That will be 6 cent please

A group of high school students from Kent Denver School came up with an idea which they took to Senator Jennifer Veiga.   The idea, to charge 6 cents for every plastic bag a customer would use. Veiga thought it was a good idea and drafter legislation to do just that.

It's a great idea for several reasons:

• less shipping weight having to haul around plastic bags, leaving more room for actual merchandise
• less pollution as many bags end up being tossed about by the wind until they get caught in branches or something else, in the landfill they become part of a very toxic soup that can end up in our drinking water
• they choke our landfills
• many bags end up in the ocean where it kills sea life, there are even floating islands of plastic in the ocean now
• our dependence on foreign oil goes down a little more, ever so slightly

But, there is also this:  some stores will now charge an arm and a leg for cloth or other bags, because customers will have less of an option.  One cloth bag does save the consumer money, especially if they are going to be charged 6 cents for each plastic bag.  In fact, one cloth bag could replace more than 6,000 plastic bags per person, a savings of $350, after the cloth bag is paid for.  Cloth bags are bulkier and also heavier, which makes carrying groceries home a bit harder, especially for people like myself who walk, not drive.

Before this becomes legislation maybe someone should think this through a bit more and not allow grocery stores to charge an arm and leg when this becomes law.  It would be good for the environment, our health - less pollution in both manufacturing and dumping of plastic, and cloth bag do reduce our dependence on oil.  Lets just not let the consumer be gouged in the process.