Plastic straws banned in S.F. under supes’ proposed bill
In San Francisco, plastic drinking straws could soon be going the way of non-reusable shopping bags and Styrofoam containers — that is to say, strictly prohibited within city limits.
On Tuesday, Supervisor Katy Tang is expected to roll out legislation that would count San Francisco among the growing list of cities seeking to cut down on environmentally noxious litter by prohibiting restaurants, bars and coffee shops from stuffing plastic straws, stirrers or cocktail sticks into the drinks they serve.
The ubiquitous plastic straw has become the focus in recent years of increasingly intense scrutiny from environmental advocates and policymakers, who have raised concerns about the huge amounts of plastic, single-use food-ware products ending up in landfills and the oceans.
“It’s sort of this moment where everyone is realizing just how many straws people are using on a daily basis, and that we really need to get a handle on this, or else our environment is going to suffer,” Tang said.
Both San Luis Obispo and Davis enacted similar ordinances last year that require restaurants to ask dine-in customers if they want a single-use straw before providing one. A ban similar to Tang’s will go into effect in Malibu on June 1, and
a planned prohibition of plastic straws and utensils will kick in this July in Seattle. British Prime Minister Theresa May called for a nationwide prohibition on plastic straws last month.
Berkeley officials are considering a broader waste-reduction ordinance that would put a 25-cent surcharge on disposable cups and containers, and make paper straws free upon request. A proposed statewide law introduced by Assemblyman Ian Calderon, D-Whittier (Los Angeles County), would make single-use plastic straws available by request only.
Banning plastic straws and replacing them with compostable paper ones or reusable alternatives represents a straightforward way to change consumer behavior with a minimal impact on the city’s food-service industry, Tang said.
“Why do we have straws all the time?” said Supervisor Ahsha Safaí, who is co-sponsoring the bill with Tang. “And if we’re going to have straws, it’s easy to have an alternative that’s much more recyclable or reusable or washable.”
The proposed ordinance would also mandate that a number of other products — including beverage lids, condiment packets and napkins — be made available only upon request or at self-serve stations. The bill, which would take effect in July 2019, also requires that events for 100 or more people on city property provide reusable cups as an option for at least 10 percent of attendees.
A 2011 study by Clean Water Action found that takeout food and beverage packaging “comprises the most significant type of trash on Bay Area streets,” accounting for 67 percent of all street trash by volume. Eliminating plastic straws in San Francisco would also inch the city closer to its ambitious goal of becoming a “zero-waste” city by 2020, meaning no trash would be sent to landfills or incinerators.
The push to purge plastic straws has received a big boost from recent reports that the enormous accumulation of plastic and other trash floating in the ocean between San Francisco and Hawaii has grown to cover an area nearly four times the size of California.
Critics of plastic straws also frequently site a widely circulated and graphic video showing marine biologists struggling to remove one from a sea turtle’s nostril for nearly eight minutes. The video has more than 24 million views on YouTube.
Discarded plastic straws can easily find their way to the ocean via storm drains. And even when they’re made out of recyclable materials, the slim, flimsy tubes frequently slip past sorting and recycling machines, often ending up in landfills anyway.
“It’s not feasible to recycle it. We have an amazing system, but it’s not feasible to recycle all these little, tiny things,” said Debbie Raphael, director of San Francisco’s Department of the Environment, which would implement the plastic-straw ban.
“These are little items that so easily become litter,” Raphael said. “If you ask any coastal cleanup person about what they’re finding, they’re finding cigarette butts and small plastic items, because these things get out of our hands so quickly.”
Should the ordinance pass, the Department of the Environment would help businesses comply with the new rules by providing restaurants with lists of suppliers carrying approved products.
“We care very deeply that our businesses ... can comply with these rules,” Raphael said.
But some restaurants have already moved away from plastic straws. In what they say reflects a desire to have a more positive impact on the environment, some San Francisco restaurant owners have switched to paper straws, and, in some cases, provide them only upon request.
“Restaurants are really focusing on how they can support the ecosystem,” said Gwyneth Borden, executive director of the Golden Gate Restaurant Association. In January, the association partnered with the San Francisco chapter of the Surfrider Foundation to start a “straws suck” campaign, encouraging restaurants to switch to compostable straws and offer them by request only.
“Generally, we can live with planning plastic straws. It will cost some businesses more, but ultimately that’s a small price to pay for helping the environment,” Borden said.
Dave Muller, co-owner of Outerlands, said his Outer Sunset restaurant replaced plastic straws with compostable paper ones about six months ago. His initial reservations about whether paper straws would disintegrate in drinks or whether customers might be put off by an unfamiliar product were quickly put to rest. Prior to that, Outerlands had offered straws upon request, which, Muller said, helped to cut down on the amount of straws they had to purchase by 90 percent.
“Anything we can do to encourage the health of the ocean, which is a major topic for food as well, is something we’re enthusiastic about,” Muller said. “There’s a possibility that someone might get upset about having to pay more for straws, or that customers are used to this or that, but people were used to smoking cigarettes inside of restaurants not that long ago, so we have to adjust.”
Borden said paper straws can cost as much as seven times what plastic ones do, which could impact small cafes or bubble tea shops. But when it comes to questions of cost, Doug Marschke, owner of the Taco Shop at Underdogs on Irving Street, said, “We’re in business to make profits, but we’re also contributing to a lot of the degradation of the Earth.
“For the places where (buying compostable straws) is such a large economic impact, they probably don’t have a great business model,” said Marschke, whose taco shop stopped using plastic straws about two years ago.
“You should be able to change your business model and absorb that cost,” he said. “We have to be conscious of what we’re doing to the society as a whole.”
Dominic Fracassa is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: dfracassa@ sfchronicle.com Twitter: @dominicfracassa