert banning plastic bags at checkouts. In Hawkins’ report he also mentioned that eight American states have banned single-use plastics.
The ban is part of a bid reduce waste flowing into the landfill, with the perhaps-untenable goal of diverting 65 per cent of all waste destined for the dump.
“There’s going to have to be other measures; that’s something we have to look at as we build a sustainable city,” said Hawkins.
During city council’s July meeting, a bylaw will be brought forward setting out the parameters of the ban, but the full implementation of that bylaw will be at least a year away.
The motion stated that the ban would not come into effect until July 2021 and that it would not come into effect during the COVID -19 pandemic or any health emergency.