NYC Council Members Trash Cuomo for Strangling Their Five-Cent Plastic Bag Fee

By Will Bredderman

Brooklyn Councilman Brad Lander and Manhattan Councilwoman Margaret Chin—the architects of the city’s planned five-cent surcharge on paper and plastic bags—accused Gov. Andrew Cuomo of suffocating both local government and the planet by signing off on legislation blocking the implementation of the statute.

Chin and Lander sold the fee, which was slated to take effect tomorrow, as a way to encourage New Yorkers start carrying reusable totes by obligating stores to charge customers an extra nickel for every disposable carryout sack. The pair has long maintained that bags cling to trees, clog storm trains, pack landfills, kill wildlife, accrue into islands in the ocean and cost the city million of dollars each year to eliminate.

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Source: The Observer (via The Empire Report)