Jay-Z Announces 2010 Tour Dates. Chicago Not On List.
Extra, Extra
Around Town
Health Care Bill Heads To U.S. House Floor For Debate, Vote
Alleged Lottery Ticket Con Artists Charged
The long-threatened lawsuit challenging the city's bottled water tax was finally filed in Cook County Circuit Court yesterday, five days after the tax went into effect.
Plaintiffs in the lawsuit seek to have the tax rescinded on the grounds that state law trumps home rule municipalities with regard to taxing food products that are consumed off-premise. The plaintiffs note that while Chicago taxes soft drinks, bottled water is not a soft drink and should be treated as a foodstuff along the lines of milk, teas and sports drinks. Joe Doss, president of the International Bottled Water Association, continues to beat the "this tax is a penalty on people for making smart beverage choices" horse into the ground, while conveniently forgetting for the sake of his and his fellow plaintiffs' argument that many bottled water brands are sourced from filtered municipal systems. Add Mr. Doss' quote to the examples of "brazen chutzpah."
Bottled water advocates also contend that the tax would force city residents to shop for bottled water in the suburbs and, while they're there, shop for food as well, which would reduce revenue for the city. In other words, they're saying that in order to save $1.20 on a case of bottled water, city residents will be willing to waste a gallon of gas to travel to a grocery store in the suburbs to buy that Dasani. Wouldn't that mean that, at an average gasoline price of $3.24 a gallon, shoppers from Chicago would still be losing two dollars?
The city still contends that the tax is legal under home rule and that, in addition to the estimated $10.5 million in revenue it will generate for the local economy, it will also raise awareness of how many bottled water brands are sourced, reduce plastic waste and maybe get some folks to re-think how they view tap water, since the soft drink companies that control the majority of the bottled water pie have no qualms about selling us the same stuff we can get from the tap for free.
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
tweet this
post to facebook
Good tax those who drink water from water bottles. There should be a state wide tax on all water bottles, therefore making it like the cigarette ban, not allowing other communities the opportunity to seize revenue from other cities like Chicago who realize how harmful water bottles are to the environment. Think of all the petroleum we would save, if we drank out of the tap. All the space these bottles take in our city dumps, even the energy it takes to recycle could be saved if people used a glass and tap water.
Now that smoking is banned state wide, I hope and expect the Anti Smoking Lobby (who care so much about the air we breathe) will get behind this worthwhile environmental cause and tax all Plastic Water Bottles statewide. Because Anti Smoking Lobby, it's about clean air and less petroleum used is less harmful toxins in the air we breathe.
I am still confused on how a bottle tax will solve the landfill problem. A bottle deposit is the correct way to go about that. Any new taxes that government initiates will only be wasted away for other projects that ultimately have no relationship to what the tax is originally for.
@Freak Deaky
I agree with you so much.
In my (naive) loathing, I place bottled water drinkers in the same wastful, ignorant catagory as SUV owners and people who outright refuse to even attempt to recycle something of their usage.
Isn't tap water actually better for people than bottled (flouride in tap?)?
Such a waste, buy a plastic bottle that you use over and over again, and a Brita-type thing.
We (and I am included) Americans waste and use so much, it sort of grosses me out (me included).
:-(
I don't quite the landfill "problem". I know it's not a very popular position, but a well sealed and carefully constructed landfill site isn't a problem at all.
We have an almost unlimited amount of space in this country to store crap. Couple this with the fact a lot of landfills have been covered up and turned into golf course communities.
Don't believe me? Remember that Chicago's Streeterville started out as a landfill, and look how that turned out.
I don't get it -- I'm a conscientious consumer, I drink (shitloads of) tap water...and I still find times when it's much more convenient to buy a Coke Zero or bring a bottle of water with me. Sometimes you're not afforded the luxury of running out to a drinking fountain whenever you need it.
The biggest problem with everyone that's either complaining about the people drinking bottled water or attempting to tax them on it is the extreme difficulty in recycling the bottles. I would recycle whatever bottles I've used (and reused until they smell like mildew), except that there's, honestly, no easy way for me to do that. So, before you tax me or look down on me like I drive an SUV (seeing as how I don't even own a car)...tell me exactly what I'm supposed to do in those times when a viable alternative to portable water isn't available. And don't tell me it doesn't exist -- it happens.